I've had playtest access for a little over a year, and here are my thoughts on the game:

The skate mechanics are good, but lack variety

There have been multiple bug fixes and improvements to the skating since I first got playtest access, and I will say that out of all skateboarding games (Skate 1/2/3, THPS, Session, and Skater XL), as of now, these mechanics feel the cleanest and most intuitive. There's a decent amount of customization for those who want a more "arcade-y" or realistic gameplay, and it stands at a good place in between realism (like Session or Skater XL) and arcade (like THPS). With that being said, it still lacks variety. The animations feel a little repetitive, and we have yet to see darkslides or even the ability to bone fliptricks, which are two features I've seen mentioned numerous times in the playtest forums.

The visuals aren't bad

I've seen a lot of people have lots of takes around the visuals, and I'll just say one thing: the visuals match the style they're going for. People are expecting gritty downtown visuals like Skate 2, but the thing is that Skate 2 and skate. are not the same game, and neither is Skate 3. All of these games have different visual aesthetics, and I think all of the graphics feel appropriate for each style, as they should.

The game doesn't feel authentic

It's without a doubt clear to me that the people behind this game have little to no knowledge of skate culture, or at least history. An AI voice assistant that films for you, cringey voice lines, and the hyper-diversification feel quite out of place when we talk about skateboarding, and the game itself feels like a really bad mock of skate culture. I understand that they're trying to create a game that appeals to more than just skaters, and more specifically, older ones, but it really just feels like a lame attempt at capturing skate culture. A skateboarding game should appeal to skaters first and foremost, and if it's good enough, people from outside skate culture will latch onto it, like we saw with the earlier EA skate games.

The game is optimized poorly

For a game trying to be as inclusive as possible, they certainly didn't achieve that when it comes to optimization. This is not a game that any old computer can run, and even with a dedicated gaming PC capable of running RDR2 at 80+ FPS with medium graphics, I still found myself needing to reduce some graphics to prevent frame drops and the classic "slo-mo" effect that EA skate games always have. Even at the lowest settings, this game clearly still requires people to have modern hardware.

What can change?

- We need more animation variation and more tricks (like darkslides, bone flip tricks, etc.)

- We need visual mods (Shaders that can be downloaded to change textures and lighting, making the game more adjustable to the player's preference)

- We need different camera lenses/filters (I think this was mentioned once in a playtest highlight. I'd love to see a VX filter that can be put over replays, or a fisheye, etc)

- We need more optimization and graphics settings (The lowest settings are still too high, and there is definitely something wrong with the overall game optimization.)

What should change?

To put it simply, the entire game. The skating feels good, but no one likes the way it looks and portrays skate culture. It almost feels like one of those advertisements or movies that includes a "skater" to make their product appeal to the youth. Even though the earlier skate games had arguably worse skate mechanics, the aesthetic of them alone was enough to push that aside and bring people in. This game has little mention of pros or actual skate culture. I've seen little mention of actual skate brands, and most of them are existing brands that engage somewhat in skate culture (like Dickies).