Skateboarding games are coming back. Not only are Activision re-entering the space with Tony Hawk remakes this September, EA also recently announced that thanks to much demand from fans (to put it mildly), they’ll be bringing back Skate a decade after the launch of Skate 3.
When Skate 4 – or whatever EA ends up calling it – will release remains to be seen, and right now, details on the game are very sparse (also putting it mildly), but in a recent investors call (via VGC), EA CEO Andrew Wilson spoke a bit about what direction they will be taking with the franchise’s comeback.
As per Wilson’s statement, EA are looking to unlock “a whole new world” with Skate 4 that will go “well beyond just creating a skateboarding game.” And what form will that take? Fans should expect to see a game that focuses on “secular trends” in the industry, including things such as user-generated content, open world gameplay, and community interaction.
“You take a game like Skate, and while skateboarding in and of itself has tremendous appeal to a huge, global audience, there’s also another secular trend that’s happening inside our industry around user-generated content, open-world and interaction,” Wilson said. “For many people, skateboarding isn’t just a sport: it unlocks their access to art, culture… if you follow a guy called Nyjah Huston on Instagram, who’s one of the world’s great skateboarders, you’ll discover that he’s a young guy who started out skateboarding, but now is a fashion and art icon who lives in a big house in Beverly Hills and drives around in a Rolls Royce.”
“So for many people, you think about skating as a starting point that has appeal, but you start to build in user-generated content, exploration and community on top of that, and that expands the opportunity exponentially,” Wilson continued. “So as we think about our future and we think about growth, a big part of it is choosing games that not only themselves have appeal, but can benefit from secular trends in our communities that we think will grow them even beyond our initial expectations.”
Given the manner in which the game was announced – with no reveal trailer or snippets of gameplay (or even a name) – we can probably expect that Skate 4 is a ways off right now. Hopefully, however, EA will continue to share more details on the game in the coming months.