Tony Hawk's Pro Skater
| Developer: Neversoft | Publisher: Activision |
| Release Date: September 30, 1999 | Also On: Dreamcast, N64 & PS |
Neversoft and Activision helped bring skateboarding back into the mainstream in 1999 when they released Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. The game was far ahead of its time in many ways, introducing a new control scheme and game design that would be mimicked for more than half a decade to follow. Taking a look back, what made Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater so special?
To begin with, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater offered a lot of skateboarding talent on its roster. Name of the game and master of the first 900, Tony Hawk, was joined by other skating legends: constant vert headliners like Bob Burnquist and Bucky Lasek were contrasted by popular street skaters like Chad Muska and Andrew Reynolds. You could choose a skater and then follow out his “career” as he completed goals in eight different levels. This “classic” goal-driven design has since been a part of the Tony Hawk series as well as most extreme sports titles.
The levels were the star of the show. The first Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater paled in comparison to other entries in the series in terms of level design, but this was a solid start. The Warehouse introduced the skater to Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater’s design, offering simple gaps and easy challenges so that the player can get a grasp on the controls. After the warehouse players could skate around a vacant School, race through a closed-down mall, skate the busy streets of Minneapolis, survive the hills of the Phoenix Downhill Jam, and see all of the sights in San Francisco. There were also three closed-course competition levels, the first being in Chicago, the second in Burnside (Portland), and the final one in Roswell, New Mexico.
The game’s basic levels provided challenges in the form of collectible “tapes”. Just like collecting stars in Super Mario 64 or Chaos Emeralds in Sonic Adventure, tapes are the ultimate goal in Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. To earn a tape, you simply complete a level’s challenges. One level might ask you to earn 5,000 points. Another might have you grind five lunch tables. All of the levels had an elusive “Secret Tape” that was more difficult to earn than the other tapes and usually required the player to use all of his or her skill to earn.
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater was an impressive work of art in 1999, especially for the Dreamcast. Still, even with the lower resolutions and blurrier textures of the PlayStation version, the game looked impressive. Players animated more realistically than in any extreme sports game before. Kickflips looked like kickflips (although we know now that animators can make them look much, much better), and ever-painful bails served as a source of entertainment or frustration during the timed 2-minute runs through each level. Joining the good visuals was a soundtrack that even today is considered one of gaming’s best: Dead Kennedys, Goldfinger, Primus, The Vandals, and Suicidal Tendencies were just a few of the names on the list.
Overall, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater is a game that proves the test of time and deserves to be recognized as the foundation of a new genre. Even though it was outdone by every sequel that came after it–especially Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2–Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater is worth revisiting in some form or another. If anything, try it on the Xbox’s Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2X, which combines THPS, THPS2, and a few new levels and challenges for one massive skateboarding experience.
| Graphics: | 8 |
| Sound: | 9 |
| Gameplay: | 8 |
| Creativity: | 10 |
| Replay Value/Game Length: | 8 |
| Final: | 8.6 |
| Written by Cliff | Review Guide |
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