However, this clever twist doesn’t feel all that well-integrated in Skatebird because of how lax and unresponsive the animations are.
#SKATEBIRD TAPE LOCATIONS HOW TO#
One of the key hooks of Skatebird’s skating is your ability to flap your wings and Ollie a second time in mid-air, effectively giving you a skating double jump - something that, in theory, should blow the doors off our preconceived notions of how to chain together strings of moves and combos. The game’s camera is also prone to jumping up your bird’s beak and refusing to show you the course in any meaningful way. As little as brushing left or right on your control stick can send your bird moving at a perpendicular angle and careening off course. The birds themselves are just too unruly to steer around, with their momentum alternating from parked boulder to runaway train, with no settings in between. Without any more visual or mechanical feedback, hitting a large combo doesn’t feel exciting or like anything the player themselves performed, more something the game is telling them to trust is happening because of the big number on the screen. Stringing together moves for combos feels perfunctory and lacking in a sense of response to your input - there’s only so much animation a pleasantly plump, adorable looking owl can do to show they’re attempting a kickflip. Skatebird’s moment to moment gameplay is bland at best, and actively hostile at worst. Unfortunately, when you get past the clever story and the inherent humor of birds on skateboards, you have to get into how Skatebird handles the action of skating, and the end result is disappointing. It’s a fun, amusing justification for why these birds are skating on a city roof, and while players likely would have just accepted the idea that birds want to shred, it’s neat that there’s some sort of narrative reason behind the idea. You also have a dedicated button for screaming, which is very fun.Īll of these charming facets of Skatebird are ancillary to its central story, which has your protagonist bird teaming up with other feathered friends to rescue their human owner (or Big Friend, as they call him) from his dead-end day job, which must be terrible because it’s keeping him away from his bird pals. These are unlocked via secret cassette tapes that are scattered around Skatebird’s five parks, and are each extremely rewarding to find. Skatebird’s soundtrack is also a clear highlight, with the initial tracks hitting a “lo-fi beats to skate to” sweet spot, and extra unlockable tunes that switch up the pace with ska and punk tracks from bands like We Are The Union, Illicit Nature, and Grave Danger. There are a tremendous number of different costumes and customization items for your birds, and a staggeringly vast array of bird breeds to choose from, putting you firmly in the middle of a veritable toybox, with more items being unlockable within the game. The birds you choose to shred up its miniature skateparks are all cute and endearing. Skatebird has a ton of charm, and knows how to look the part. However, as every former teen has to understand one day, looking cool and actually being cool are very different, and it’s much easier to look like a skater than it is to actually know how to skate. Those who are good at skating are cool, and all of the equipment associated with the sport - the board, the pads, the helmet, the anti-establishment attitude - equals being cool.
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