PX360: Will EA be moderating the creating items?
Balmer: “There’s always some oversight, mainly because the graphics will be publicly viewed on our website. Our goal was to create as much freedom as really could and let people go for it. If things show up that are highly illegal or stepping on some boundaries, we may be forced to edit but our goal is just let the creativity happen and see the people go nuts with it.”
PX360: What affected the team’s decision to allow gamers to get off their boards and walk around?
Balmer: “The hardest part about adding the board was not to do it in the original Skate. We really decided that it was going to be a fairly big job with having the players walking around the open world, climbing up stairs and almost anywhere on the random terrain. The hardest decision was deciding not to do it for the original Skate and just focusing on getting the tricks done as best as we could. So it was something we knew we had to do for Skate 2 since you don’t want to just fall when you run into stuff with your skateboard. You want to run around the world and get up back up the stairs. Trying to combine that with tricks, you can use them in hippy-jumps and combine it a variety of different ways. We also didn’t want to just allow people to walk around but also provide them the ability to move objects when they walk around by grabbing onto things and sliding them around.”
PX360: Will gamers be forced to get off the board to accomplish certain tasks or missions within the game?
Balmer: “There’s nothing as prescriptive as having to get off the board, though you may find that getting off your board will make it easier. There’ll be time that you have to get off your board to find hidden stairs to climb to new place. But there are no off-board challenges or missions. In a similar aspect, there are no skitching races or events where you have to skitch. But you can use skitching almost anywhere for a boost in a race or getting back up to a certain spot.”
PX360: What features from Skate 2’s online and multiplayer aspects will be the most attracting for gamers only play their games online?
Balmer: “We’ve got a great online progression system, tons of competition modes, tons of ways to play with and against each other, free skating, free skating challenges and the real bullet feature that the team discovered when we were close to completing the game was the create-a-spot. Being able to find your spots in the game world, whether it’s just a gap or a small set of stairs, you can potentially own your own spot in the game world and upload it online for gamers to download and beat your score through its own leaderboards. For me, create-a-spot will keep people entertained for a long time.”
PX360: How far is Skate 2 pushing the technology for the Xbox 360 and PS3 in terms of raw power?
Balmer: “Well the biggest addition was the objects and the memory for them. If you see something you moved or placed, as long as it’s not set on the road, it’ll stay there for hours and over multiple game sessions. I think our real pushing for the performance was the objects tumbling around, where they go, all the people walking around the world, skaters skating different places, cars driving around and plus, the city is a large city all connected. Also we were really pushing ourselves to get everything happening at 60 frames per second.”
PX360: What benefits will gamers have downloading Skate 2 directly to their hard drive?
Balmer: “It does improve the loading times slightly because you know, we always have to be reading and streaming these things away from the disc spinning away in the drive. Access to the hard drive allows faster access and a small improvement, but it’s not something you have to do.”
PX360: What fixes have you provided for gamers who complained about the camera in the original Skate?
Balmer: “We were dedicated to creating the feeling of skating for the original Skate. We found the best way to do that is the low-angle camera that you could really see the tricks and looked like a skate video. You could see how high the guy was going with the board and it was a real big part of the original Skate. Now that we’ve shared that feeling, in Skate 2, we’ve provided the option to change to a higher camera that’s sort of overhead and traditional third-person view where the skate is less in the way. It’s easier for navigation but you don’t get to appreciate the tricks in the same way. So there’s an alternative camera but I don’t think it feels the same. Though, it’s there for gamers who want to try it.”
PX360: Could you speak on the possibility of downloadable content for Skate 2 in the future?
Balmer: “I can just say we left the doors open for us to do downloadable content after the game is released. There’ll be some stuff that will be coming out that we are working on to come out as soon as we can after the games released. But the doors open for us to keep building the game and producing more stuff later on. Though there’s nothing specific yet.”
PX360: What’s your belief on cutting content just so you could potentially release it after the game is released with a price tag attached?
Balmer: “I think that kind of sucks. The goal with the original Skate was to give everything we could. The same thing occurred with Skate 2. We really wanted to release everything we could and build more later if we have more time or more inspiration. What we are releasing with Skate 2 is everything we can. Some stuff wasn’t finished on time so some stuff will be finished up and released later. But nothing was held back to be released later for download content.”
PX360: What are your expectations for Skate 2 when it hits store shelves and is there a possibility for a third entry in the series before the end of this generation of consoles?
Balmer: “The future is always kind of grey. Our expectations for Skate 2 are we hope people enjoy it. We think we built something great and it’s something the team is super proud of. We just want to see people enjoy it and we are already seeing people post videos. It’s just awesome with the new replay editor. My expectations are that people have a good time and they talk about it. Hopefully we make everyone happy and sell enough copies to carry on with Skate 3.”
PX360: Where do you see the future for the extreme sports genre?
Balmer: “It’s a really tough genre. I worked on SSX3 and had some contact with the Tony Hawk series myself. It’s kind of combining a racing game with a fighting game that’s measured against reality where people are looking at minute details to decide if the animations look realistic or not. It’s a really tough genre because you can’t just jump in and think it’s going to be easy. I can see others struggling with it but I see huge potential for what it can become and where it can go. It’s just that people overestimate how easy it is jump into. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens to the Tony Hawk series. I hear that they’re coming back but it’s a tough job.”
