Details are still pretty sparse for Skate 4 – heck, we’re not even entirely sure that’s what it’s ultimately going to be called. But we do know that a new Skate game is in the works at EA, and its directors have shared a little bit more of what they hope to accomplish with the next game in the storied series.
Game director Deran Chung and creative director Cuz Perry spoke with skateboarding magazine Jenkem last week, ahead of the official announcement Thursday at EA Play. The interview touches on a few of the viral sensations that helped bring Skate 3 into the public consciousness, and which ultimately created the momentum for the upcoming sequel.
Part of what has shaped the design concept for the next Skate has been community creativity, the directors said. “There are guys who do their own thing and make like Rube Goldberg machines within the game,” they told Jenkem. “They didn’t do anything with skating, they just used it like Minecraft. It was so sick.”
“We want to have fun with the community, and give them a platform and let them do their own thing,” they went on. “It’s like hey, you could just go steal that wood and build your own spot. Like a sandbox.”
Beyond creating a bigger ‘sandbox’ for skateboarding action and creativity, Chung and Perry say they’re interested in expanding Skate’s suite of social features.
“It’s going to be more representative of where the culture is in skateboarding now,” one said (their answers are not identified by speaker in Jenkem’s interview). “We were pretty ahead of the curve back in the day with our social features; it’ll be an evolution of all those things.”
Even with the new features and 10 years of time under Skate’s belt, the directors say that fans of the previous games should feel at home in the next version of Skate – the controls you know and love from Skate 3 should make it over to Skate 4 feeling fairly untouched, from the sounds of things.
Take a look at our deep dive of Skate 4 release date speculation and gameplay details for more information. Our list of the best skateboarding games on PC could do with some new entries.