Genre: Extreme Sports
Publisher: Activision
Developer: Neversoft
Release Date: October 9, 2007

Activision has been publishing Tony Hawk games every year since 1999, and they seem to get better with each launch. Originally the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater lineup of games featured mission-style scenarios in which you had to achieve goals such as collecting the letters S-K-A-T-E scattered around the skate park and find a secret tape. The new Tony Hawk games, however, are much different and focus more on pulling off amazing tricks and racking up massive amounts of points at skate parks and shows. After a decade of Tony Hawk titles, does Tony Hawk's Proving Ground seem like just another game, or will it revolutionize the genre?

In a single sentence, THPG has the potential to be one of the best, if not the best skateboarding game out there. Not only is Neversoft bringing back exciting features such as "Nail the Trick," (an innovative gameplay mechanic that slows down the game to near-bullet-time action and utilizes the analog sticks to move your feet and pull off crazy tricks), but new features have also proven to be quite interesting, such as Bowl Carving, Aggro Push, Skate Checking, Climbing/Exploration, Environment Altering and "Rig-a-Kit." If one thing is certain, the upgrade in the amount of features and overall gameplay mechanics is a major plus for the series.

The story and overall goal in THPG is a lot more in-depth and immersive. You're a young up-and-coming skater from Philadelphia, and your hometown also doubles as a tutorial for learning the game's controls. You have three main "types" of skaters: career, hardcore, and rigger. Each type has different missions and goals through which you must progress, and you'll experience in-depth stories that intertwine with the other two types. If you really hone your skills, you can improve in each of the three skater types and be good at just about everything.

The career guys focus on just that: their career! From participating in huge competitions to appearing in famous skate videos, the career mode is for the skater who tries to show off and become a celebrity in the skating world. The hardcore skaters are all about pulling off crazy huge gaps and working up the ranks in secret underground tournaments. The hardcore skaters also use their Skate-Checking skills to eliminate gangs trying to take over the skate parks. The riggers are for the truly creative minds. Riggers use their skills to place skate props anywhere in the world to use for stuns and tricks. Riggers are also expected to fulfill the duty of fixing up the rundown areas of Philly, Baltimore, and Washington D.C., the three cities in THPG.

In reality, the three cities that appear in THPG are very large in size, and they're just as big in the game. Neversoft pointed out that THPG is "a hell of a lot bigger" than the previous offering, Tony Hawk's Project 8. Not only is the game much larger, but the multiplayer content has also been enhanced to be much easier to join, play and enjoy. Anytime you're skating in a part of a city, all you have to do is pause the game, choose the "Xbox Live" command, and select from a list of current games being played in that particular city. You will then enter that game with the same appearance, stats, and tricks from the single-player mode. THPG will support up to eight people in an online game at once.

An exciting new feature in THPG is the video editing. You can place still-photo and motion-capture cameras throughout the maps to get some "pretty gnarly footage" of what your skater is doing. Once you have tons of footage of nailing huge gaps and long grinds, you can piece together the clips and compress it into a minute-long clip of insane tricks. From here, you can add effects and music to make the video more intense and immersive, and then share it online with your friends. Even though the shareable clips can only be a minute in length, the number of clips you can have is only limited by the available space on your hard drive.

Fans of previous Tony Hawk games may remember the "Create-a-Park" feature, and it's making something of a comeback in THPG, which features a customizable skate lounge for each player. It can be decorated using props and themes that you buy to make your lounge better than everyone else's, and then you can invite friends over to tear up some half-pipes or grind some rails. The props and themes for your skate lounge will be obtained by earning money through completing goals, missions, and eventually getting sponsored in the game.

Even though THPG will bring a lot of new content to the skateboarding genre, fans of the older versions will be able to reminisce with a new arcade-like feature. Twelve arcade machines are scattered about Philly, Baltimore, and D.C., where skaters can take a break from the real world (in game, mind you), and relive the classic Tony Hawk experience, accomplishing some of the classic goals and playing a new game, "Hawkman," which is basically Pacman in Tony Hawk form.

Perhaps the most promising aspect of THPG is just how open the game really is. Despite three separate immersive story-driven mission chains, the game also allows you to unlock entire new areas based on goals you've accomplished and tricks that you've learned. A Neversoft developer informed me that it took a hardcore THPG quality assurance tester 10 hours to complete the storylines, and that it would take 30-40 hours for the average person to complete them all. On top of that, it supposedly will take up to a week of solid gameplay to obtain near 100% completion of the game, including all the secrets and unlockables. Xbox 360 Achievements fans will be happy to know that THPG will have about as many achievements as Project 8 did.

Visually, THPG is beautiful. From the lively cities to the empty museums, each and every reachable place seemed detailed and polished. Random events such as a D.C. security guard trying to wake up and redirect a bum lying on the sidewalk also helped make the experience much more realistic. We played the game on a 720 HDTV on both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and it looked great on both consoles.

As with most Tony Hawk games, the soundtrack for THPG is most certainly one to remember. Featuring songs like "Supersonic" from Oasis and "Slaughter of the Soul" from At the Gates, every skater will be nailing tricks and manuals while jamming to intense upbeat music. When editing videos, you'll be able to use music from a set track list, but due to software limitations, you will not be able to import your own music from your hard drive to use in your clips.

With the impressive graphical quality and size of the levels, Tony Hawk's Proving Ground has certainly earned my admiration. I liked how the title shows Neversoft trying to appeal to more than just the hardcore skateboard fans. With its analog-based FlickIt controls, Skate may be the more innovative of the skateboarding books to be released this autumn, but THPG will certainly give it a run for its money.