When I reminisce about the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater series, my most cherished memories center around the first three entries. THPS 1-3 was my prime with the franchise, the games that introduced me to Mr. Hawk, his skateboarding friends/rivals, and skateboarding culture in general.
These are the titles that convinced me that I, too, could skateboard, to the point I went down a rather tall half-pipe before learning how to stay upright on a board. “I nail the 900 all the time in the games, so surely this isn’t so hard,” I confidently thought. This attempt went about as well as Peter Griffin walking down stairs. Misplaced confidence aside, this exemplifies my obsession with the first three games, as they inspired me to do something very, very dumb.
Those warm and mildly painful memories do not apply to Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4. Released in 2002, I didn’t have the means at the time to buy the game for my PlayStation 2. It was the first Tony Hawk game I didn’t own, instead borrowing a copy from a friend or playing it at their house. The game did not hit for me.
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4 changed gears by featuring a free-roaming world. Gone were the run-based challenges and the two-minute timer. Instead, players had free rein to explore the larger parks to complete objectives at their leisure. This blueprint would form the foundation for subsequent entries, such as the Underground and American Wasteland games. Perhaps I was resistant to change as a then-14-year-old, or maybe I was subconsciously experiencing burnout with the series after playing a new game for three years straight, but I did not enjoy THPS 4 nearly as much as its predecessors.
This initial impression cemented Tony Hawk 4 in my brain as a “so-so” experience for years. I didn’t touch it again after 2002, but as time passed and my critiques became fuzzier, I began to wonder if I hadn’t given the game a fair shake. So when Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 was announced, I was excited to revisit the fourth game with a new coat of paint and a fresh perspective. Like many THPS 4 fans, I was disappointed to learn developer Iron Galaxy didn’t just make the game look better; it effectively remolded it in the two-minute timed image of THPS 3.
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4’s College level
I understand the motive for this approach. THPS 3 is the best-reviewed entry in the series; why wouldn’t you want the comparatively more polarizing fourth game to mirror that successful blueprint? However, this means the original design I hoped to reevaluate no longer exists. But it’s a shame, because this approach robs players of one of the best, but least talked about, benefits of a more faithful remake: the opportunity to reassess.
It’s one of the reasons I loved the 2020 Demon’s Souls remake. It didn’t “get” the appeal of the game when it first arrived in 2009. I disliked the hub-based structure and high difficulty. “This is stupid and hard,” I thought as those rolling skeletons dudes cut me down for the umpteenth time. “How on Earth could someone enjoy this?” I gave up on the game quickly and never looked back. It wasn’t until Dark Souls introduced an interconnected world that the appeal clicked for me, and I fell in love with From Software’s then-new sub-genre of action games. As I played and enjoyed future entries like Bloodborne and Sekiro, Demon’s Souls was long-branded in my mind as the “weird” entry that wasn’t very good.
Demon’s Souls (2020)
Replaying Demon’s Souls for Game Informer via the 2020 remake, which was largely a graphical facelift, I found myself enjoying and appreciating the game far more for what it is and tries to do, now that I had a fresh perspective to view it from. If developer Blue Point had more radically changed Demon’s Souls’ hub-like design to more closely resemble Dark Souls’ more successful template, it might have resulted in an even better game. But then I would have just viewed this as Blue Point “fixing” Demon’s Souls, further cementing my existing, perhaps somewhat bad-faith opinion that the original iteration was always terrible.
I wish I could do the same for Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4. Looking back, I know my criticisms weren’t completely fair, and I would have loved to re-experience it from a place of excitement rather than burnout or mild resentment at its changes. Even if I still didn’t like it as much as the first three games, I’d at least be able to form a more educated and measured opinion as to why. I’ll have to hunt down an original copy of the game to do this, if for no other reason than in hopes my opinion will improve enough to spur me down another half-pipe.