Skater XL Switch Review
I remember eagerly playing Tony Hawks Pro Skater when it came out on Nintendo 64 with its technical limitations that made the music loop after the first chorus of each song. While I never did get to learn the full lyrics to Goldfingers subliminal ska track “Superman,” I did fall in love with Skateboarding and grew my hair out much to my parents’ shock. Enter Skater XL, a game that was announced for Switch almost 3 years ago, originally slated for a 2020 release, then a 2021 release, and now at the end of 2023, it’s finally here. Developers Easy Day Studios seemed to have utilized this extended development time claiming Skater XL is a “buttery 60 fps” on Switch. What’s it like? Grab your Mullins-style backpack, tighten those trucks, and thanks to modern technology, load up the full version of “Superman” on Spotify as we attempt to kickflip this review of Skater XL for Switch.
Before we ollie into things, skaters should know that Skater XL plays more like a skateboarding sim, rather than an arcade game, meaning it is a far departure from the Tony Hawk Pro Skaters series, so I won’t be making comparisons to that series in this review.
Skater XL puts your feet right on the grip tape with a quick and concise tutorial. Each stick controls a foot each, meaning you can flick the right stick to ollie, and the left stick to flip the board, turning your ollie into a kickflip. There are no buttons to grind, simply line up your trick and turn in the right direction. You can also grab your board with your left or right hand by pressing L or R respectively. While you can turn by shifting your weight with the left stick, it’s recommended you use ZL and ZR. This control scheme takes a bit of getting used to, but once you do, it’s incredibly rewarding to land your trick or complete your line.
Skater XL doesn’t hold your hand throughout your skating journey, once the tutorial is complete, you simply get told to skate. This is the double-edged sword of Skater XL as there’s just nothing much to do except skate. Sure, the game suggests some lines and challenges to complete, but apart from that, you just… skate. For me, I love skateboarding and I found the game fun to play and quite relaxing, but the lack of direction may put some players off. It feels like a testing sandbox for a game that’s still in development. It would have been good to have some sort of scoring system, or maybe some map challenges to keep players engaged, but once the excitement of finding some lines to run dries up, there’s not a lot to do apart from wandering around randomly grinding rails or jumping gaps. It’s like when you free-roam in GTA, it’s fun for a bit, but ultimately, you end up craving something more to further the narrative or progression.
A couple of great features help extend the fun like being able to set custom spawn points by tapping down on the D-pad, or even setting a custom waypoint by pressing X to get to hard-to-reach areas or more precise placements for your lines. The game does spruik mod support for the game, but those expecting anything game-changing will be disappointed as you can’t browse a mod database, it’s just clothes and accessories and a handful of levels, automatically added to the game.
Graphically, the engine does that job of rendering the world, filling maps with things to jump off, grind, or zoom down. The developers boast a silky smooth skating experience, and that’s true, but at the cost of sharpness. While I don’t have the correct tools to measure framerate, docked performs well with no slowdown or stutter, but with blurry edges and textures, and handheld runs silky smooth as promised, but with a very low locked resolution. You get used to it pretty quickly, and aside from some taxis and billboards in downtown LA taking their time to load in, you do get immersed in the world of Skater XL, especially thanks to the chilled lo-fi hip hop and West Coast vibe soundtrack.
The game also features Multiplayer which just lets people join your lobby which is just the same as offline mode. It was really cool following other players around and attempting the same lines they are, and thanks to no clipping, you won’t find griefers ruining your experience online. With this mode, it makes the world feel much more alive and makes the game more enjoyable despite still not adding challenges or competitive modes. It should also be noted that the developers are still constantly updating the game, with a recent multiplatform update coming out in September adding grab tricks to the game, so it’s not outside the realm of possibility that we will see more features added in the future.
Whether Skater XL is for you all boils down to how much you love skateboarding. I personally found it to be an enjoyable, relaxing experience and it’s something I can see myself going back to in short bursts to chill out and bust some tricks. Skater XL is a competent, if somewhat bare-bones skateboarding simulator on the Nintendo Switch. It’s difficult and rewarding, runs well at the cost of visual fidelity, and has a very chilled-out vibe.
So What’s it Like?
Skater XL is like Tony Hawks Skateboarding meets an in-depth simulation.
It’s time for this skater boi, to say see you later boi.