Skate 2 Review

Written by: Darren Cartledge Posted: 26th January 2009

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We hit the street of New San Vanelona.

Skate 2 Details:

	Sports
	PlayStation 3/Xbox 360
	EA Games
	EA Games

16+

Out Now

1-4

EA scored something of a surprise hit in 2007 when they released their open world skateboarding game Skate. Many thought it wouldn’t be able to stand up against Activision’s Tony Hawk games but it did! Now it’s back with Skate 2, but does this new game build on the success of the first?

Skate 2 is set five years after the first game you have just been released from prison after your mysterious disappearance from the skateboarding scene at the end of the last game and New San Vanelona is a very different place to how you remember. MongoCorp has moved in and rebuilt the city and clamped down on the once thriving skateboarding culture, capping rails, and hiring goons to hassle and bust skaters. Now it’s up to you to rebuild your career and revive the once thriving skate culture in New San Vanelona.

So first things first, what’s new in Skate 2? Well first off since your incarceration skaters have figured out how to get off their boards and can now jump off anytime, allowing them to run up stairs or move out of tricky spots with ease. Getting off your board not only allows you to run up stairs and so on, but now you can grab objects and move them around allowing you to create your own skate spots. For instance grab a ramp, move some rails around and hey presto you’ve got a new area to skate, although the controls whilst on foot and moving objects are clumsy at best and take a little getting use to.

In general Skate 2 plays the same as its predecessor, with tricks easily performed by flicking the right analogue stick and the right and left shoulder buttons and triggers. It’s a great system that worked well in the first game and has been refined for Skate 2, although it does require very precise timing which can become annoying, especially since many of the games tricks are performed in very similar ways! This can make challenges in which you have to perform specific tricks extremely frustrating. Despite this familiarity there are some other new features in Skate 2. New moves such as hand plants are now available and when you bail new physics have been introduced allowing you to control your character as he flies through the air causing maximum damage. Whilst this may not sound like a good thing, it allows you to earn extra cash by uploading pictures of injuries to the new Hall of Meat blog.

The games career mode is obviously the main stay of execution, in the career mode you will be required to take part in challenges, contests, races and so on earning cash and putting yourself in the limelight. Other game modes include Free Skate that allows you to skate around the city or meet up with friends online and take part in various challenges, compete in ranked and custom matches and so on. Skate 2 also features a Party Play mode for two to four players on the same console. In Party Play players can compete in spot battles to own the spot, S.K.A.T.E challenges in which you have to pull off tricks and avoid earning the aforementioned letters. Party Play also features an extremely fun Hall of Meat game in which players compete to get the nastiest wipeout!

Like the original Skate 2 is enjoyable enough to play however, after testing the game on both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 we found problems and minor annoyances with both versions.

Firstly the controls of the Xbox 360 version are slightly better and seem a little more responsive then on the PlayStation 3. However much to our dismay when playing through a challenge in which I had to perform three different flip tricks down some stairs on the Xbox 360, the game failed to register the moves. Playing the same challenge on the PlayStation 3 version I encountered no such problems. Overall the Xbox 360 version seems the most stable as I encountered freezes and stutters on the PlayStation 3 version, not too frequently but these were never experienced in the 360 game.

Problems aren’t just limited to each specific console either, AI controlled skaters can frustrate you when you have to compete against them in events as they will often skate right in front of you and ruin a trick. Also the game will often see pedestrians and cars wandering into areas and once again getting in your way often resulting in you failing a challenge! This obviously takes some of the enjoyment away from Skate 2 and can at times become a rather frustrating affair at best.

Overall the game looks good! New San Vanelona is a huge place with numerous different areas to explore, each with its own look just like in any city. The game features a great amount of detail and some of the games scenery is highly impressive. Skaters have been animated brilliantly for the most part, although the games characters do tend to move in a sluggish way when off their boards. The games sound is also brilliant, Skate 2 features all the ambient sounds you would expect to hear in any city, but the skating sound effects are top notch with the rolling sound changing depending on what surface you’re running on. The game also features a good soundtrack that fits in well with the skating action and includes songs from LL Cool J, Nas, Motorhead and Rage Against the Machine.

Whilst Skate 2 can be somewhat frustrating at times, its core gameplay does get enough right and introduces a lot of new features that makes it a worthwhile purchase for newcomers and Skate veterans alike. Overall, a welcome addition to EA’s skateboarding franchise!