What's up, gamers? My journey through Skate. continues, and honestly, things are getting a lot more interesting now. After grinding through those cooperative missions required to advance to Phase Two of the Tour, I also had to unlock quite a few missions within the city to access Tour 2's main missions. The game basically required me to accumulate a certain amount of completed missions before letting me tackle the primary objectives. At first, this felt a bit restrictive, but looking back, it makes sense as a progression system that gradually opens up the world.
The good news is that these Tour 2 missions, despite still being explanatory to some degree, are finally starting to feel like the actual game itself rather than an extended tutorial. This is something I complained about in one of my previous posts, and it was honestly becoming pretty lamentable for the game. If it had continued that way indefinitely, Skate. would have turned incredibly boring, like being stuck in training wheels mode forever when you're ready to ride downhill at full speed.
Breaking Free from Tutorial Hell
Now the open gameplay between doing side missions and the main mission is becoming much more articulated and cohesive. The Tour process makes logical sense without feeling like you're trapped in some endless introductory sequence. It's like the game finally trusts you to skate without constantly telling you where to put your feet. The transition feels natural, organic even, where you're exploring the city, finding your own lines, and the Tour missions integrate seamlessly into that experience rather than interrupting it.
This shift is crucial because skateboarding games thrive on freedom and creativity. When you're constantly being told what to do and how to do it, the magic disappears. It becomes work instead of play. But now, Skate. has found that sweet spot where guidance exists without suffocation. You have objectives, sure, but the path to completing them feels like your own discovery rather than following painted lines on the ground.
The missions themselves have evolved too. They're more challenging, more creative, and they actually require you to understand the mechanics you've been learning. Landing a kickflip is one thing, but threading it through a narrow gap between obstacles while maintaining speed? That's where the game starts to shine. Tour 2 throws scenarios at you that demand precision, timing, and most importantly, that you actually understand how your board moves through space.
The Mystery Box Economy: A Double-Edged Grind
Something else I've been diving into is spending on various boxes from the cities I've unlocked. Let me tell you, the item boxes in this game are kind of strange. They don't clearly specify what items they contain or what you're going to get—they just have a name and that's it. You could end up with pretty much any object, which makes opening them feel like a gamble every single time. It's exciting in that lottery-ticket kind of way, but also frustrating when you're hoping for a specific deck or wheels and end up with yet another hat.
However, there's a silver lining to this system. Buying boxes helps you level up, which is actually pretty smart game design. What makes it even better is that purchasing boxes adds points to the city they belong to. So it's not just about collecting random gear—you're also contributing to your progression in specific areas. This creates an interesting economy where spending your hard-earned credits actually feels meaningful beyond just cosmetic changes.
The leveling system tied to purchases creates this loop where you're motivated to engage with the city-specific content. Each city has its own flavor, its own spots, and its own challenges. By investing in boxes from a particular city, you're essentially deepening your relationship with that location. It encourages exploration and makes you pay attention to where you're skating rather than just mindlessly grinding the same familiar spots over and over.
That said, I wish the box system was more transparent. A preview of potential items or at least categories would go a long way. Right now it feels too random, too disconnected from what you actually need or want. If I'm working on perfecting transition tricks, I'd love to know if a box might contain gear that complements that style. Or if I'm building a street setup, having some indication that certain boxes favor street-oriented equipment would be incredibly helpful.
Progression That Finally Makes Sense
What I'm really appreciating about Skate. right now is how the progression has started to gel together. In the beginning, everything felt disjointed—cooperative missions over here, city challenges over there, Tour objectives somewhere else entirely. It was like juggling multiple games at once rather than playing one cohesive experience. But now? Everything feeds into everything else in a way that feels intentional and rewarding.
Completing city missions unlocks gear and credits, which you can spend on boxes that level up your city ranking, which in turn opens up more challenging spots and missions, which improves your skills, which makes the Tour missions more accessible and enjoyable. It's a beautiful cycle when it's working properly, and right now, for the first time since I started playing, it's actually working.
