Remember when I did a preview of Just Cause 2; I mentioned I loved extreme sports games? Well, the most prolific genre in that category is the skateboarding game, and boy do I lap that stuff up. Every year Activision release a new Tony Hawks game, and every year I find myself mildly disgusted at myself for lining their back pockets with my hard earned cash to give it a go, safe in the knowledge that I’m going to hate it. But good news! EA started making that series called Skate, which is something I can get behind. And now it’s on its third instalment, the aptly named Skate 3.

The first thing Skate 3 introduces you to is Coach Frank, your friend and mentor throughout, voiced and based on Jason Lee. Why they couldn’t just have Jason Lee appearing as himself is beyond me, though I assume it’s something to do with him starring in TH: Project 8 as himself. Coach Frank, his persona, is a highly irritating man with a stupid catchphrase who starts to grate within the first minute of meeting him. Thankfully, if you’ve played a Skate game before, you can skip that ordeal, but then you might miss out on the new tricks the game has hidden up its sleeve.

See, to keep things fresh, EA have decided to throw two very, very tricky moves into the mix. Underflips are introduced first, and these require lightning fast reflexes in order to pull off. Essentially, you’re pulling off a kickflip that goes into a heelflip, but when you actually try and pull it off, half the time you just end up doing an ollie and wondering what you’re doing wrong. Darkslides are the second trick, and are actually pretty easy to pull off, but failing to get them right when you’ve commited yourself to pulling it off leads to a messy patch of blood on the floor where your face ends up.

You then discover how Skate 3 progresses the career. Levelling up! Yes, in the true spirit of making games bigger and better, EA have decided that every task you complete rewards you with “board sales”, or XP if you’re not trying to confuse yourself. There’s a minimum amount of “board sales” that you get for completing a task normally, but if you “kill” it, by pulling off something a bit more special (as told to you by the game, don’t worry), you are rewarded with some extra board sales to help you, uh, level up. What levelling up actually achieves is still to be seen.

Hall of Meat challenges are back, and this time you can slow down time to line up your landing, and there’s even a handy little dot on the floor that lets you know where you’re going to land. This may also be a good time to mention difficulty levels. EA have introduced difficulties, although what this actually does it affect how easy it is to control your skater. For example, on the easiest setting, you can practically fly through the air when bailing, and flip tricks are made harder to fail. Play on Hardcore, however, and you’ll find yourself falling out of the sky like a ton of bricks, and you’ll need to get some real air before you can start pulling off tricks.

There’s also a multiplayer element, but the one time I tried to play it, the demo froze and my 360 crashed. Screw you, EA.

If you’re interested in the graphics, go out and buy a copy of Skate 2, and you’ve got the same game. There are no improvements or changes in style, except for a slightly more modern set of logos and the use of blue instead of orange. Aside from that, it’s almost a complete carbon copy. Lazy, sure, but it works well, since the graphics were already quite pretty to begin with.

It looks like this time around, your skater will start doing the talking, rather than the camera man, which makes a nice change. Voice acting wasn’t particularly present in the demo (except for Coach Frank, don’t get me started on him), but all the sound effects are back and work wonderfully, particularly the bone crushing sounds when your skater slams into the floor from a 200ft drop. The soundtrack that accompanies the game is pretty good as well, featuring some tracks you might know and others that slide comfortably into the background and don’t intrude on your game.

Overall, Skate 3 is shaping up to be… well… Skate 2. But with a few added improvements. Which is no bad thing; Skate 2 was a fantastic game, and if it ‘aint broke, why fix it? Still, if you’re looking for a whole new skating experience, this isn’t going to be it.

Skate 3 comes out May 11th in America and May 14th in Europe.

Think I’m being a bit fanboyish? Agree with every word? Let us know in the comments!