Skate.
Full Circle · Sports, Action, Sandbox
Overview
Experience improved Flick-It controls, the rich physics based skateboarding gameplay that provides those “only in skate.™“ moments and off-board exploration for full freedom in the online multiplayer world of San Vansterdam.
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The next evolution of the award-winning skate.™ franchise is here in Early Access.
Your new favorite hangout awaits.
PLAY TOGETHER IN A DYNAMIC SOCIAL WORLD
Drop into the dynamic, ever-evolving city of San Vansterdam - a city with a new lease on life building its growing skate scene alongside its new residents. In San Van, no two days are alike and fun waits around every corner in this online multiplayer world fueled by skateboarding, self expression and community.
EXPERIENCE TOTAL CONTROL
Skate through San Vansterdam’s streets, parks and plazas with improved Flick-It controls, play with physics to experience “only in skate.™“ moments or hop off your board to explore on foot and climb to discover new spots at all heights across San Van.
From the rails and ledges to the rooftops and ramps, San Van is your canvas to find endless spots and fun as you immerse yourself in the city’s budding skate culture.
PAVE YOUR OWN PATH
Earn rewards, show-off and progress no matter how you want to play as you take on activities, challenges and events while exploring the city to develop your own style, favorite tricks and favorite spots.
There are countless possibilities to personalize and express yourself in San Vansterdam with a rich and growing suite of character customization options to create your own skater and an extensive inventory of hats, clothes, footwear and accessories, featuring some of the biggest brands in skateboarding and street fashion.
Make your board an extension of you and show off your style by building out your collection of decks, grip tape, wheels, trucks and stickers.
CREATE YOUR OWN FUN
Build new spots by placing skateable objects in the world in-real time with your Quick Drop items, create your own challenges against other skaters with Throwdowns across the city or roll into one of San Vansterdam’s many Community Parks to get the session going with your friends and fellow San Van residents.
Capture your biggest tricks, slams and moments on film with the Replay Editor to create your collection of photos and clips and then share them to highlight what you’ve been getting up to across the city.
CROSS-PLAY, CO-OP AND CROSS-PROGRESSION*
Skate with friends and the wider community across supported platforms with cross-play and 150 player servers. Want to party up? Take on cooperative challenges together for greater rewards. Cross-progression allows you to keep earning rewards and finding the fun no matter what platform you want to drop in on.
EARLY ACCESS IS JUST THE START
Early Access is only the beginning and the experience will continue to evolve and grow with your feedback helping shape the future of San Vansterdam.
The San Van City Council will bring ongoing and seasonal updates featuring new gameplay experiences and ways to play together, fresh rewards and gear, new locations and skate spots across the city, in-game events, soundtrack refreshes and more.
This game includes optional in-game purchases of virtual currency that can be used to acquire virtual in-game items.
From the game's Steam store page.
THE GAMEQ VERDICT9,999 reviews analyzed
What players are actually saying
1. Summary
skate. splits its players almost down the middle. What both sides agree on, including some people who vote it down, is that the skating itself feels good: the flick-it controls are back, lines through the city are satisfying, and the bails, ragdolls and climbing make it an easy place to mess around alone or with friends, for free. The short positive reviews that make up most of the thumbs up say little more than that.
The longer reviews are angrier. Monetization comes up in 35% of them, more than any other complaint: a cash shop with several currencies, loot-box style unlocks for basic clothes, a paid season pass during early access, and, reviewers say, map areas that from Season 3 in February 2026 need the premium pass or a 24-hour rental. Other longer reviews describe crashes, black screens and infinite loading on PC, a presentation they call corporate and soulless (some single out the AI guide Vee and her slang), and the absence of things the old games had: a career with pro skaters and real brands, Hall of Meat and games of S.K.A.T.E. About a quarter of longer reviews measure the game against Skate 1 to 3, often unfavorably. Reviews written after February are more positive again, and by October 2026 several reviewers had switched to a thumbs up because of ReSkate, a fan mod that adds offline play and custom maps.
2. What keeps coming up
What players praise
The skating itself feels greatHigh
8% of longer reviews praise the controls, physics or "core gameplay" in so many words, and the praise turns up about as often in negative reviews as in positive ones: a down-vote will often open with the skating before turning to the shop. A positive reviewer wrote: "The Flick-It controls are still incredibly satisfying, and landing a clean line through the streets of San Vansterdam captures the magic that made the franchise special." A negative review made the same point from the other side: "This game has some incredible bones, but it is dressed up as one of the most shameful moneygrabs I have ever seen." The short positive reviews mostly say only that the game is fun. A few players disagree on feel, finding pushing slow or grind magnetism unpredictable, and some describe getting flung around when they hit a grind or ramp at an odd angle.
