EA’s Skate series was one of my childhood favourites—I’m not nearly as skateboard-obsessed as I used to be, but I was into the classics. THPS (there was a time when I thought Underground was peak fiction, don’t judge me) and Skate 1 and 2 were a huge part of my childhood rotation.
Which is why I started out hyped for Skate 4 (or just “skate.”) and have gradually become wearier and wearier as time has gone on. EA’s latest blog, unfortunately dubbed The Grind, hasn’t helped matters much.
When it comes to customisation, the blog mercifully promises that “there’s a lot to unlock by simply playing the game and earning rewards” via “Rip Chips”, the game’s freemium currency earned by completing challenges.
But there’ll also be a “skate.Pass”—we truly are just throwing out all punctuation rules, huh—and a seasonal structure, which EA plans to have on a rotation every three months. Details will be coming up in the next grind, but the new Skate’ll have all the live service trimmings we’ve all come to loathe.
And, look—I can only complain so much, given the game will be free-to-play, but I can’t help but feel like the corruptive touch of modern gaming has finally come to infest one of my favourite franchises. It’s not like it’ll be pay-to-win, or anything, it’s a skateboarding game. But there was a time when cosmetics weren’t inherently linked to cash, and we were better for it.
On the plus side, at least the music looks sick: “The soundtrack is big—like, 100 songs big. The team focused on emerging artists and threw in some deep cuts to help you discover music you may not have heard yet.” The blog says you’ll be able to “like” individual tracks to create your own custom playlist, and discover tracks in the game world, too. Neato.
As for when early access is coming? “We’re getting closer every day.”
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