Heavenly skateboarding, a deal with the devil and huge philosophizing heads? Skate Story is far from an everyday action sports story, as you’ll soon see when it arrives on PS5 on December 8 as a premiere in the PlayStation Plus game catalog.*
With the full version of Sam Eng’s fascinating adventure, I had the opportunity to delve deep into the underworld and shed featherlight on what it means to be a strange-looking demon who wants to eat the Moon.
Slick tricks with history
So you’re a skateboard demon made of glass and pain. And this pain is only accentuated by sleepless torment, partly caused by the brightness of the Moon. Hungry and tired, a nameless demon wants to devour the pale planetoid, but can only reach it using a skateboard that the Devil offers… for a price.
After an intense introduction to the basics and skating into an extraordinary high school full of giant stone heads pondering the meaning of life, Skate Story opens up to a broader adventure that dramatically goes beyond the first steps of a demonic space-shaking expedition.
Wisely, the game makes it uncomplicated for you to make the immense number of moves at your disposal. I started with a basic power slide by holding the square button, and an ollie by holding the circle button, but by the time I got to the end of High School I was full of techniques.
In fact, the first boss fight acts as a tutorial, as it teaches you how to combine the L and Circle buttons to perform stunts like Pop Shuvit, Heelflip, and Front Pop. However, there is a catch.
Combine your skills against bosses
For the most part, you’ll be skating through enormous, open spaces or speedy and narrow paths, jumping over obstacles, leaping through gates to close disapproving, disembodied white eyes, and completing hilarious and bizarre tasks, which I’ll get to in a moment. But when it comes to your skating skills, you will be judged.
It’s not enough to utilize the same move over and over again. The combo meter keeps track of which tricks you’re performing and will only boost quickly as you change up your somersaults. You can also earn extra points for landing your jumps in the right place, which gives you a bonus for timing. Failure or impact and the counter drops to zero.
All of this is imperative in boss battles, where the only way to deal significant damage is to drive speedy and perform various tricks to build a combo, then press the square button in the air before landing for a devastating stomp. The higher the combo chain, the higher the damage, so risking everything for meaningful attacks is fun and crazy.
One particular boss fight was a mix of everything I had learned in the game so far, putting me on a space chase through a constantly moving track where I had to perform tricks, jumping over obstacles and attacks, making sure to stomp each time to deal damage before my demon was reduced to shrapnel.
Strange souls and the pursuit of the devil’s pants
Back to the mission, Skate Story manages to mix things up to keep my demon on its glass fingers. Many of them required me to utilize my skateboard to jump over places like manholes, spin around environmental features like spindly soul flowers, or grind across a set number of surfaces.
The underworld is also full of imaginative characters in need of support, with floating skulls, a pillow demon and a giant frog just to name a tiny selection of the quirky souls I’ve encountered.
At one point a enormous talking garbage bag asked if I could support him by removing a smelly monolith he didn’t like. The next goal was to chase the Devil’s clothes as they came to life and tried to avoid drying out after washing. Skate Story’s sense of humor was a constant surprise and always brought the narrative to life.
Make the board yours
Accompanied by the ghostly rabbit Rabbi, you’re given a shapeless soul space that acts as a hub that connects each chapter of the story, but also gives you the ability to customize your skateboard. The soul currency you earn by performing stunts can be used to purchase wheels, stickers, and more in gift shops.
The devil is in the details
With a strangely endearing centipede train, the shattered remains of a skater’s failed attempts littering the surroundings, and a versatile soundtrack that moves from melancholic horns to funky bass-heavy electronics, Skate Story is full of nice touches.
The DualSense wireless controller’s featherlight bar caught my eye a few times, wanting to see how it would reflect the on-screen environment. The demon’s skateboard, on the other hand, told the story of my journey itself, showing the scratches, nicks and wear that my choices (and accidents) had caused, especially around the rear ends of the board due to my over-enthusiasm while sanding.
It was an experience that made me want to see where this heavenly journey would take me.
Intrigued? You’ll be craving for the moon soon – on December 8, when Skate Story arrives on PS5 and the PlayStation Plus game catalog.
*PlayStation Plus game catalog available with Extra and Premium memberships.
