Since the days of the licensed Tony Hawks games, skateboarding games have seemed something of a taboo amongst developers with very few titles being worked on until Skate hit shelves last year, and now Skate It makes an appearance of the Nintendo Wii and DS.

Skateboarding remains a hugely popular past time amongst certain social groups across the world. Whoever you are and whatever you are in to personally, the chances are you know somebody who loves skateboarding - and most people know somehow who happens to be pretty good at it too, as it is pretty easy to pickup. This is something which translates well in Skate It.

The unique control system seen in the original Skate title, released by Electronic Arts last year on the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360, was without doubt the biggest attraction of the game as it allowed gamers of all ages to get into the game, and to play it with a good level of skill in most cases.

Once again the control system is very easily accessible on the Wii title Skate It. The Wii balance board works particularly well, as you would probably expect given it’s vague similarity to an actual skateboard. However some motion sensitive controls within the game do let Skate It down at certain points of the game and at times, performing a trick mid-air is something of a lucky dip as you need to be so precise with your movements to perform a specific trick - and if you are marginally out, a completely different trick comes out of you! Sometimes you get lucky and land an even better trick than you wanted to, but unfortunately luck usually goes against you.

The idea of the game is to start out on the streets and in run down skate parks as a completely random unknown skater, with the ultimate ambition of making a name for yourself, gaining lucrative sponsorships and to eventually be rightly considered as a pro by being named skater of the year. You do this by making your way through various stages in the city of San Vanelona, which you may have seen in the original Skate title on the Wii’s rival consoles last year, with your cameraman by your side throughout.

You are not limited to the constraints of San Vanelona for the entire duration of the game - you will at times branch out to venues in Europe, too. Each venue, both within San Vanelona and Europe are fantastic visually and physically too. Almost everything you see in the huge environments can be used for tricks in some way, even things in high places can usually be reached with a little practise which gives the game a good sense of variety even though it is probably considered an essential part of any skater game nowadays, thanks to the trends set by the popular Tony Hawks titles.

The characters are equally impressive graphically, and are well animated too. Skate It has flawless frame rates which make playing the game a breeze, and no jolting means smooth tricks which look and feel great. Even the games introduction and the menu interfaces are well designed, and give a great impression from the very beginning which does not fail to suck you in. If the game itself had a bit more of a plot to it then there would be days upon weeks of gameplay to be had with Skate It, but instead the pretty visuals hide what can only realistically be considered a good skateboarding game, but certainly not an outstanding one.

If you are a skateboarder yourself, Skate It will have something you will love within it whilst annoying you eventually because of the imprecise motion controls. If you are not a skating fan, this is probably not one for you as the plot does not offer enough to turn you into one for any worthwhile length of time.

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