Skate. Will Be Free To Play, Support Cross-Play Across All Platforms, and Include Microtransactions

Finally, some major details on what we can expect from the insanely hotly anticipated follow-up to the Skate franchise.

The team behind Skate 4, which is now simply titled “Skate.”, have released a mini documentary titled “The Board Room” where they reveal some pretty crucial details to the game’s design, and what fans can expect. Check out the full conversation here:

The roundtable in the video above, which features several Skate. developers as well as renowned Skate series die-hard Avalanche, covers a handful of pretty heavy topics. The team reveals that Skate. will support cross-progression and cross-play across all platforms and PC (and eventually mobile), and that it’ll be free to play… But you know what that means.

Yes, Skate. will support microtransactions. The live service model that Full Circle and EA are working on is said to be focused on supporting the game “forever”, and that Skate. will be the end-all-be-all for the franchise. The video features a quote that says something to the effect of “there’s no Skate 5 after this, Skate. will be supported for years to come”. So there’s that… Now what do we think?

Personally, I feel like this model suits the franchise and the game perfectly fine. EA has proven that they know how (and how not) to put on a live service model. After they basically invented the pinnacle of awful live service, pay-to-win titles in Star Wars: Battlefront II, they took a hard look inwards and have launched one of the most successful live services titles of all time in Apex Legends – the latter of which Full Circle cites as inspiration for Skate.

Personally, I don’t see an issue with this, but I can already hear the hate-click journalists out there click-clacking on their keyboards getting ready to skewer this decision six ways to Sunday. I’m stoked for Skate., and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.