Ever play an extreme sports game and think that it really could have used some Dante’s Inferno allusions with a Faustian twist? Nope, same here. However, Skate Story turned out to be just that, and it’s the kind of title that gamers didn’t know they wanted. Just looking at screenshots should signify how this game is unlike anything else out there. Sure, there’s skating, but it also has a fair bit of adventure game elements, exploration, boss fights, and otherworldly visual novel-like sequences that are akin to something out of Suda51’s imagination. What kind of story is this? What kind of skating can be expected? Find out in this Skate Story review!
Skate Story is a story of a lowly demon who discovers the joy of skating, a highly verboten activity in the nine circles of hell. When the demon took up the board, he signed a pact with the devil, selling his soul and becoming a living glass figure, forced to endure eternal shattering whenever he bails on a trick. The only way to get his soul back is to devour moons. Descending through the layers of this bizarre underworld, the skater grinds rails, pulls off tricks, and battles vicious demons while helping lost and tortured souls along the way.
Skate Story is dense with dreamlike exploration, quirky characters and poetic interludes that add emotional and surprising philosophical weight. As the demon hones ever more challenging tricks and journeys through an abstract hell, the once-simple pact transforms into something far stranger and deeper. What starts as a desperate grasp for freedom turns into a wild, transformative journey of perseverance, pain, creativity, and the quest for meaning in endless torment. The game’s story is surreal, witty, and unexpectedly touching, building up to a cosmic finale that’s both unforgettable and hilariously absurd.
Skate Story‘s skating mechanics revolve around fluid, momentum-based movement that feels responsive and rewarding once you get comfortable with the controls. The control scheme mixes elements of classic arcade skating games like Tony Hawk with the more grounded street feel of EA’s Skate. Ollieing is tied to a single button, but timing your press affects height and power. Shoulder buttons and triggers modify the trick mid-air kickflips, heelflips, spins, and more complex variations become accessible as you progress.
Like in most skating games, grinds activate naturally when you approach rails or ledges with the right pop. Manuals and reverts help maintain combos. There are no grabs, but the game emphasises flow, timing, and creativity over technical precision. The slow-motion “focus” helps with big tricks, making landings feel cinematic and satisfying. The range of tricks is deep and complex enough that there is almost no limit to the possibilities for combos. Bailing is also forgiving enough that retrying a course is painless.
As a story-driven skating game, it plays out like an adventure, featuring various objectives and hub areas to explore and skate in. There are quirky NPCs, shops to spend points on customising the board, stickers to collect, and linear racing or time-trial-style sections where the skater must ollie, flip, and grind through obstacle courses. The designers even found a clever way to implement boss encounters against the moons in which the skater must build massive combos and “stomp” damage zones to defeat them.
With its smooth, consistent game mechanics and the effortless flow of skating, the Skate Story keeps things exciting while still letting players enjoy the ride at their own pace. Progression feels natural, with new tricks and abilities unlocking steadily through story milestones and practice. However, customisation leans more toward cosmetic and performance tweaks rather than offering deeply transformative changes. It would have been nice if there were more utility to the board customisation apart from cosmetics. Amusingly, all deck designs and decals wear down over time as the skater breaks in the board, creating a steady incentive to spend points to keep the skateboard looking presentable.
Skating carries a dreamy, rhythmic quality that matches the psychedelic visuals and excellent soundtrack. The skater is literally a glass demon, which adds tension since the slightest bump can send him careening into a million shards of particles. Getting better with sessions turns into hypnotic flows where chaining tricks effortlessly across glowing, jagged environments. The world design is wonderfully strange, with shattered architecture, jagged spikes, swirling smoke, and surreal objects that spark creative line building, though the levels feel more directed than a completely open sandbox.
By far the biggest letdown of Skate Story is that it’s over too quickly. The story is beatable in a single sitting, and replay value is admittedly low since there isn’t a direct path to doing specific stages or challenges, being how the game prioritises a narrative. Skipping to individual chapters is fine, but you still have to work your way through them to reach specific challenges and face bosses again. There needed to be an unlockable arcade mode with bespoke stages and challenges to give Skate Story life after the story ends.
