Remember When? | Tony Hawk Games

<p>At the beginning of this century&comma; extreme sports games were all the rage&period; You couldn&&num;8217&semi;t walk down the gaming aisle without seeing a <em>Kelly Slater Pro Surfer<&sol;em> game&comma; or more importantly&comma; a <em>Tony Hawk Pro Skater<&sol;em> game&period; This was back in the day when yearly releases were very uncommon and sequels over the number two even more uncommon&comma; but Neversoft and Activision kept extreme sports fans like me happy every October or so&period; Each year the game would get better&comma; improvements would be made&comma; levels would grow&comma; and gamers would smile&period; As of late &comma;the extreme skateboarding genre has been taking many kicks to the head&period; No wonder more and more people are looking into products like the <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;thefloatlife&period;com&sol;pages&sol;onewheel-accessories"><strong>onewheel accessories<&sol;strong><&sol;a> by The Float Life&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Nothing seems poised to have these games makes a comeback&comma; so let&&num;8217&semi;s take a look at the joy we use to get from them&comma; and where it went horribly&comma; horribly wrong&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2014&sol;05&sol;05105921&sol;tonyhawk600&period;jpg"><img class&equals;"aligncenter size-full wp-image-61468" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2014&sol;05&sol;05105921&sol;tonyhawk600&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Tony Hawk" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"336" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The first <em>Tony Hawk Pro Skater<&sol;em> game came out during the PS1 generation&comma; it was released August of 1999&comma; and it was something that gamers had never seen before&period; The game garnered amazing reviews&comma; and gamers bought it up by the board-load&period; They loved the controls&comma; the career mode&comma; the tricks&comma; the soundtrack and the graphics&comma; and the competition&comma; there was no doubt that a sequel would appear to grind the rail&period; And Activision answered the call&comma; a little over a year later <em>Tony Hawk&&num;8217&semi;s Pro Skater 2<&sol;em> was released and was met with high sales and high reviews&period; This was also the first time the player could use the &&num;8220&semi;manual&&num;8221&semi; which would allow you skate on two wheels and link tricks together so that you could school your friends in the high score&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>I remember I use to have friends over&comma; we&&num;8217&semi;d create ourselves in <em>Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3<&sol;em> and battle on the boards&period; We would spend hours and hours finding every little place to grind&comma; to flip&comma; ollie and revert&period; We became skating masters without ever skinning a knee or breaking a bone&comma; which is a good thing&comma; we may have gotten controller burn&comma; but that&&num;8217&semi;s easily healed&period; Many say that 3 and 4 were the pinnacle of the series and that once <em>Underground<&sol;em> came out the series began to go downhill&period; They obviously had run out of fresh gameplay ideas at that point&comma; these games are the ones that introduced getting off of the board to run around the world instead of skate around it&period; Not the brightest idea&comma; but it worked for a bit&comma; you could climb buildings to find special jumps&comma; do tricks from rooftop to rooftop and spray-paint every now and then&period; The flashier graphics and better controls made these games very fun&comma; but gone were the days where you were stuck in one level and trying your hardest to spell S-K-A-T-E&comma; they hid those in the game&comma; but it just didn&&num;8217&semi;t have the same feeling to me&period; Adding in a campaign like story really took away from the earlier magic of the game&comma; and sadly&comma; they stuck with that idea for the remaining games&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2014&sol;05&sol;05105905&sol;THUG2&lowbar;002-large&period;jpg"><img class&equals;"aligncenter size-full wp-image-61470" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2014&sol;05&sol;05105905&sol;THUG2&lowbar;002-large&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Tony Hawk" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"480" &sol;><&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>While <em>Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3<&sol;em> was released on the cusp of the PS2 era&comma; <em>Tony Hawk American Wasteland<&sol;em> was released on the cusp of the Xbox 360 era&period; This game built upon the mechanics of <em>T&period;H&period;U&period;G&period;<&sol;em> and was the last game of its kind to fully hold my attention&period; The story was pretty engaging&colon; you were skating around Los Angelos trying to get away from your past&comma; saving the damsel in distress&period; You travel with Mindy so that she can get her drawings into a little skating magazine called oddly enough American Wasteland&period; As you travel you build up your rep and make money to continue skating&comma; while this game boasted some of the biggest skating maps at the time&comma; it still lacked the magic and charm the originals had&period; The final nail in the coffin was Tony Hawk Project 8 that left me with a bad taste in my mouth&comma; seeing as I bought the game&comma; then got stuck at the very beginning due to the fact that the controls were a bit off and I couldn&&num;8217&semi;t snap a picture of myself&period; I tried time after time for a few days&comma; then finally gave up and the neglected name has sat on my shelf since then&comma; maybe after writing this I&&num;8217&semi;ll dust if off and see what I can do&comma; but don&&num;8217&semi;t hold your breath&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>When the brief peripheral phase hit gaming everyone jumped into the act&comma; even poor old Tony Hawk&period; <em>Tony Hawk&&num;8217&semi;s Ride<&sol;em> and <em>Shred<&sol;em> were the sad and final pats on the mound by the shovel&period; The game sold for about eighty dollars&comma; which was pretty pricey back then for a hunk of plastic to pretend to board on&comma; the game and its sequel were failures&period; I personally have never played the game&comma; and almost purchased it when it was on super sale but I passed&comma; probably a smart choice on my part since my knees are horrendous&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s been five years since these franchise destroyers hit the market&comma; and Tony Hawk still hasn&&num;8217&semi;t made an amazing comeback&period; Yes in August of 2012 we were blessed with an HD remake of the original title&comma; but that isn&&num;8217&semi;t enough to get the firestorm moving again&period; A full retail game that takes the best of the series and removes the &&num;8220&semi;off the board&&num;8221&semi; mechanic&comma; improves the picture mechanic and makes it like Infamous&colon; Second Son&comma; and brings back the magic that the Birdman had all those years ago&period; We all know that Activision likes to make money shelling out sequels&comma; so why don&&num;8217&semi;t they take a chance and make an old school Tony Hawk game for the Next Gen and rake in all that cash&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;