The Tony Hawk series of games are perhaps the only sports games I have ever enjoyed. The first one I ever got my hands on was Pro Skater 3 back in 2001 and it was really like nothing else I had ever played. Instead of being a straight up simulator of real life skateboarding, it knew that in order to make a good video game based on real skateboarding you would need to combine the logic of video games with real life skateboarding. So what you end up with is a game where you skate around locations inspired by real life, doing real skateboarding tricks, but you're also able to jump (or ollie for all of us who understand skateboarding terminology) to super human heights, grind on rails to create earthquakes, break into a haunted house, stop criminals at an airport and all sorts of other crazy things. It's a skateboarding video game that knows it's a video game.
See this? This is a good Pro
Skater game!
So, what happened to the
Pro Skater series I hear you ask? Well, the last Pro Skater (Tony
Hawk's Pro Skater 4) was released in 2002 to high acclaim, but after
this the series had a number of re-brands and re-stylisations,
starting with the Tony Hawk's Underground series (which introduced a
story mode and a more realistic vibe focusing on underground skate
scenes) and eventually ending with the extremely poorly received
motion controlled spin offs to the main series; Tony Hawk: Ride and
Tony Hawk: Shred.
Just what Pro Skater fans
wanted right? Motion controls!
After this, the series
wasn't heard from for a while. That is until Robomodo (the company
that took over from Neversoft to create the previously mentioned
motion controlled games) decided to reintroduce the world to the Pro
Skater series with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD. This was a HD
re-imagining of some of the levels from Pro Skater 1, 2 and 3, but
was the game any good you ask?
Well, it received fairly average
reviews but is considered among Pro Skater fans to be
disappointing, primarily due to the lack of features that were in the
original Pro Skater series such as create-a-skater, the ability to
play splitscreen with friends, create-a-park, the ability to spine
transfer and the ability to revert (however the latter was added as
DLC along with three Pro Skater 3 levels).
This gave a slight bit of
hope for Pro Skater fans... Now, that hope is gone. Just like the
money I spent on Pro Skater 5.
After the digital only Pro
Skater HD came out, the series again looked as if it had gone into
remission. Until three years later, a true sequel to Pro Skater 4 was
announced. It was finally here... Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5. But does
it fix the mistakes made with Pro Skater HD? And is it the
revitalisation that this once great series had been looking for?
Well... If you want the short version of the review. No. No it isn't
very good.
The problem seems to be that
instead of getting a new team who actually understood the inner
workings of the old Pro Skater games Activision chose to yet again
hire Robomodo to take on the great task of making a brand new Pro
Skater. I really don't understand why this was done after Pro Skater
HD being quite lackluster, but there we go, it happened. And what we
are left with is a game that fixes some issues with Pro Skater HD but
does nothing to fix other issues and also creates new ones.
They have a good ident.
Shame about the game. Also, why can't you skip these idents?
An issue that has been fixed
in Pro Skater 5 (from Pro Skater HD) is the lack of the create-a-park
mode. You can now create skate parks based on levels within the main
game, starting with a flat area and building vert ramps, rails and
all other manner of obstacles and skate equipment. You can also play
other people's skate parks and upload your own for other people to
play and rate.
However when this game takes
one step forward it take four steps back. Arguably the biggest issue
with Pro Skater HD was it's lack of local multiplayer. I will never
ever understand the logic of anyone who doesn't put local multiplayer
in a game that A: has previous entries in the series that both feature and
are well known for local multiplayer and B: would highly benefit from
having local multiplayer. And guess what? Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5
does not have any sort of local multiplayer. Absolutely ridiculous.
Most of the time I spend playing the original Pro Skater games is
with a friend, playing the plethora of modes that the previous
entries offered. The lack of local multiplayer in Pro Skater 5,
severely limits it's play-ability and lessens the fun of the game by an
immeasurable amount.
Where's multiplayer? It's
got to have it right? Right?
