Session: Skate Sim

Crea-ture Studios have achieved a great feat by making the most authentic skateboarding game to date, seconded only by going out and practicing kickflips yourself. The physics-based controls are incredibly intuitive and satisfying to learn. There’s a steep learning curve that may put players off but if you stick with it, there’s no other game that does skateboarding as well as this. It’s not without its minor flaws, but look past them and you’ll find a game with endless replayability.

The updates for Session: Skate Sim have contributed to the overall immersion and added touches of realism to the experience. While there are still performance issues in places, and I am still having to wear the same beanie/hairstyle, the updates and DLC maps successfully keep the game interesting. By adding new spots and slowly but surely implementing new gameplay elements, Session keeps you coming back for one more try, and to see how you can skate a spot differently. One slight inconvenience when using the board breaking option however, is the lack of skate shops in the DLC maps, meaning you will have to frequently return to other locations or use a blank deck. But overall, Session: Skate Sim remains engaging and is still a fantastic virtual skateboarding sandbox.

At the end of the day, Session: Skate Sim is either a brilliant release or a frustrating game to try. It all depends on where you are when it comes to a realistic skateboarding experience and your expectations towards a digital version of it. If you’re not a professional skater and just want to try out a new game, there’s absolutely no doubt Session: Skate Sim isn’t for you.

With the presence of multiple pro skaters including Daewon Song and Samarria Brevard, as well as a semi-open world with legendary skate spots like Black Hubbus and FDR Park, Sessions: Skate Sim is a well-written love letter to the sport. While some may feel underwhelmed by the lack of customization and find the controls too difficult to adjust to, players that have a love of skating and are itching to dive into a new skateboarding title will eventually feel right at home.

Session: Skate Sim is unique amongst its peers. Its control scheme, while taking time to master, is massively rewarding. Rolling around the streets and finding your own skating lines is addictively entertaining. It's a shame about the quest system, its overall presentation and some of the rough edges but do I feel Session is a few patches away from greatness.

Session: Skate Sim knows how to capture what makes skating so much fun with its in-depth settings and excellent board control and physics like no other game. That also means a huge difficulty level. It's not for everyone, but it gives real skaters a simulator they can play for years to come, if Sessions many shortcomings are made up with updates.

Despite the 1.0 release, Session: Skate Sim still has a few issues. However, this shouldn’t keep any skating fan away from this deeply rewarding simulator that can, at times, feel just as rewarding as the real sport.

Although Session: Skate Sim is a difficult game to get used to, the joy of pulling off tricks far outweighs the frustration. It faithfully recreates skateboarding culture of the 90s, and offers tons of freedom to play however you want.

Despite how ugly I might find it, there’s no doubt that the gameplay in Session is its strongest suit. The difficulty might not be for everyone, but I urge anyone interested to stick with it and try to embrace what it offers — a sim-like, realistic skating experience. I commend the devs for trying something new and interesting within the genre, and while not as immediately approachable as most games, it’s something that any skating fan should try.

Sim games approach their subjects with a mix of reverence and intense focus. Unlike more arcade-style skateboarding games, Session is a pure, unfiltered experience. If you want to recreate the slow, careful process of learning how to skate, this is your game. But be warned! The mix of intense difficulty and self-directed gameplay isn’t for everyone. Anything less than a pure, powerful love for skateboarding will leave you feeling dissatisfied with this game. But if you’re looking for a pure challenge, and don’t mind a few bugs, you’re in luck. Session: Skate Sim is exactly what you’ve been waiting for.

Session: Skate Sim is the ultimate skateboard simulator, but also a video game with several shortcomings.

Session: Skate Sim is the most authentic skateboarding experience you can get from a video game. Though you will fall down (a lot) and may get frustrated, you will undoubtedly leave this experience with a greater appreciation for skating and the culture that surrounds it.

Session's ultra-realistic skating mechanics are spot-on and reward your practice and patience. However, it's set in a world that feels a little dead, empty and cold at times and the structure the game does give you isn't particularly interesting or user-friendly.

This skateboarding simulation will really torture you. Hardcore players will enjoy it, others not so much. Session: Skate Sim is just an unfinished version of a project with good ideas.

If you are new to skateboarding, chances are Session: Skate Sim will frustrate you more than impress you, but if you live for the board, it will provide you with an unrivaled simulator worth playing.

It’d be nice if the game did more in the way of teaching you the ropes, offered different control schemes, and provided a wider array of accessibility options. In general as well, it’d be nice if the game offered more in the way of incentives, excitement, and action to keep you coming back for more, regardless of its punishing difficulty.

An unapologetically tricky ode to street skating, Session is packed with a palpable love for the sport, but bugs and unsympathetic tutorial and mission design decisions undermine its approachability.

With a steep learning curve and bland presentation, Session: Skate Sim ends up being a mixed package.

The mission structure of the game devolves into going to a place, doing a trick or route, strung along by forgettable story dialogue. The missions have a habit of being poorly explained, furthered by being unable to re-read text boxes explaining what you need to do. And rarely do the inputs needed for specific moves get shown during these prompts. For better or worse, Session is a game for the hardcore skater. While its dedication to realism is impressive, the frustration in the early hours is likely to turn most off.

Session: Skate Sim is a game of two halves at the moment. It presents a daunting, yet rewarding challenge that genuinely tries to move the genre forward through its dedication to being an authentic sim, but at the same time lacks the character and anarchy that the genre and skateboarding, in general, are synonymous with. Add onto that a healthy serving of jank and bugs, and Session: Skate Sim becomes a hard sell. However, if you can look past its flaws and are down for a challenge, it’s worth giving a shot as the innovations it does present are worth experiencing, and the highs you will receive from mastering the complex controls are unlike anything else the genre has to offer.

Serious skaters will appreciate the impressive commitment to realism, but a serious lack of polish stops Session from sticking the landing for a wider audience. [Issue#20, p.82]