Skater XL News

💥 This Holiday, Skater XL’s evolution continues!!! 💥 We are bringing the world of community creations to all platforms, easier than ever!! Stay tuned for more details...

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The day that we have all waited for 1.5 years for, is finally here!! Skater XL 1.0 is now available! This is such an amazing milestone to reach and we’re so humbled to have discovered how many skate game fans out there shared our dream to make a skateboarding game which evolved the genre and finally gave you the control you always wanted.

We would not have gotten to this point without all of the Early Access supporters that have given critical feedback and created the ecosystem and community that been built around Skater XL. This has truly been a team effort and it’s been amazing to be a part of a community that has rallied to both bring back and advance this genre a huge step forward.

Catch our 1.0 Launch Trailer here:
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HOW TO ACCESS THE 1.0 GAME:
If you are new to the game, welcome to the world of Skater XL! We are stoked to invite you to the evolution of skateboarding games! Simply buy the game on Steam now, grab your board and let’s go!!!

If you purchased Skater XL in Early Access, you will receive the 1.0 content update automatically at no additional costs. As part of the transition, the Early Access branches will be removed and all users will now be using the single 1.0 version of the game. If your game does not automatically update, close the Steam client and reopen it.

With the launch of 1.0 we can’t help but reflect on the goals that we set out to achieve when we first started asking ourselves ‘what would a skateboarding day look like today, if it was designed from the ground up?’.

The answer to that question came largely down to evolving the controls into something that transformed the game into an expressive tool, one that gave you the freedom to build and express style and skill in your own way, and that really felt like skateboarding.

Skater XL is designed to be fun in the same way that skateboarding is fun. The core of the gameplay is designed more as a creative tool than a traditional video game with pre-set challenges to complete. The game is unique in that it doesn’t actually have any tricks programmed into it, only control of the movement of the board through the thumbsticks. Each thumbstick is connected to the character’s corresponding foot — the right stick controls the right foot, the left stick controls the left foot.

This control scheme is consistent through all parts of the gameplay, making it easy to learn and rely on when inventing new tricks and movements.

There are a range of basic movements, with a ton of freedom in how they are performed. Skater XL uses physics controlled by the sticks to drive all movement in the game, which is a huge shift from traditional ‘canned animation’ based systems which all past skateboarding games have been based upon. Precise movements made through the thumbsticks will make your tricks look and feel different each time, adding a level of expression, personalization, and style to the gameplay. There are so many ways to combine and style the same few tricks, and there are endless tricks possible in Skater XL.



The resulting gameplay is very much free-form, sandbox and creative in nature. Think of it more like a musical instrument than a conventional game.

And while much work was put into pushing and evolving the controls and game mechanics, careful consideration and testing were put in so that the controls were not difficult to learn. One of our goals in developing the controls and gameplay for Skater XL was to make skateboarding accessible to anyone with even a casual interest in skateboarding. We didn’t want the controls to be the challenge of playing the game, but rather have them be intuitive and allow the player and challenge themselves to develop their skills, allowing a huge amount of depth for those who choose to progress their skill-set and creativity. We’ve seen countless times in testing and through the game’s Early Access that once players have experienced the level of control available in Skater XL, they can’t imagine ever taking a step back to previous control schemes. It’s that satisfying.



And while the core gameplay mechanic is at the center of everything Skater XL was designed around, the environments, pro skaters, customization, challenge system, and community content provide the authentic window into the skate world that make the game a must have for anyone with even a casual interest in skateboarding.



Some of the feature highlights of the 1.0 game include:
Freedom Of Expression - Skater XL’s physics-based controls don’t have any pre-programmed tricks - only the movement through the thumbsticks. Each thumbstick is connected to the corresponding foot of the skater and as the player moves the stick, the board instantly responds. Much like a musical instrument, the player has complete freedom, whether it be pushing to nail a line or skating free from.

Real Life Iconic Locations - Skater XL levels are all inspired real-world skate areas and designed to ensure a constant flow of skate lines. From the DTLA Map with skateboarding landmarks around the Staples Center and LA Convention Center, to Easy Day High School’s sprawling campus of iconic skate spots like the Wallenberg Big 4 and the ‘Leap of Faith’, to the humongous ‘Big Ramp,’ where skaters can soar higher than a hawk.

Play As Real-Life Skate Pros - Select from renowned pros Tiago Lemos, Brandon Westgate, Evan Smith, and Tom Asta, all with their own distinct gear that fits their style.