The game does however feature online multiplayer, but this is never a
real replacement for local multiplayer. So let's talk a little about
the online modes... Basically, it works well, I've had a few matches
on different game types, most of which just being the standard trick
attack (you have two minutes to score the most points), but I've had
a couple on the manual challenge mode too (where your score is based
on the amount of time you spend manualing multiplied by your combo
multiplier). The inherent problem with the online mode is that hardly
anyone plays it because the game isn't very good. Even when you get a
match it will most likely be on the first level with someone who
hasn't played the game much, resulting in the experienced player
always winning and the least experienced person leaving instantly.
Also, every time I've played online it's been with one opponent, when
it can be with eight opponents, but obviously not that many people
are playing for the online mode at any time. Another problem is that
the method you use to search for matches is terrible. Rather than
just having a system where you go to the main menu and create/search
for matches, there is no way of searching for a specific match. You
need to enter the normal single player and go on quick match and
simply hope someone else has created a match. Or you can create your
own match and wait for a very long time until someone happens to
click quick match too. There is the option to invite people, but the
recent players list updates slowly (at least on PS4) meaning you
can't even invite the people you see skating around in the single
player mode most of the time.
Another online part of the game is supposed to replace the NPCs
featured in the other Pro Skater games. This is a nice thought in
theory, but in practice it simply doesn't work. When in freeskate
mode you can see other people playing online skating around (if you
have an internet connection and PlayStation Plus or Xbox Live Gold),
but you can't communicate with them, making it pointless. And this
lack of interactivity ultimately means that this online feature does
not replace the NPCs at all, it just sort of teases you. You see
these other people skating around but you don't feel like you're
skating with them.
They all just stand there... Teasing me with their presence...
The create-a-skater mode
that was a big part of the older Pro Skater games is absent once
again. I say absent... A half hearted attempt at character
customisation has been made but it really isn't very good. You have a
selection of heads you can choose from, a selection of bodies and a
selection of decks. And that's all. You can't customise hats, facial
features, beards, colour of clothes, bags, tattoos, hair styles, type
of shirt, type of trousers, shoes, nothing. These are features that
you can customise on Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, a game released in
2000 on PS1 (just to put it into perspective).
Despite the lack of features
in previous entries though, how does the game play? Well. It plays
okay. An issue for me (and most likely other people that played any
main series Tony Hawk game in the past) is that the push button is
now R2 (I played on PS4) instead of being X and to stop you press L2
instead of pressing down on the d-pad (or holding down on the
analogue stick). This is very strange and I honestly don't know why
this was changed. The original series games controlled perfectly,
it's almost like Robomodo just wanted to screw with the people who
loved the older games. But anyway, once you get used to the new
movement controls everything else feels pretty much the same. Grab,
lip and flip tricks all work in the same way they did in every other
Tony Hawk game and you can now spine transfer and revert (unlike in
Pro Skater HD, at least before the DLC). However some more advanced
moves have been taken out of the game, such as flatland tricks (added
in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4) and grind/lip extensions (again added in
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4). So for people used to getting high scoring
combos using these methods, you'll need to simplify the way you play
slightly.
Jump, flip, grind. Jump,
flip, grind. Jump, flip, grind.
Another very strange change
made to the game is that you can't bail from a manual or a grind.
Very, very strange as this basically completely gets rid of any
tension when balancing during a big combo. Instead of bailing and
losing your combo, the combo now ends and you still get all the
points. This means the game also requires way less skill to play and
even if you mess up you can still score highly. The only reason I can
think of for this change is that there is no longer a getting up
animation. In the older games when you bailed you would mash buttons
to make your character get up faster adding pressure to you as a
player and making you want to get up as quickly as possible to start
your combo again. In Pro Skater 5 however, the screen flashes white
and your character is magically up on his or her feet again. Maybe
Robomodo didn't want this happening too much so made it almost
impossible to bail in the first place.