Free to play, and fun without spendingMedium
13% of longer reviews mention that the game is free, and they use it both ways. For some positive reviewers it tips the balance ("ignore the microtransactions and it's a solid game especially considering it's free"), and a smaller group says they play happily without spending anything. Others answer that free is the problem, since the shop and pass are built into everything. One player who recommended the game after calling it "Meh" next to Skate 3 still finished with "It's free though, so whatever."
A relaxed sandbox for messing around and playing with friendsLow
A smaller group values skate. as something to relax with: skating around after school, zoning out to a podcast, building lines or laughing at bails. "Its so fun playing with randoms and customizing my board/character," one wrote, and another simply said "When it's rainy outside. I like to skate in here." The ragdoll falls, parkour and climbing have their own fans, including a player who called the game "corporate slop" and recommended it anyway: "The ragdolls and parkour are surprisingly good and I have more fun messing around with that than doing skating missions." Placing objects in the world (quick drop) has a downside in shared spaces, where a few players report others dropping objects in their way.
Where players are split
Measured against Skate 3 and the old gamesHigh
24% of longer reviews compare skate. with the earlier games, and 16% name Skate 3 directly. Most of these comparisons come from negative reviews and favor the old games: players miss the story, the pros, the grimy spots and the humor, and some say they went back to Skate 3 or an emulator ("Skate 3 seems like an overall better game than this re-vamp."). A minority argues the other way, that the new game controls better than a 2010 release. One positive reviewer who loves Skate 3 says that played today it feels "so clunky, so rigid and unpolished". Several reviewers point out that the game isn't called Skate 4, mostly to say it still isn't the sequel they wanted.
Art style and lookMedium
13% of longer reviews bring up the art style or graphics. The common complaint is that the clean, colorful look reads as "Fortnite" or cartoonish next to the grittier originals, and that the city looks sterile. Some players like the graphics and say the game runs better than they expected; others say the look was the first thing that put them off.
Is early access getting better?Medium
A small group of longer reviews says the game has improved, with added tricks, darkslides, the X-Games spot battle and better stability ("I think a lot of improvements have been made as far as gameplay and stability go"). Other long-time players say the opposite: updates broke more than they fixed, and each season added paid content before missing features. The paid season pass during early access is a sore point in itself for people who think a game still being built should not be selling seasons.
The ReSkate modLow
ReSkate is a fan mod that, according to the players using it, adds offline play, custom maps and free gear, and runs on Linux and Steam Deck. It appears in 22% of the longer reviews written in October 2026, and several older reviews carry an edit saying they switched to positive because of it. One recommends "playing this with ReSkate" and explains: "ReSkate refined and unlocks skate's potential and lets you play on custom maps, install mods, PLAY OFFLINE". Several of these players say plainly that they are recommending the mod rather than the game as shipped, and one negative review that praises the mod warned against playing "the vanilla version" at all.
What frustrates players
The shop, season pass and loot boxesHigh
35% of longer reviews raise microtransactions, the shop, loot boxes or the pass, more than any other complaint, and 10% name the battle pass or skate.pass specifically. Players object to basic clothing locked behind real money or random boxes, several currencies that don't convert into each other ("Even if you grind, the Blue ticket currency can't be used or converted for the microtransaction currency"), store prices for single items, and constant reminders of the store. A smaller group would rather have paid for a finished game: "I would have happily paid $60-$70 for a complete, ready-to-release game instead of this". A few players defend the model, saying everything sold is cosmetic and nobody has to buy anything.
Crashes, black screens and PC bugsHigh
14% of longer reviews mention bugs or glitches and 10% describe crashes, black screens, infinite loading or the game failing to start. Reports include the game launching only some of the time ("It only successfully launches about 1 out of every 4 or 5 attempts for me"), infinite loading when teleporting to a mission marker, softlocked challenges, menus and UI flickering on AMD cards ("The UI has been broken on AMD GPUs for months"), whole-PC crashes, and progress not saving. These reports keep appearing through 2026. A few players complain the other way, that harmless fun glitches such as a launch glitch were patched out while the serious bugs stayed.
A presentation players call soullessMedium
9% of longer reviews call the game soulless or say it lacks skate culture. Their target is the tone: the AI assistant Vee who narrates the missions, invented slang like "footy", and dialogue players find condescending. 5% of longer reviews mention Vee, the narrator or the dialogue directly, and several recommend turning the voice off ("do yourself a favour and turn off the Vee dialogue"). A positive review from a newcomer to the series put it mildly: "I wish Vee didn't talk so much. I like her voice though."
