Flick-It's Back, Mate: How Skate's Iconic System Accidentally Invented New Tricks and Blew Pro Skaters' Minds
AI Gaming News Author · Polygon ·
Skate's iconic Flick-It system is making a grand return, and it's so brilliantly complex it accidentally invented new skateboarding tricks that even real pros hadn't conceived, leaving them delightfully dumbfounded, as detailed in a Polygon interview.
Right, so you know how sometimes a spell works a bit too well, and suddenly you've got sentient teacups doing kickflips? Well, EA’s new *Skate* game has done something similar, but instead of teacups, it’s actual, honest-to-goodness new skateboard tricks that even the pros hadn’t conceived. Fair dinkum, it’s wilder than it first appeared.
After years of fans memeing "Skate 4" into existence (seriously, the dedication was admirable, like a prolonged summoning ritual), the series is finally dropping into early access on September 16th. And yeah, it’s coming back as a free-to-play, live-service, squeaky-clean open-world affair. Now, I know what some of you are thinking – "Free-to-play? Live service? What fresh hell is this?" – and believe me, my eyebrow arched so high it nearly touched the ceiling. Corporate buzzwords, right? Always a bit of a red flag in my book. But stick with me, because underneath all that marketing speak, there’s a genuine bit of digital wizardry that’s got me genuinely excited.
At its core, *Skate* is resurrecting the very thing that made it legendary: Flick-It. If you're a veteran of the series, you’ll remember the sheer joy of wiggling your right joystick like a digital shaman performing a trick-summoning ritual, rather than mashing buttons like some kind of rhythm game gone wrong. It felt less like inputting commands and more like drawing the trick into existence, creating a fluidity that set *Skate* apart from anything else on the market. It was intuitive, it was expressive, and it was utterly brilliant.
But here’s where it gets really interesting, like stumbling upon a hidden chamber in a forgotten dungeon. Bringing Flick-It back for a new game wasn’t just a simple copy-paste job. As Senior Creative Director Deran Chung revealed to Polygon in a video interview (this gem of a story, originally unearthed by Giovanni Colantonio for Polygon, provides a fascinating look into the game's development!), the old *Skate* engine was an absolute "Frankenstein." Picture a patchwork quilt of ancient code, duct tape, and pure, unadulterated programmer caffeine. There was no way to simply resurrect it. They had to rebuild the whole damn thing from the ground up, porting the essence of Flick-It over to EA’s shiny Frostbite engine.
This is where the story takes a turn into the delightfully absurd. See, the original Flick-It system was so intellectually complex, despite its simple feel for players, that it inadvertently *invented new tricks*. That’s right, code essentially stumbled upon new forms of airborne acrobatics that professional skateboarders had never even thought to attempt. Chung recounted how during motion-capture sessions, they’d ask pros to try things like an "ollie 360 inward heel" or an "ollie 360 hard flip."
And the pros' reaction? "Dude, what the f*ck are you talking about?"
Bloody hell, can you imagine? You bring in the best in the business, legends of the concrete jungle, and a video game system is asking them to do tricks they didn't even know were possible. It’s like a magical artefact showing you spells you didn't know existed. The reason, apparently, was to "complete the circle of gestures" within the Flick-It system – a kind of mathematical purity that demanded these oddball variations. It went against "all sensible skating instincts," according to Chung, but it was there, waiting to be discovered by the digital realm.
This wasn't just some late-night coding experiment, either. Both Chung and tech lead Jon Lawler had moved on to other projects after *Skate 3*, but the idea of reviving Flick-It became this persistent side-quest for them. Lawler, now working with Frostbite, started tinkering, trying to recompile the old code. For years, they kept an eye on it, waiting for Frostbite to catch up. And then, like converging ley lines of digital magic, everything aligned: the tech was ready, fan demand was deafening (thank you, meme lords!), and skateboarding itself was having a resurgence with social media and the Olympics. Suddenly, what was once a technical pipe dream became a smart business move.
But a 1:1 recreation wasn’t enough for these digital alchemists. They wanted to build on it, to push the improvisational nature of Flick-It even further. And thus, they started "bolting new ideas around the old code base." This is where things like "variable speed flips" come in – or as Chung puts it, "late basically everything." You can now do slow-held kickflips, late 360 flips, late inward heel flips, and all their nollie versions. It’s like they unlocked an entire new spellbook of trick combinations. And it’s not just Flick-It; the animation system got a revamp too, now using minimal blending for more natural, nuanced trick captures. Even the physics engine got a glow-up, with original devs returning to make sure every ollie, every grind, every "wallie" (where you bash into an object and ollie off it – the system can now predict this!) feels as authentic as possible.
What does this mean for us, the players? Well, for most casual flickers, you probably won't dissect the technical nuances, and that's the beauty of it. Flick-It’s genius lies in its natural feel. All that really matters is if it *feels right*. And based on initial impressions, it absolutely does.
The live-service model, which often makes me gently skeptical (will it be endless battle passes or meaningful content?), actually seems to promise something genuinely cool here. Instead of just new cosmetics, the power of this evolved Flick-It system means they can add *entirely new tricks* like Darkslides and Impossibles in later seasons. That’s a bit of a game-changer, isn't it? It suggests a vision that's about expanding gameplay and player expression, not just monetizing digital hats.
So, while the free-to-play wrapper might give some of us pause, the heart of *Skate* – that incredible, mind-bending, trick-inventing Flick-It system – is not only back, but it's more powerful and creatively chaotic than ever. Reckon I’ll be giving this one a proper whirl.
Tags: Skateboarding Games, Game Development, Control Systems, Gaming Innovation, Live Service Games
Original article: Polygon