SKATE - updated impressions

SKATE's game world is billed as "reactive" - largely through your interaction with non-skaters. Think jocks, businessmen and grannies, who all react uniquely to your actions - although it's not yet clear how this will affect play. No trick will look the same, since they depend on your angle of approach, speed and fluidity of analog movement - so, for example, you can perform a three foot grind while wobbling all over the place, or a ten-foot grind at high speed with effortless grace. If it works, Tony Hawk's tricks will look mechanized by comparison.

Plus, you'll have a choice of "career'" path, from beginner, to amateur and pro, to full-on icon - you can choose fame, or infamy. Basically, this means you can either earn your glory by mixing it with the professional crowds and dazzling at specially-organized events, or just hang out with the street crews and wallow in underground kudos. Either way, it's likely you'll end up plastered to the front of some in-game skate mag, in a similar vein to Need for Speed: Carbon.