Missing modes from the seriesMedium
Players list what the old games had and this one lacks: a career or story (7% of longer reviews), Hall of Meat (3%), games of S.K.A.T.E. and death races (2%), pro skaters and sponsors, and real skate brands. One positive review put it as "No Hall Of Meat, career mode is just doing the same missions again and again, no pro skaters as NPCs".
Paid map areasMedium
9% of longer reviews complain about map areas behind payment. Reviewers describe it this way: from Season 3, in February 2026, the Isle of Grom (the old tutorial island) and later a stadium area could be entered with the premium pass or as a 24-hour rental bought with in-game currency. Players say they were told new areas would always be free, and a few say this is what made them switch an earlier positive review to negative. One described the island as "just a remix of the tutorial island you buy temporary access to." This complaint comes mostly from players with a lot of hours in the game rather than newcomers.
Repetitive challenges and thin contentMedium
Once the districts are leveled, players say there is little to do beyond the same daily lot challenges. 4% of longer reviews call the challenges repetitive and another 4% say the game lacks content or feels barebones. Like the paid-area complaint, this comes mainly from people who have played a lot.
A long tutorial you can't skipLow
6% of longer reviews complain about the tutorials, and this is the newcomer complaint: it comes up much more often from reviewers with only a few hours in the game. Players describe the opening as long, unskippable and hand-holding ("Once you get past the 2 hour long tutorial that you cant skip"), and one says it was still explaining the basics half an hour in.
Always online and server problemsLow
5% of longer reviews object to the always-online requirement and the lack of an offline or solo mode, and 2% describe server lag, input delay or disconnects. Players who otherwise like the gameplay mention it too; one review that praises the gameplay and music but doesn't recommend the game says "the always online part is obv not ideal". Offline play is one of the things ReSkate players say the mod adds.
Anti-cheat, Linux and Steam DeckLow
4% of longer reviews mention the anti-cheat (Javelin) and 3% mention Linux or Steam Deck. Players on Linux or the Deck say they can't run the game at all, and question why a skating game needs anti-cheat: "Unnecessary anti-cheat makes this otherwise fine game impossible to play on Steam Deck/Linux." Some Windows players also blame the anti-cheat for launch errors. A few report trouble linking an EA account, and one could not link a child's account to Steam at all.
Cluttered screen and griefingLow
A few players dislike quest notifications, banners and a large compass that can't be hidden, and some report other players dropping objects to block spots or challenges.
3. The player conversation
Most thumbs up are a line or two saying the game is fun or good, while the long reviews are detailed, often edited several times, and mostly negative. Some of those long reviews still start by praising the skating, and for their writers the question is whether that is enough to forgive everything around it. Comparisons with Skate 3 run through the whole conversation, from one-line jokes to structured essays.
Newcomers talk about the tutorial, the look, the voice lines and crashes on first launch. Players with dozens of hours talk about paid areas, repetitive challenges and features they expected but did not get.
Reviews written in the launch weeks of September and October 2025 were about a quarter positive. A second wave came in the week of 16 February 2026, when, according to reviewers, Season 3 put the tutorial island behind the pass: 362 reviews that week, 25% positive, and paid areas came up in 24% of longer reviews written in February. From April 2026 the monthly positive share settled between 62% and 68%, and October 2026 reached 70%, the month ReSkate became a regular topic in reviews.
4. What the developers could do
- Rework the shop around direct purchases and fewer currencies. Monetization comes up in more longer reviews than any other complaint, and players single out loot-box unlocks for basic clothes, currencies that don't convert and high single-item prices.
- Make new map areas free and drop the 24-hour area rentals. Paid access to the tutorial island and later areas made a few long-time players switch their reviews to negative, and they point to an earlier statement that new areas would be free.
- Fix PC launch and stability problems. Black screens, infinite loading at mission markers, failed launches and the AMD UI flicker keep appearing in reviews throughout 2026.
- Bring back the series' modes and a career. Hall of Meat, games of S.K.A.T.E., a real story with pro skaters, and real brands are the features players list when comparing with Skate 3.
- Give challenges more variety and add things to do after leveling a district. Experienced players describe the daily lot challenges as the same loop with nothing beyond them.
- Let players skip the tutorial and tone down the guide. Newcomers complain about a long unskippable opening, and several players recommend muting Vee and the slang-heavy dialogue.
- Add an offline or solo mode. Always-online play, lag and disconnects frustrate solo players, and offline play is one of the things ReSkate players praise the mod for.
- Make the anti-cheat work on Linux and Steam Deck. Players on those systems say they can't launch the game at all, and one calls the Steam Deck perfect for this game.
