A quality, challenging game! (Skate 2 (PS3))

Member Name: Ghareth

Product:	Skate 2 (PS3)
Date:	20/06/09 (28 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Hall of Meat, New San Vanelona well designed.

Disadvantages: Skate Reel still rubish, Character Customisation is kinda crap.

Skate 2 - Playstation 3

Skate 2 is an amazing skateboarding game. The concept is very similar to skate. You still skate around a city on your skateboard, doing tricks and challenging pros. The FlickIT system still needs a brand new control pad when trying to pull off some of the more complicated flip tricks.

The difference lies in all the little changes they've made which add up to one big, worthwhile sequel, the most obvious change is New San Vanelona an earthquake destroyed the old city, requiring an almost complete rebuild. Fans of the previous game will still recognise some landmarks, but a lot of areas are completely different. The rebuild also introduces the other major difference in the game MongoCorp.

These guys rebuilt most of New San Vanelona, and as such they feel justified in putting security all over their favourite new creations be it security guards or simply capped rails, from a personal perspective this seems reasonable they spent millions of dollars fixing up the city so if they don't want you skating through the New San Vanelona Museum of Contemporary Art frontsliding a priceless sculpture maybe you should show a tiny bit of respect but in the game this is an affront to your raging against the machine. So you fliptrick through shopping centres, grind over fountains and smash pedestrians going about their business, and if security or capped rails get in the way you can call people in to deal with them at a cost.

Calling in help is one of the more unnecessary features of the game you could probably argue that capped rails simply shouldn't exist and the security is easy enough to avoid, just as it was in the first game.

Probably the best part of Skate 2 is Hall of Meat. After seeing my mates crash out more often than land tricks in the first game we quickly devised our own game based on number of bones broken when crashing out Hall of Meat scores you on collision speed, drop height and crash time as well. The ragdoll physics have been tweaked slightly as well your character will kick his legs as he falls and reach out with his arms to protect himself.

The only other problem I have is with the character customisation. You can make your own graphics for your clothes and skateboards, which is absolutely killer. Your character, however, is still very static. You can move all kinds of sliders regarding cheek size, chin size, weight, eye height etc. but most characters never wind up looking like you. It's not a huge issue, just a little bit weird when you look at the EA Sports range of games - where you can recreate almost anyone you want.

Skate 2 is a must buy, once you get past the learning curve Skate 2 will blow you away. Skate, taking the time to learn what Skate 2 has to offer will definitely pay off in the long run. The small issues like the clunky walking controls, illogical gameplay choices and the slightly sloppy vert skating controls aren't enough to make Skate 2 any less than an awesome game, but they do make me worry about the future of the series. Skate 2 isn't a perfect skating game but you still want to get it it is genuine fun.

Summary: A good game if you like skating games, better than the original i think...