Let's talk about how the
game is actually set out. Basically, you select a skater, select a
level and then enter your chosen level as your chosen skater. The
level starts in a 'freeskate' mode, here you can skate around and
collect the hidden SKATE letters (a returning feature from the
original Pro Skater games), collect the COMBO letters which you have
to do in one combo (like in Pro Skater 4), find the hidden VHS (like
in the original games), find the hidden DVD (like in Pro Skater HD)
and find a certain number of level specific objects. As well as
freeskate mode, you can activate missions which will send you to a
certain area of the level and ask you to do a specific thing, such as
do a combo that reaches this particular score in a set amount of
time. As you unlock more levels these missions get harder and if you
complete all missions in one level you unlock the pro missions (which
are just harder variants of a mission you have already done). What is
good about this is that the freeskate mode basically makes you learn
the layout of the level so that you can find lines and good places to
get high scores so you can then complete the missions easier. However
this is nothing new and is pretty much copied and pasted from Pro
Skater 4 which had almost the exact same structure. Only Pro Skater 4
did it better because you had to not only explore the level to find
collectables, but you also had to find someone to talk to in order to
start your mission. In Pro Skater 5, you can enter a menu and just
start any mission you want from there. No exploration required. This
takes away from the enjoyment of exploration slightly but it could be
worse. At least in freeskate mode you still have the collectables to
find.
Just thought I would put
this picture here to remind people that the Pro Skater series was
good at one point. Now back to Pro Skater 5...
Some new features added into
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5 are, the power-ups that are scattered across
most levels of the game and the ability to slam. The slam function
basically enables you to fall straight to the ground (or onto a rail)
at the press of a button (however I would seriously recommend to
anyone that you change the slam function to activate when you double
tap the triangle button otherwise you may go to grind something and
end up accidentally slamming to the ground, ending your combo
unexpectedly, this is a feature which was added in the huge 1.03
update). The slam function I actually quite like, it can be a little
bit weird getting used to it but once you do you'll be able to use it
to accurately jump from one rail to another even if that jump would
have been difficult in the older games.
The power ups however, I
have a bit of a problem with. The levels in Pro Skater 5 feel very
static and uninteractive. Yeah there are certain objects you can
crash into and they move, but other than that it doesn't really feel
like you're doing very much. There are no NPCs, no cars, not even any
voiceovers. Everything feels flat and dead and this is an issue
because this means the game doesn't have any character or charm.
Because of this, I feel like the power-ups were shoe-horned in as an
attempt to inject some personality into the levels, but really, if
the game had already got personality the power-ups would have been
unnecessary. The power-ups are unique to each level and allow you to
do things like gain speed while manualling, double jump and have moon
gravity. But again, if the levels would have been designed slightly
differently these power-ups would have been completely pointless.
One of the best things about
the Pro Skater series has always been the zany objectives within the
levels, you can make an elephant crash into an aquarium which opens up a
whole new section of the level to play, you can skitch on the back of
a stolen car to return it to it's owner, you can jump into a tree
causing the snow to fall and bury someone. These fun and level
specific objectives made not only the original games stand out but
also each level had it's own personality and charm due to what you
did within the levels. Now, back to Pro Skater 5...
The objectives in Pro Skater
5 are not level specific and are repeated in every level. Each level
has a grind challenge, manual challenge, high combo challenge, high
score challenge and a stupid make the big balls get out of the bowl
challenge. And that's about it. One challenge which is actually quite
good is the big head survival challenges where your head gets bigger
and bigger until it explodes and the only way to stop it is to land a
combo, but as time goes on your head inflates faster meaning you need
to do the combos faster to match it. However, this (like all the
objectives) is repeated in every level and quickly gets boring.
Another big head survival objective...
How many heads does Tony Hawk have exactly?
The music is good. It could
have done with a few more well known tracks and maybe some throwback
tracks from the old Pro Skater days, but what we have got is decent.
It is probably in need of some more funky, upbeat songs but this
would have only been a little issue if the game had been good. Also,
the tracklist probably could have done with being longer, it gets a
bit tiring after a long period of play after the tracks start
repeating themselves. One big problem with the tracklist however is
that as far as I can tell there isn't a way of actually viewing or
customising the music tracks. If you want to play a certain song or
only play certain genres or skip a song, or if you like a song and
want to listen to more from a particular artist. You can't. Nowhere
does it display what song is playing or give you any control over
what's playing. This is very silly and you would have thought the
artists would have wanted this feature in the game too so it would
work better as a promotional tool for them.
