I've had these skates since July and they are still in unbelievable shape. The sides are still incredibly stiff as if they were out of the box.
They're very comfortable although at times the inside wall of the big toe can be slightly uncomfortable. I should note that I did not heat mold these.
The Vertexx cutout thing for pushing off looks cool, but I'm not entirely sure if it makes a difference.
I'm really happy with these. The price is maybe a little more than what I wanted to spend. The Elite pro skates are really comfortable, but I didn't want to drop $600 on skates.