Customizable Characters - The possibilities are endless to personalize the Skater XL experience. Players can customize their entire look, including their skater’s gear with different tees, hoodies, hats and shoes from over 30 of the most recognized skate brands like Vans, Santa Cruz, DC Shoes, Independent, Lakai and many more.

Trick Challenges - Hundreds of challenges with progressive difficulties, to help build your bag of tricks as you move further toward the completing them all. Can check off the entire list??

Thriving Community - Dive into a passionate community with more than 100,000 members in Discord (the biggest Discord in the World for reference is Fortnite at 500k, amazing given that Skater XL is still in Early Access!) who create online zines, video parts, fakeskate brands, and hundreds of mods. Players can become part of a bigger ecosystem and join the digital skateboarding subculture where they can share their creativity on the newly launched Skater XL modding hub, Skaterxl.mod.io.

Legit Soundtrack - Modest Mouse, Getter, Interpol, Animal Collective, Future Islands and Band Of Horses headline the distinctive music that blends well with the Skater XL’s West Coast vibe and fluid physics-based control mechanics.

We really hope you enjoy 1.0 and again thank the entire community for all of your contributions in getting us to the game you see before you today! While we are proud to stand behind the 1.0 game as a fully featured product, it is also laying the foundation for what Skater XL will become in the future as the game, community and platform continue to evolve.

The future of skateboarding games has never been brighter and we are very excited for the road ahead! Thank you for joining us on this journey! Let's goooo!!! 🔥

The Easy Day Team

What is up guys? 1.0 launch day is almost upon us and what a ride it has been over the past 18 months! As we look back on the time in Early Access, it again needs to be said how much we appreciate every one of you that has taken part in the journey. Your support, feedback, and suggestions have allowed us to improve and build on the core ideas behind Skater XL, and took the game to levels we couldn't have imagined. We are very excited to see where this community is able to take the game with the 1.0 launch and beyond.

At its core, our mission with Skater XL was to make skateboarding, in all its forms, accessible to as many people as possible. While street skating gets much of the shine today, ramps are a huge part of skateboarding and crucial to any true representation of skateboard culture. From the backyard vert ramps of the 80’s, to the boundary breaking mega structures of more recent years, skateboarding’s history was written on plywood.

While our outward development focus through Early Access may have appeared to be driven toward a focus on street skating mechanics, in the background we were quietly refining the transition skating experience with the same attention to detail.

Many of the improved transition skating features released in our latest Early Access public beta update have had very positive community reception, and we have continued to enhance the mechanics in advance of our 1.0 launch on July 28th.

As with Skater XL’s controls on other terrain, you are in full control of the board at all times on ramps and have the same ability to add style and nuance to all of your tricks. From the technicalities of the perfect spine transfer, to tweaking a backside 540 melon over the 135’ gap in just the right way, the transition experience is designed to be just as satisfying as all other areas of gameplay.

“But where are we supposed to use all these cool transition skating features? I’ve only seen street maps!” Well, I’m very glad you asked. Welcome to ‘The Big Ramp!’

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Modeled after the desert dwelling ramp structures that broke the barriers of what is possible on a skateboard, The Big Ramp is truly insane terrain! Encompassing many different sizes and shapes of vertical variety, this map is where you want to come to GO BIG!



If you’re looking for a real crowd pleasing remake of your favorite gold medal run, start at the roll-in above the 135’ gap jump which lands straight into the massive 60’ quarterpipe. Here we are talking about some serious hangtime. Link together your best tricks, spins and grabs on your quest for the perfect run. You can also take the gap to rainbow rail or kinked ledge if you want to up the level of difficulty. This section is perfect for creating jaw dropping clips in the replay editor.




In the mood for a more straightforward vert skating experience? Check out the vert ramp section, complete with bowl corners and multiple height variations just waiting to be thrashed.



Transition tech more your speed? Hit the mini zone, which is chock full of smaller quarterpipes and spines, just itching for all the lip tricks you can throw at it. Our unique game mechanic allows you to roll into and out of grinds without popping, allowing some of the smoothest coping grinds and stalls ever seen in a skateboarding game.





Explore the area more to find other features like hips, tabletops, bank to ledges, and everything that make ‘The Big Ramp’ a plywood paradise!

Check out this map along with Downtown Los Angeles, Easy Day High School, Grant Park Chicago and more when Skater XL 1.0 drops on Steam on July 28th!

