Skatewas an engaging franchise that built on the success of theTony Hawkgames by increasing the difficulty of tricks, as well as largely keeping to an open-world format. Many have been wondering what happened to the beloved franchise and if it will ever return.Despite EA’s Instagram being bombarded withSkate 4demands, there has been little hope for fans. The answers to fans questions about the future of the series are embedded within an understanding of what happened in the development of the franchise.
Skatewas released through EA in 2007 and introduced a ‘flick it’ approach to doing tricks. Essentially, the right analog stick needed to be mastered in order to do simple tricks and many appreciated this new difficulty, so much so that the game sold far more than EA had anticipated. With a host of groundbreaking online features and recording mechanics, it’s unsurprising that a lack of news about a reboot of theSkateseries was one of thebiggest disappointments of E3 2018. Unfortunately for the franchise, its demise was in this incredible foundation given by the first entry in the series.
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Skate 2built onSkateby expanding the world and introducing ‘Hall of Meat’ which was inspired by Thrasher’s real-life feature. The mechanic allowed players to see what bones had been broken and the damage caused by a players bail. This meant that difficult tricks were much more fun to fail and it certainly added longevity to the game. The game sold well and the franchise looked to be thriving. In fact,many of the mechanics ofSkate 2are still wanted in a newSkategame. Yet, this was a peak for the franchise before a steep fall.
Black Box lost staff because EA cut 10% of all its employees in 2008. However, the studio continued to produceSkategames.Skate 3was released a year afterSkate 2and delivered improvements for online gameplay. Yet overall, this wasn’t a huge improvement onSkate 2and the game sold less than its predecessors and critics noted that there weren’t too many new aspects for players to get excited about. The result was a game that sold 5 million copies, which is impressive but was not substantial enough to swerve EA’s set direction.
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Skate’smain competitor theTony Hawkfranchise was rapidly losing sales and EA felt that the future of sports games was in other extreme sports. The remaining Black Box team was set to work onNeed for Speed: The Runwhich was released to disappointing returns. With that, Black Box was shut down and members of the team dispersed to other studios.
Hope was rekindled whenTony Hawks Pro Skater 5was released in 2015 and many were riding the wave of skateboard game nostalgia. Yet, the poor reception of the game likely reaffirmed EA’s decision 5 years prior. In fact,for manyTony Hawks Pro Skater 5was one of the most disappointing games of 2015. Robomodo couldn’t recapture the magic of the NeversoftTony Hawkgames andSkatewould likely find itself in the same position under a new developer. Since this point, speculation aboutSkate 4has largely come from fans of the series.
Interest inSkate 3peaked when it was rediscovered for its ‘Hall of Meat’ mode and some of its glitches. Followed bySkate 3servers coming back online, there was an air of anticipation for an announcement. On the back of the servers coming back online, there was a huge expectation for EA to give some details at E3. In the build-up to E3 2018, Tyler the Creator even tweeted aboutSkate 4and excitement was at an all-time high, with a mysterious trailer also adding to the anticipation.
Rumors of a new trailer beingSkate 4were dismissed as it was revealed to be a new skating game calledSession. The only news from this point on has come in the form of a trademark. Electronic Arts has renewed the Skate trademark, but this is likely a precaution in order to retain the rights to its back catalog and safeguard a franchise if skating games become popular once more. It is also cheaper to renew a trademark than create a new franchise.
It looks as ifSkate 4won’t be arriving any time soon because of EA’s lack of interest in the genre, waning audience excitement, and a defunct original studio. The franchise has been dismantled piece by piece through external and internal factors.While EA renewing theSkatetrademark may spark hope, its likely a business decision based on practicality. If a new game were to revive the market,Skatemay come back, but this seems very unlikely. For now, it seems like players need to reboot their old consoles and ready their right analog stick if they want to break as many bones as possible or carve out runs in San Vanelona.
There is no knownSkate 4game in development.
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