http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/06/17/e3-2015-tony-hawks-pro-skater-5-sees-old-meet-new1:"the team have added the ability to push when you're playing - gone are the days of desperately jumping up and down to try and muster some speed. Holding down R2 causes you to push off, though you won't be able to achieve max speed this way. As you'd expect, this has also necessitated the creation of a brake ability, which can be found on L2."
So they removed auto-kick? Great. Not only is R2 "push off", it's also Spin right, Revert and switch stance(powerslide)?? L2 is then Spin left, Brake and Fakie/regular. L1/R1 should be spins.
2: "The second major change is to the way grinding works. A popular playstyle used to see gamers hold down triangle as they jumped in order to snap to the nearest rail and start grinding but, thanks to the addition of a new "Slam" move, this isn't an option any longer. Holding triangle will now see you plummet towards the ground. It's a useful ability, designed to enable you to stop yourself overshooting jumps, though as an added benefit it means you need to be much more skillful with your grind timing."
Because we needed help to not overshoot rails. It's called skill and timing. Holding triangle makes to fall??! What is the point of that?!
3: "The final modification is the ability to use your filled Special bar when you wish. Whereas previously it used to trigger as soon as your bar was full, the studio realised this could sometimes frustratingly result in a wasted boost. Now, once the bar is full, it'll remain so until you elect to trigger the benefits by pressing L1"
FFS! Yes, it would trigger when the special meter was full.. from THPS3 - on it at least STAYED special until you bailed! Now we are stuck with a decaying special meter. That gives us, what, 20 seconds per combo to do specials? Do they seriously not realize that good players can combo for more than 5 minutes straight? We brought this up months ago and they have not changed a thing.
My hope is dwindling.