What is up guys! As we get to the last few weeks until the launch of Skater XL 1.0, we have been humbled by the community’s support and the excitement that you have shared with us. Community has always been, and continues to be, at the forefront of our thoughts as we continue to develop the game.

One of the biggest surprises and most rewarding experiences for us over our journey from Early Access to the multi-platform launch has been the emergence of an insanely passionate and dedicated community with immensely talented and inventive mod creators. While we expected the game to resonate with players and for them to want to craft a gameplay experience that was unique to their sensibilities, the sheer scale and creativity that has accompanied that has been nothing short of amazing. The quality and volume of community made maps has been astounding and has really transformed Skater XL into something that we could never have imagined.

Modding allowed us to see the types of content our players enjoyed and how they interacted with different environments. This information, along with countless hours of user testing and design, helped lead us to the official content and environments that you will see in the full game.

In addition to that, we were also able to find some of the most talented individuals that had a unique blend of both skateboarding and game development knowledge that might have been impossible to find through traditional means. After seeing their skills being shown through mods in Early Access, we were stoked to add the talents of map creator Theo and programmer/replay editor creator Kiwi to the team as official members. Since joining the team, these two have played key roles in the development of the game that you will see on July 28th.

As the community continues to grow, it is important that we continue to express our gratitude for all the hard work of mod creators and acknowledge their contributions to the Skater XL ecosystem. In many ways, we know that we are just one part of this game, and the community and player’s role has been a huge part of the success of SXL. Moreover, we don’t view Skater XL as a traditional video game, where we are the developers and the players are the consumers. We see things as more of a collaborative effort between us and the community, each of us contributing in the areas that we are strongest. As we continue to move forward to the official launch of Skater XL and beyond, we want to continue to cement our commitment and excitement about what the community will continue to achieve.

To that end, today we are excited to announce that we will be including three of Skater XL's most popular community created maps available at launch!! These maps encompass multiple terrain and environment styles, and show some of the best the community has to offer. Not only that, but these maps have also been given a new and improved look and enhanced visually by Easy Day's art team in collaboration with the map creators for the 1.0 release. Check 'em out below!

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'Streets' by Jean-Olive

‘Streets’ by prolific map creator Jean-Olive is a mash up of street spots inspired by some of the best terrain in the skateboarding world. ‘Streets’ encompass several city blocks of skateable territory, from San Francisco-esque hills, to the unique skateable architecture of Spain. Players will recognize skate spots from Los Angeles and New York, as well as Jean-Olive’s own creative designs. As Jean-Olive simply puts it, “my goal was to create some of the most famous street spots compiled in one map.” Mission accomplished.



Here is a compilation of real skate spots that Jean-Olive has incorporated throughout the sprawling map.




‘Hűdland Training Facility’ by Pactole

An original creation by Pactole, ‘Hudland’ is every skater’s dream private skatepark. Packed full of street and transition features, Hudland is the perfect indoor place to hone your skills before taking them to the streets. Features include flatbars, stairs, hips, handrails, quarterpipes and more. The warehouse setting and overhead skylights give the map a unique look and feel, while the overall flow of the park will keep players perfecting lines for hours.



As Pactole describes the creation process, “This map was created as a collaboration with a really good crew of dudes I met in the Skater XL community. I didn't really plan a design, I just knew I wanted a "circular" layout, where players could do infinite lines by just cruising through the park, never getting bored. Through talking to the guys and some iteration and testing, I finally found a design that really works well for all different types of skating. I really like the lighting and the rest of the environment details, and think it is something really different than the official maps created by Easy Day. I learned a lot of new things with this project (as for all of the maps I made) and I was happy to create it for the crew and the entire Skater XL community.“

‘Grant Park’ by Theo

Skater XL 1.0 will also feature the worldwide debut of the mod map created by modder turned Easy Day Studios team member Theo. Grant Park is one of Chicago’s premier public skateparks. The three-acre waterfront park has a variety of terrain, including street and transition features with a focus on overall flow. Revealed here for the first time, Theo’s version of this real-life skate park holds true to its layout and design, while small tweaks have been added to optimize gameplay.



