Some may see this as a rant, others may see this as someone who is a little too obsessed with the classic Tony Hawk Pro Skater games, and for those people — they are completely right on both accounts. For each category I will talk about the reasons where the game missed the mark or achieved it but to the detriment of the classic games.

Authenticity

Whether you are playing the demo or the first level of the game, one thing is made clear. The typesets from THPS1 and THPS2 are not default, they are settings you can enable. They should’ve ONLY allowed those type sets to ensure the game stuck to it’s title-based bounderies. Instead what we got was Tony Hawks Underground typesets by default which were used to establish the career goals and a majority of the multiplayer.

Physics

Even if they got the typesets right, everything else in terms of speed, momentum, rotation, and more, were completely untied to THPS games. The originals touted slow acceleration but granted speed upon trick landings and grinding. The new game sped up the acceleration, slowed down grinding, and broke the fun of some goals in the process. Goals that required tricks to be landed right before the big jump, or traversing large areas using a smooth grind were left feeling nerfed and underhanded compared to the originals.

Longevity

One of the best parts of THPS 2, was each time you 100% the game with a given skater, there would either be a unlocked skater or cheat code. Each skater had their own career, adding hours of playtime and variety since each skater had their own tricks and specials. THPS 1+2 destroyed all of that allowing the game to be beaten on day one with one skater that applied to all other skaters. The fun of legitimately getting cheat codes to help your second or third or eighth playthrough was gone, and all that was needed was one playthrough.

Perfect Blueprint

Combining two games and intertwining them can be hard. If only there was a previous game that did that….First off, they didn’t intertwine them, they kept both careers seperate which is a valid choice. It would be surprising to know that not one but two other THPS releases had already done this, AND done it very well. Nope not talking about that horrendous THPS HD game. I am referring to THPS 2X and THPS2 (IOS). Both these games incorporated THPS1 and THPS2 into a singular game, though the latter just brought 3 levels. The point still stands, their have been previous games that figured it out without messing with the game to the point of breaking what it stands for.

Moving Forward

I very much doubt we will ever see another Tony Hawk skating game, but I do hope that IF we do, it’s a carbon copy of the games that already are timeless. People still play THUG2 and THPS3, and me? I am still holding out hope for a true THPS collection where they give us 1-4, in 4K, with textures and frame rate boosts, and maybe some fun unlockables. But to not touch another thing beyond that.