Released in 2010, Skate 3 became somewhat of a cultural phenomenon for its balance of realistic (at the time) skateboarding physics, arcadey gameplay, and as many YouTubers would discover, insane glitches that would make something like Big Rigs: Over The Road Racing blush.
The skate. series up to that point had relatively good reputation, being a more realistic take on the skateboarding video game genre unlike whatever Tony Hawk was doing at the time, and the reputation peaked with the fourth entry in the series, Skate 3. (Yeah, 3 is the 4th game. Skate It exists.)
Naturally, as with the three games that preceded it, it would only make sense that a sequel to Skate 3 would follow relatively soon after its release and blockbuster reputation, right?
Wrong. Not only did a sequel take two and a half decades to become available, it wasn't anywhere near what the community wanted. At all.
In the years that followed Skate 3's release, there was plenty of debate from the gaming community as to where the next goddamn Skate game was, only becoming even more of a debate when EA shuttered Black Box. That alone signaled to the community that Skate was probably dead, having bailed into a ditch due to EA's upper management.
However, just around the onset of a certain worldwide cough bug, EA stepped up to announce that Skate was back! It wasn't 100% a surprise, as various hints and internal leaks relating to a potential sequel were found and poked around with, namely the idea of a mobile entry in the series (foreshadowing).
But who cared? Nobody, really, because Skate was back, and that was all that mattered to most people. It wasn't long until the first few glimpses at the game were shown off, in the form of a trailer revealing the motion capture artists, then followed by a few screenshots and clips, then followed by full on in-engine recordings of skaters tearing up the then-polygonal streets.
The future was bright! For a period of time, anyway. It was soon revealed in some of the first developer interview sessions that the game would only be available to select people who signed up for a playtest. Not the end of the world, but what was the end of the world was EA's announcement that the game would have microtransactions (typical for EA), and it only got worse when it was announced that the game would be always-online and require a constant, 24/7 Internet connection to play. Even alone. Or at least, that's what everyone thought. (foreshadowing). And what would this newfound sequel of the series be called? Skate 4, like you'd think? No, just "skate.". Just like the first game in the series. (God, I hate it when games do this shit.)
In the span of a few years, the game went from being highly anticipated to being one of the most protested against games from EA, with every blog post, YouTube video and social media plug about the game being flooded with angry fans demanding an offline mode. EA being EA, they ignored the fans. As one of the unfortunates who waited years to get her hands on the game, save for one time in 2023, I finally got access to it at the start of July 2025, finally quenching my desire for that skating serum.