“Grant is to me, the best way to show what I have learned working with the team over at Easy Day. I have always been inspired by Chaz Ortiz who's a Grant local, and I have watched countless clips of his at this skatepark. It's a really unique feeling to recreate a spot that you see on the internet a lot and it makes you feel like you are there. On top of that, I love Chicago. It's a vibrant place. But winters can be harsh and I wanted to give the skatepark a more gritty feel to it. With Easy Day being located in California, we made a lot of beautiful west coast spots, so I thought it would be a nice change of pace to have a very foggy and cold looking map. It was a very challenging map to make. The ground itself has a lot of subtle variations in colors that were difficult to replicate, but with the help of the team members, we managed to make something feel more immersive. I'm very grateful to be able to share this project with other skaters, gamers and fans of SkaterXL.” - Theo

Announcing Skater XL on Mod.io!
In addition to officially including mod created maps in the game, we have given a ton of thought as to the best way to organize and showcase all the amazing community created mod content, as the audience and playerbase continue to expand.

While Discord has been a great place for the community to engage with each other and share a ton of valuable information about modding and Skater XL in general (84,000+ members!), it lacks a lot in the way of organizing and easily finding the mod you might be looking for. We feel that this is a big issue for players, and also for the content creators, as their hard work can get buried just days after it’s been launched and almost impossible for new users to find. It also makes it difficult to update or improve mods and make sure that all of the original audience are aware of and receive the improvements. Discord is simply not built to house the amount of amazing content that is being created.

After reviewing all available options, we believe the best way to make Skater XL mods searchable, to support tagging and versioning is to use the new mod.io platform. This platform allows creators to create a profile, create listing pages for their mods with screenshots, images and videos and gather & discuss feedback. It’s very similar in design to Steam Workshop but is not tied to Steam or it’s restrictions. What’s more, mod.io is made by the creators of ModDB and IndieDB and we’ve been working with them closely on plans for the last few months. We believe they’re a team that understand and are passionate about modding and make a great fit for the SXL community.

To note that we do not see this as a replacement of the existing SXL modding Discord, mod.io works in a complimentary way in that direct links to mod pages can be dropped into the Discord channels. Discord can continue to operate as the community hub and place for people to discuss + announce new mods moving forward, the addition of mod.io should serve only to improve the experience of finding old mods, managing updates and all the other benefits listed above.

We’ve seen this work really well in many other games including the recent Space Engineers, Snowrunners and TABS and opens up all kinds of new possibilities within the modding ecosystem.

Our page is now live on HERE, and we are excited for the community to check it out and familiarize yourselves with the structure and mod organization. We think you will be impressed by it's functionality and search features. To note, there will be no changes to the current structure of mod implementation or Discord server, and mod.io will serve as a mod discovery platform for now, as we receive community feedback and implement any necessary adjustments. There is no mod.io integration within the game, and you will still install mods as you currently would.

Please feel free to contact us at [email protected] with your feedback about this new modding platform.

We appreciate all of our community's support and positivity and look forward even more announcements coming before July 28th!

What is up guys? Today, we are excited to be sharing a NEW MAP REVEAL with the announcement of “Easy Day High School”. Included in the 1.0 game launch on July 28th, Easy Day High School is the quintessential skateboarder’s playground, capturing the California schoolyard vibes and terrain where much of skateboarding’s roots come from.

At approximately 11x larger than the L.A. Courthouse map, here you’ll find a utopia of picnic tables, stairs, handrails, manual pads, and banks, offering lines that are limited only by your imagination.

The level comprises a mix of areas and spots including ones we designed from scratch, and also more than 25 real-world spots from high schools and elementary schools that are staples of skate videos and magazines over skateboarding’s history. We've got the Wallenberg ‘Big 4’ in there, the famous Clipper ledge, the Lockwood Elementary bank-to-benches, The ‘Leap of Faith’ and pieces of a lot of other recognizable locations from throughout skate history.

One thing we learned over the course of building the game is that exact one-to-one replicas of real spots can look great, but don’t often provide ideal gameplay. Given that Skater XL has a completely new game mechanic based on physics and independent foot control and that our core philosophy has always been to prioritise gameplay first, we decided to go back to the drawing board on how we approached level design for 1.0.

Easy Day High school is the result of months of work figuring out how to unlock the most gameplay in an environment. Through countless testing and play sessions, we've learned how each real-world spot can stay true to their real life counterpart, while optimizing them to get the most fun and variety in gameplay. So the angles, the distances, the way things fit together and the combinations of elements are arranged in a way to make sure that there's a lot of runs and as you finish one trick, there's always something more to do next.

Check out the teaser video for a deeper look at Easy Day High School, and check out preview on Game Informer and GamesRadar+ for even more information.

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Thanks again for your continued support and we couldn’t be more excited to bring 1.0 to everyone on July 28th. Stay tuned for even more big news over the coming weeks!