The game has also gotten noticeably more difficult, but in a good way. Early missions were about learning basic tricks and understanding controls. Now, missions expect you to chain together complex lines, adapt to unexpected obstacles, and showcase genuine creativity in how you approach challenges. There's rarely just one solution anymore. You can go high with transition tricks, stay low and technical with flip tricks, or mix everything together in ways that feel uniquely yours.
This is what skateboarding games should be about—expression through movement, finding your own style, and having the freedom to tackle obstacles in ways that feel natural to you. Skate. is finally delivering on that promise after keeping us in the shallow end for way too long.
The Editing Problem: So Close, Yet So Far
Now, let's talk about something that's been bugging me—the editing and filming processes. This is honestly one of the most pro aspects of the game, but it desperately needs improvement. The fact that we can capture our best tricks and lines is fantastic. Skateboarding has always been as much about documentation as execution. If nobody sees that impossible combo you just landed, did it even happen?
But the tools we have right now feel limited. I really wish they would integrate more cameras and effects natively into the game's filming system. Currently, capturing footage feels more functional than creative. You can record your tricks, sure, but the cinematic options are pretty bare-bones. We need more camera angles, more dynamic following options, maybe even slow-motion controls that are more granular.
Imagine being able to set up multiple camera positions for a single line and then editing them together in-game. Or having access to lens options—fisheye for that classic skate video look, wide angle for big air tricks, tight follow-cam for technical stuff. The potential is there, but the execution feels half-finished. For a game that understands skateboarding culture so well in other areas, the filming tools feel oddly underdeveloped.
The editing interface could also use some love. Right now it's serviceable, but if Skate. wants to truly capture that aspect of skate culture where filming and editing your footage is just as important as the skating itself, they need to go deeper. Let us add our own music from a more extensive library, give us transition effects, let us adjust speed in post rather than just during recording. Make the editing suite something we actually want to spend time in rather than just a quick way to trim clips.
Think on the next process
So, gamers, Skate. is getting more and more fun as I progress. I'm doing some really interesting things within the game that I'll be showing you in future posts. The world is opening up in ways I didn't expect, and I'm finally starting to feel like a skater exploring a city rather than a student completing assignments. That shift in feeling is everything.
The combination of improved mission design, the addictive progression system, and the sheer joy of finally having freedom to skate how I want has transformed my experience. Yeah, there are still issues—the box system needs clarity, the editing tools need depth, and some missions still feel a bit too hand-holdy—but the core experience is solid and getting better.
I'm particularly excited about some of the more advanced techniques I'm starting to master. When you finally nail a complex line that you've been working on for an hour, threading together manuals, grinds, and flip tricks in a way that flows like water, that's when Skate. shows its true colors. That's when you understand why people get obsessed with these games.
One thing I've started doing is challenging myself to find unique lines through familiar areas. It's easy to follow the obvious paths that the game suggests, but the real fun comes from looking at the environment differently. That ledge everyone grinds straight? What if you approach it from the side? That gap everyone ollies over? What if you go under it instead? This creative problem-solving is what keeps skateboarding games fresh long after you've technically "seen everything."
The multiplayer aspects are also growing on me. Those cooperative missions I mentioned earlier aren't just obstacles to progression anymore—they're genuinely fun ways to session with other players. There's something about landing synchronized tricks or working together to complete a challenging line that recreates the communal aspect of real skateboarding. You're not just playing alone in your digital skate park; you're part of a scene.
So that's where I'm at with Skate. right now, gamers. The game has finally found its footing, pun absolutely intended. It's evolved from a promising but frustrating experience into something that's genuinely engaging and fun. I'm looking forward to diving deeper into the cities, unlocking more challenging content, and hopefully seeing some updates that address the filming and editing concerns.
Until next time, keep pushing and remember—it's not about landing every trick perfectly on the first try. It's about the journey, the progression, the moment when something finally clicks and what seemed impossible becomes second nature. That's the magic of skateboarding, whether it's virtual or real.
See you in the next post!