Skate Story Review — To The Moon

Long, long ago (2009 to be precise), the five founders of Devolver Digital gathered together and performed a profane ritual to summon an ancient Sumerian demon. “Give us the power, oh demon,” the five founders said, huddled around a pentagram at the center of which lay a sacrificial Alienware gaming PC, “to attract the most incredible indie devs of our time, so that we may publish the most creative, visually stunning games the world has ever seen!”

That is, at least, my personal explanation as to how any game I have come across with a Devolver Digital publishing label manages to impress me completely with its creative concepts, unique gameplay, and incredible visual direction. Some kind of deal with the devil had to be struck for this company to so consistently find and publish the works of these incredible indie devs, to the point where the name alone can be a signifier of success. This time, Devolver brought us the brilliance of developer Sam Eng by means of Skate Story.

As I have said before, I do not usually get to do a whole lot of research into the games I play before I play them. This is due to my busy schedule of reviews, and I prefer it because it usually means that I go into a game with no prior misconceptions and can give it an honest first impression.

It also means that on occasion, I judge a game by its title and make assumptions about what I am going to experience while playing it. Sometimes these assumptions are more or less correct. As is the case with Skate Story, I turned out to be completely wrong.

What I expected going into Skate Story was your typical skating game. These titles, arguably popularized by the Tony Hawk games of the PlayStation 2 era, almost always feature the player skating around a city, performing tricks with a highly interactive environment to earn points. So common is the city street environment and the overall street culture of skating utilized in these games that I struggle to think of a game where this is not the case, except perhaps that time we got to skate around Metal Gear Solid 2’s Big Shell.

Skate Story destroys this expectation by taking us into an esoteric, honestly incredibly original interpretation of hell. Playing as a demon who is tired of being kept up by the light of the moon, you sign a contract, sealing your form in glass and acquiring a skateboard, and the quest to destroy the moon.

What I love about Skate Story is that it completely demolishes the street style setting of the skating game genre, taking us through portals that teleport us from an artist’s reimagining of hell that is far removed from the typical fire and brimstone. Mirrored crystalline pathways and the literal cosmos intertwine with an almost dreamlike interpretation of sidewalks and roads. The entire setting sits in the uncanny valley of near familiarity. The setting is incredibly creative and gorgeous to look at, and is something I struggle to compare to anything else.

Furthering the what I love about Skate Story statement is the fact that, while the setting is different, the actual street culture of skating, as well as the elements that we love from skating games, are still very much present throughout.

It is not just that the entire game is a thinly veiled expression of the counterculture movement tied to skating, criticizing its biggest opponents in often comical ways, but the entire game is a love letter to skating games themselves. While the setting is different, everything you love to do in, say, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater or the Skate franchise is here. In Skate Story, you will skate, ollie, and grind your way through hell and to the moon, earning points, doing tricks, and even customizing your board like you would in other titles. The only difference is the setting, and perhaps the fact that your tricks are used to fight demonic boss fights instead of just increasing your score.

I actually do not have much to criticize about Skate Story. I think it serves as a fantastic reimagining of the typical street skating game, taking the familiar mechanics and repurposing them in a unique, somewhat story-driven setting that greatly breaks the mold while still delivering the feel and culture of the skating scene.

One minor nitpick I have is about how the game handles its keyboard controls. Skate Story is definitely a game you want to play on a controller, something the game warns you about before you even launch it, but it could be so much easier to play on PC if it allowed you to control your turn direction with the mouse rather than relying on the A and D buttons. This minor change would make the game much easier to play on keyboard and mouse, though the game is far from impossible to play as it is.

Overall, Skate Story impressed me, delivering a title that is incredibly unique in its setting and is as thought-provoking as it is visually striking. At the same time, it provides a familiar enough experience, encapsulating everything we love from the genre, and still doing just enough different in the familiar place to match the other areas in which the game stands out for its incredible uniqueness. It is, in short, a great game for skating fans.

Try Hard Guides was provided a Steam code for this PC review of Skate Story. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles on our Game Reviews page! Skate Story is available on Steam, Nintendo Switch, and PlayStation 5.