8 October 2015
For fans of the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series, the 29th September 2015 will be a date difficult to forget. This was the launch day for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5 which has subsequently become a front runner for the worst game of the year. The hype was big at first, then it slowly grinded (sorry) to a halt. Previews from gaming media weren't looking fantastic, and the marketing push for the game wasn't there just ahead of its release. Hence only the biggest Pro Skater fans were still excited for the end of September. And boy were their dreams crushed.
Rewinding the years, I've always been a massive Tony Hawk video game fan. I remember playing the original at a friend's house on PS one, and eventually owning Pro Skater 2, although these aren't my greatest memories. Pro Skater 3, the peak of the series for many people, was another game I vividly remember playing on PS2 round at friend's houses and would later own. But the height of the series for me has to be Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4. This along with Burnout 2 were the first two games I owned on PS2. Pro Skater 4 had everything from the previous games but with new trick sets, new challenges, and a career mode that actually felt like a career. Free skate replacing the 2 minute run was arguably the biggest change in the first 4 games and encouraged you to play for longer. Even after completing the missions I would spend hours finding new gaps to create the best combo lines imaginable. Following Pro Skater 4, I also owned the two Underground titles and finished with American Wasteland. All three were great games that deserve higher credit in my opinion. Each added something new to the sublime core mechanics, with American Wasteland even adding BMX gameplay which felt like an entirely new game in itself.
Unfortunately the Tony Hawk licensed video games hit the downslope after this, with the slight exception of the 2012 digital title Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD. A good throwback to Pro Skater 2, but criminal to leave out split-screen multiplayer.
This leads us to 2015 and the announcement of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5. Needless to say I was super excited for the game, and couldn't quite believe it was due to launch in September this year, given the game was only officially revealed in May. This should have been the first warning sign. Soon previews were popping up online and I can't recall any real positive vibes for the game. Most media outlets would say something like it's still early in development and they'd have time to scrub up the graphics and fix the bugs. I still had a glass much more than half full and believed developer Robomodo could turn it around (the same guys behind the 2012 HD release). If only this were true...
Around the launch date I was eagerly searching for people on Twitch livestreaming the game to see what it actually played like (another warning sign being searching for it on Twitch). Of the few gamers I found, no one was having a very pleasant time. Bugs and glitches were persistent, and the online aspect was crippling load times and just annoying people. A few days later I found out there was a 7GB patch for the game when it was originally only a 4GB install. It seems this converted the game from unplayable to a barely stable state. As a result review scores across the board (sorry again) were not a happy sight for any Pro Skater fan.
At the time of writing, Pro Skater 5 has been out just over a week and the game has practically disappeared from conversations and media. However today I did see a review video by Tim Gettys at Kinda Funny. A lifelong Tony Hawk's video game fan who I hoped could draw blood from the stone that is Pro Skater 5. If anything this made me realise how tragic the game really is.
Firstly the new slam feature, which I had seen promoted in an early trailer, was intended to slam the player down whenever hanging in the air, in order to hit a ramp or rail that you would have otherwise flew over. Potentially increasing momentum. I could see the idea. However, two problems with this. A) this was never really an issue in the old Pro Skater games because hangtime was everything. You bust out your biggest grab trick to score huge or try to make that massive gap to maintain your combo. B) Slam has been mapped to triangle, the same button as grind and cannot be changed. Whoever thought of this needs shooting. Now there are situations where you want to grind but slam down before hitting the rail, ending your combo and losing all momentum. This is an awful solution to a problem that didn't exist.
Next the missions or challenges. There are classic high scores and collect the SKATE and COMBO letters, but the rest are incredibly boring and repetitive, such as knocking balls out of a pool. Where are the 'Lip trick on the helicopter', or 'Special trick over this gap' missions? The reason the latter doesn't exist is another point for ranting...
The whole system behind Special tricks has been changed and ruined for skilful players. First of all, pressing L1 now activates Special, which triggers a coloured vapour trail behind your skater - bit weird - but the worst thing is that every trick performed is now a special trick. Pressing triangle does a special grind, pressing square does a special flip trick etc. The skill of remembering special trick combos, and using the right ones at the right time, has all gone. I had no idea this had been implemented and couldn't believe Robomodo had changed such a core mechanic of the Pro Skater series.
Continuing with tricks, there are some other major elements missing. There are no flatground tricks as in Pro Skater 4. There are no grind or lip trick variations, which were awesome to boost your combo. There are no double or triple button grab or flip tricks, so no double kickflip in the game. But the biggest omission has to be the spine transfer! The key mechanic introduced in Pro Skater 3 to link combos between vert ramps has not been included. Again, someone needs shooting for that decision.
This list of issues goes on with dull, lifeless levels, and ever present in-game cues to encourage you to play online. Playing the single player career while other online players are skating around is pointless as there is no interaction. All this does is add to the glitches and load times still plaguing this game. To make matters worse, Pro Skater 5 is still a full priced retail game that Activision has published. Even without the numerous faults the game should be sold at a reduced price. It blows my mind that Robomodo and Activision didn't delay the game as it was clearly never ready for release.
So as you can see, my heart was broken by the end product of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5. It's a very odd mix of elements from all previous Pro Skater games but executed in an appalling way. Tony Hawk himself was a big driving force behind the game, speaking so positively about it at various gaming conventions, but now I don't know whether he'd dare show his face at one again. Pro Skater 5 is a big contender for the worst game of 2015, and I feel it has killed the once glorious Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series for good.
Watch Tim Gettys' gameplay video here (and try not to cry...).