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In 2005, Tony Hawk's American Wasteland was released (Microsoft Xbox 360,
Nintendo GameCube, Sony PlayStation 2, and others). This game was also known as
THAW, and was a sequel to THUG 2.
Screenshot from Tony Hawk's American Wasteland.
The goal in story mode is to win the
approval of the pros by mastering various feats and obtaining pieces from Los Angeles and the surrounding area to build a
skate park, which will be called "American Wasteland."
This game is
the first to allow the game to be played in one large streaming level, and the
game world is much larger than any of the Hawk games that preceded it. It also
features a classic mode in certain levels.
This same year, Tony Hawk's American Sk8Land, which was loosely based on THAW, was introduced to the handheld market
for the Nintendo DS and Game Boy Advance. It was the first Tony Hawk game for
the DS, but the sixth for the Game Boy line.
The Game Boy Advance version did
not have the same graphics and capabilities of the DS version, which made good
use of the dual screens. For instance, players could use the touch screen to
create skateboard art.
In 2006, two more games were released: Tony Hawk's Project 8
(Microsoft Xbox, Sony PlayStation 2, Sony PlayStation Portable, and others) and
Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam (Nintendo
DS, Nintendo Game Boy Advance, Nintendo Wii, Sony PlayStation 2).
Project 8 featured
a complete graphics overhaul with all new motion captures, lending a more
realistic feel to the animation. There is one large city to skate in and all
levels are interconnected, with no loading times. Another option that was added
was the "nail trick," which allowed the player's feet to be zoomed in
on and controlled with the analog sticks, thereby allowing new types of moves.
Another unique feature is the ability to control characters during crashes,
with the goal being to injure the player as much as possible and receive a
large hospital bill -- which results in cash rewards in the game.[15] Downhill
Jam is a spinoff of the Hawk series and does not have a story
mode. The goal is to race opponents, complete goals, and achieve high scores.
Screenshot from Tony Hawk's Proving
Ground.
In 2007, Tony Hawk's Proving Ground (Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii, Sony
PlayStation 3, and others) was released and met with mixed reviews. Naturally,
many felt that it did not bring anything fresh to the drawing board.
They had
seen most of this before, and the similarities in the Hawk games were even more apparent after Electronic Arts released Skate (also known as skate., 2007; Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony
PlayStation 3), which gave skateboarding game fans an exciting new option.
No
major Hawk games were released in
2008], as Activision took a much-needed
hiatus, but the company has resolved to continue on with the series under the stewardship of new developers
With aggressive new
competition from the ever expanding Skate series, as well as games like Shaun White Snowboarding (Ubisoft, 2008;
various platforms), whose Nintendo Wii version supports the Wii Balance Board
as a controller, and Stoked (Destineer,
2009; Microsoft Xbox 360), which is an open-world snowboarding game featuring
dynamic weather conditions and multiple mountains to explore, Activision will
be forced to put a truly new spin on the ollies, grabs, and grinds, hopefully reinvigorating
the genre once again.
Even if future Hawk
games fail to make an impact, the legacy of Tony
Hawk's Pro Skater is undeniable and will continue to be felt in the genre
for the foreseeable future.
[15]
Idol Minds' Pain (2007), a popular
downloadable game for the Sony PlayStation 3, would base its entire premise
around hurtling characters via catapult to inflict as much damage and bodily
harm as possible.
[16] Series
offshoot Tony Hawk's Motion for the
Nintendo DS was released in November 2008 to critical and commercial
indifference. Tony Hawk's Motion is
bundled with the DS Motion Pack add-on, which is an accelerometer that allows
for twisting, tilting and turning using the handheld itself, and the game, Hue Pixel Painter, where the objective
is to "paint the town." Activision has promised that future Tony Hawk
games will feature alternative control schemes.
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"It wasn't until later in the development process that Tony Hawk was signed on and the game took on the name we all know."
I read an interview with Tony Hawk by a skateboarding magazine some 5 years ago where he said that the idea for doing a skateboarding game was his, and that he went around to the various video game companies pitching the idea and they laughed him off. He remembers one big brand-name company (was it Atari?) whose president laughed him out of the meeting and said, quote, "There is no market for a skateboarding video game." That's a famous quote and I'm disappointed to not see it and that piece of history here, in what is a history of the series. It's possible they had started THPS1 before he got on board, but it's important to note that he wasn't simply tacking his name onto an existing game, he had the idea and was trying to pitch the game on his own. This is also the reason why he's had such creative control and input over the series. I'd love if you could find the reference and update/post it here.
Joshua is correct that despite a mo-cap session attended by the videogame press (and it being a bullet point on the back of the box), all of the animations actually used in THPS1 were done by hand.
Motion capture used as a reference? Maybe... I think by the time we had that motion-capture session, the work on animations were well under way. But really, my memory is too fuzzy and I'm probably the wrong person to ask about how much influence the mo-cap ultimately had on the finished work.
The problems with actually using the mo-cap was that it was going to take way too much work to turn the raw data into something useful and, more importantly, it just plain didn't look as good as the hand made stuff (not as dramatic, etc...).
Work began in full in October 1998, by which time Tony Hawk was pretty much the name of the game. Tony's initial involvement was not major though. The mo-cap was done in April 1999, but there was never any expectation that the data would be very useful. Good publicity though. The actual animation was done by hand by Noel using video reference of various skaters - mostly from commercial skate videos. The game was finished in August 1999.