This shouldn’t come as a surprise to, well, anyone considering the success of EA’s skate and skate 2 — Rumor circulating the web suggests that EA is hard at work on Skate 3, or at least are planning to be hard at work on the game sometime soon.

This rumor comes to us from the Epicly Trife (a site dedicated to skateboarding) twitter which reads: “I just got told ‘tonight we gotta celebrate,’ one of the bro’s got offered to be in SKATE 3.” Now assuming this bro is a pro skater, this rumor may hold some merit.

However, like always, we’ll hold final judgement until we hear word from EA themselves.

EA has recently released word that the next DLC pack for their popular skateboarding game, Skate 2, will feature the Maloof Money Cup and be made available on July 9th for 240 Microsoft Points/$3.00.

The DLC pack will feature the both the park and competition guidelines featured at last year’s Maloof Money Cup:

“Skate 2 has been embraced by the gaming and skateboarding community across the globe, making it the perfect stage for the Maloof Money Cup’s videogame debut,” said Joe Maloof, President of Maloof Companies. “Now players everywhere can experience the world’s greatest skateboarding championship and revel in the high-stakes excitement of the competition for themselves.”

And so I approached Skate 2 on my Xbox 360 with a little bit of trepidation, as I knew it was going to involve a lot of rolling around on wheeled boards and trying desperately not to kill myself.

Skate 2 takes place about five years after a series of horrible catastrophes in Skate left your home city in ruins and apparently also sent you to jail (whoa, so much for “skateboarding is not a crime”, huh guys?).  Now you’re out, but the city you left behind is not the same—five years will make a lot of changes to any town, especially one that’s just been hit by several disasters in a row.  The evil corporation (and you know that there’s got to be one in a game about skateboarders somewhere, right?) MongoCorp has taken over the revitalization effort of the ruined city, converting it into the almost-recognizable New San Vanelona, often referred to throughout the game as New San Van.  MongoCorp is willing to shell out these vast sums of cash to rebuild the city apparently so that it can institute a kind of martial law specifically targeting skateboarders, adding blocks to rails so they can’t be ground, and so on.

This is, of course, as ridiculous as stories get from a narrative sense—next month, watch for the Jenny Craig corporation to nuke and rebuild Brussels to make Belgian chocolate illegal—but the story isn’t exactly what we’re here for.

Now, I will freely admit that if you’re looking for a rail-grinding, box-crunching, trick-landing, air-grabbing good time, then indeed, Skate 2 is EXACTLY what you want.  Even I had a good deal of fun riding around on my skateboard, finding places to do tricks, and soaring into randomness.  I liked that the game put on a pretty nice simulation of speed and open-air movement on the board–I remember one crash where I’d apparently reached twenty-five miles an hour.  I liked the whole “annals of meat” system that rewarded me for doing stuff that wouldn’t even make it to MTV’s Scarred for being too graphic.  I liked the wide array of customization, and no doubt, those who enjoy skateboarding games are going to have a TOTAL blast with this game.

And if you liked the original, then you’re going to have a positive field day with the sequel.  Most of the original stuff has been kept—you’ll recognize a lot of the tricks and gestures and boards and clothes and whatnot.  The stuff that has been altered—mostly city landmarks—have been removed and replaced as would be expected according to the storyline.  In fact, some of those landmarks have been left in place, but noticeably altered.  I’ll admit, from a narrative sense their storyline is the worst kind of limping scrod but they stuck with it come hell or high water.

So basically, yes, if you’re a skater buff then you will go nuts over this game.  Frankly, even if you’re not you’ll likely still get at least a little entertainment out of this, which is great.  But if you’re not a skate buff, don’t expect much more than a rental’s worth of fun out of it.

PS3 users get custom soundtracks, while both versions get better off-board controls, a more streamlined approach towards retrying a challenge and the squashing of several bugs.

The patch will be delivered once players sign-in online using the game. Full details can be found here.

Skate 2 has been out since January 21st and recieved generally good reception ever since. Well, EA has kept it’s promise and released some DLC for the game.

Included in the pack is Rob Dyrdek’s Fantasy Factory skatepark, taken from the MTV show, and the surrounding LA area which means a ton of new spots to skate on.

The new pack is available now for $5 on the PS3 and 400 Microsoft Points on the 360.

There seemed to be some confusion over the release date of the late EA Black Box’s Skate 2 as the demo had the game’s release date as today, the 23rd, while retailers and news sources had it listed as the 21st.

Either or, the game is now officially on store shelves everywhere, some stores got it the 21st (my local Gamestop got it yesterday, the 22nd) but if you’re a diehard fan of the Skate series, you probably already knew that.

With the recent news that EA will be closing its Black Box studio, let’s just hope sales are good enough for a Skate 3.

Just in case you missed it yesterday, here’s a friendly reminder. The demo for EA’s upcoming skateboarding game, skate 2, hit the Xbox Live Marketplace yesterday.

Featured in the demo are 2 different game modes; campaign and party play. The campaign demo is just a general run through of the new features added to skate 2 such as new tricks in the trick book, and the ability to move objects. The party play, on the other hand, showcases one of skate 2’s new multiplayer game types; Hall of Meat. 

Unfortunately, the demo will not allow for play over Xbox Live as previously thought, but it’s still fun to completely wreck your skater with or without friends along side you. skate 2 is currently scheduled to hit shelves on January 23rd.

The publisher promised the demo would offer a sample of the single-player portion of the game, as well as two online modes: Hall of Meat where players attempt to rack up the most injuries, and Spot Battle that focuses on scoring major points.

Skate 2 is due out in North America on January 21.

Defying expectations of a March 2009 release, EA today sent word that Skate 2, the sequel to the popular skateboarding game, will hit stores in North America on January 21, 2009 and the world two days later.

To make the deal sweeter, EA also revealed that those who pre-order the game now will receive an exclusive code to unlock the Throwback Pack, a special upgrade pack that includes retro clothing, accessories and gestures in-game.

Skate 2 will have you revive the skating scene of New San Vanelona, a city that is recovering from an “unspeakable disaster five years ago.” You will be tasked with creating your own skating career; it will let you create your own epic spots and challenges which can be uploaded and shared with the rest of the world.

The game is due out on PS3 and Xbox 360.

Skateboarding fans everywhere will be pleased to hear that EA’s skate 2 will be hitting shelves stateside January of next year.

This comes to us from IGN who, after thumbing through their pre-release Mirror’s Edge copies, noticed a skate 2 advertisement that states the game will be “In Stores January 2009″. Following their discovery, they phoned EA who gave them confirmation that they are, in fact, set for a January ‘09 release.

So there it is, you’ll be back flicking it in San Vanelona sooner than you may have thought.

Read(IGN)