One thing a lot of people
have said, is that the game is full of glitches. While I have come
across a few glitches (three of which required me to restart the
game), this hasn't actually been as bad as I thought it was going to
be. Although that's not saying much because I expected it to be
really really bad and it turns out it's just bad. And even then that
could be down to the fact that I played the game after the 8GB update
(bringing the game to version 1.03). I imagine the glitches were a lot worse before then.
Also, why when a mission is
loading is the logo for the game so pixelly? Anyone?
Graphically, the game is
actually alright. I don't at all mind the new cartoon style graphics
and I actually think this could have fit quite well with the tone(y
Hawk) of the previous games. The problem however, is that everything
looks empty and smooth. If the game had more interestingly themed
levels, NPC characters, more interactivity, more attention to detail
and still had the same art style it has now, I don't think I would have a
problem with it. I think the problem visually is not due to the
actual graphics but the level design and general game design choices
which limits how the game looks.
Another annoying thing about
Pro Skater 5 is that you gain stat points for one specific character
as opposed to the Pro Skater 4 method of gaining stat points. Because
Pro Skater 3 was a short game, it was created to be played through
multiple times with different characters, therefore each character
having their own stat points made sense. It gave you a reason to
replay the game as another character. However in Pro Skater 4, the
single player mode was massivley expanded and they changed the stat
point system to match this. Instead of having to play through the
whole game with every character, you had to play through once and the
stat points were unlocked universally across all the characters. Pro
Skater 5 is not a short game. It's not as long as Pro Skater 4 by any
means but it's also a lot longer than Pro Skater 3. Because the stat
points work based on gaining them with each character (like in Pro
Skater 3) it results in you having to grind (get it!!? It's a
skateboarding based joke!) through the game as every character if you
want to get 100% completion. The stat system really should have
worked like in Pro Skater 4 as opposed to Pro Skater 3.
There is also no level
unlock notification (aside from a tiny bit of text you just ignore,
seriously, I only spotted it because I was specifically looking for
it). Remember in Pro Skater 3 when the levels unlocked and you were
actually notified? Good times.
As previously mentioned, I
played the game with the version 1.03 update. I hadn't played the
game before this update (because I wasn't going to spend a full
retail games price for this game to get it on release). But I had
watched lots of videos of it in action before the update. So, what
does this free update add? It actually adds and fixes quite a lot. It
adds two new levels, a wild west level and an underground level. Two
new characters, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Tyler the
Creator. And it makes quite a lot of fixes to the game. For example,
loading times have been reduced, certain levels have had a bit of a
lighting makeover, certain character textures have been changed and
some general bug fixes have been done. The thing with this update, is
that it should have been in the game to begin with. The wild west and
underground levels should have been secret levels, and the Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles and Tyler the Creator should have been secret
skaters (oh by the way, don't expect any hidden things like in the
old Pro Skater games) and the texture, lighting and bug fixes should
have been in the game from the start. So yeah the update is good, but
it is annoying for those that bought the game at full price expecting
the game to function well. For a more comprehensive list of changes
made in the update you can click this link:
All in all, really, if you
want to play a Tony Hawk game, just go with Pro Skater 3 or 4. You
really aren't missing much at all by not playing Pro Skater 5. It's
bland, boring, has no charm, doesn't expand on the series in any way
(in fact it's a step backwards from Pro Skater 3 and in some ways
even Pro Skater 2) and doesn't even have local multiplayer. The
update makes the game a lot more playable, but that's all it is. It's
playable. That doesn't mean that you should play it. I feel bad for
the people who are maybe new to the series or haven't played a Pro
Skater game before and judge it based on Pro Skater 5.
3/10
Pros
- Create-a-park sharing system
is good
- Tracklist is okay
- The new slam function could
have had potential if the game had been good
- The base game is actually fairly decent
- The base game is actually fairly decent
Cons
- Bland, boring, non
interactive level design
- Repetitive and uninteresting
objectives
- Very bad character customisation
options
- Requires an 8GB update for
the game to be half playable
- No local multiplayer
- Power-ups feel like a poor
attempt at making the level design more interesting
- Stat point system means that
you need to replay the whole game again if you want to increase the
stats of more than one skater
- The online multiplayer has
an unintuitive search system and is almost completely empty anyway
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