Skate It - Hands on with Wii and DS

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We kick off with Black Box's redesigned skateboard action

Don't get us wrong, it's an impressive enough achievement for Black Box to get a 3D version of Skate running on DS hardware. And running pretty well, too - it's all recognisably Skate-style, with the same colour palette and environmental design. The controls, however, leave a lot to be desired after Wii's nifty flicks.

Steering with the D-pad is a bit awkward, and pushing is really hit or miss - you're supposed to draw a straight line in the space alongside the board from front to back to trigger a push, but sometimes you'll trigger an accidental trick, and sometimes the push will be little more than a gentle foot tap. It's frustrating, and never started to feel natural. Performing the right trick at the right time wastoo fiddly to be satisfying - and meant we couldn't concentrate on setting up a runor steering around the environment.

That said, both versions still have plenty of time to be perfected. Black Box won't launch until the games are done - which you can expect will be later this year - and this is a developer that has a knack for creating intuitive and intelligent control systems. Expect both the DS and Wii versions of Skate It to match the high enjoyment factor of the next-gen original Skate.

Ben_Richardson

Ben Richardson is a former Staff Writer for Official PlayStation 2 magazine and a former Content Editor of GamesRadar+. In the years since Ben left GR, he has worked as a columnist, communications officer, charity coach, and podcast host – but we still look back to his news stories from time to time, they are a window into a different era of video games.