Table of Contents
Table of Contents
True to the previous
Keeping up with the current
Looking to the long run
For getting older millennials like myself, this coming July 11 is simply as vital a vacation as Independence Day. That’s when developer Iron Galaxy will launch Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4. The remake bundle will convey two skating classics again into the mainstream, faithfully recreating the collection’ critically acclaimed third installment and radically reimagining its fourth. It’ll even include full cross-platform assist, together with Nintendo Switch 2, and permit customers to share their create-a-parks throughout any platform. It’s sure to convey up lots of nostalgia for thirty-somethings who nonetheless know each phrase to CKY’s 96 Quite Bitter Beings.
But the remake bundle isn’t nearly trying again on the previous; they’re simply as a lot in regards to the skate tradition’s current and future. At a preview occasion, I went arms on with Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4. While accumulating secret tapes and skating round Alcatraz introduced me again to my mother or father’s front room, I nonetheless felt like I used to be taking part in one thing that belongs in 2025. Whether it was the good trendy music cuts or one of many bundle’s wonderful new parks, it by no means felt like Iron Galaxy was merely coasting on millennial nostalgia. Instead, this very a lot seems like an audition for a model new Tony Hawk recreation, one which’s in-tune with what skateboarding is at present slightly than what it was within the 2000s. It represents the previous, current, and way forward for skate tradition in a single bundle.
True to the previous
Picking up proper the place 2020’s Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 left off (minus its authentic developer), the brand new bundle unifies the collection’ third and fourth installments into one constant bundle. That’s a bit sophisticated to correctly pull off, because the originals are very totally different video games. While Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 adopted its predecessors’ lead, the fourth was a completely totally different artistic swing that launched extra story and open-ended exploration. Iron Galaxy rebuilt the latter to structurally match the previous, with two-minute runs stuffed with challenges to finish. In an interview, Design Manager Mike Rossi tells me that the choice merely got here all the way down to attempting to create a unified assortment that takes what’s nice from 4 and melds it into 3.
There’s a balancing act right here between staying trustworthy to those video games whereas reinventing them, and that spectrum is represented at just a few ranges. I see the primary aspect of it instantly after I dive into Foundry, considered one of THPS3’s most iconic ranges. The new model is nearly precisely how I bear in mind it, tossing me into an oblong room stuffed with catwalks to grind on and molten hearth traps to keep away from. The solely distinction? It will get one heck of a makeover. Foundry is an ideal showpiece for the technological overhaul right here, as flames spew out of pipes as I grind previous them and I can see mild reflections within the steel surfaces. It’s far more spectacular than something I’ve seen within the collection earlier than, but it surely nonetheless feels totally within the spirit of the unique degree with no ramp or collectible misplaced.
Activision
Other ranges from 3 equally profit from the glow up. Suburbia seems like extra of an actual city, with a higher density of element and interactables like a skitchable ice cream truck that rounds the cul-de-sac. Rio is similar graffiti-filled park the place I have to compete in heats, but it surely’s bathed in hotter mild that higher matches the South American setting. Canada initially seems like a completely new degree, however I principally chalk that as much as whiter snow and extra detailed bushes that convey a previously sparse park to life. Every time I felt like the degrees had been totally redesigned, I’d lookup the originals and understand that Iron Galaxy was sticking a lot nearer to the script that I believed. That’s a testomony to its potential to make one thing previous really feel trendy.
It’s additionally instantly obvious that Iron Galaxy didn’t attempt to repair what wasn’t damaged with regards to controls. I used to be in a position to begin skating on pure intuition as quickly as I picked up the controller, pulling off manuals and kickflips from muscle reminiscence. It feels remarkably easy and even perhaps speedier than ever due to faster restoration instances after falling (which I did fairly a bit). I can inform that the motion issues rather a lot to the event workforce when talking to Mike Rossi, who credit the unique video games’ motion as being a part of its timeless enchantment.
“A big thing is how the character actually feels and plays,” Rossi tells Digital Trends. “To me, games that always are touted as timeless, they have really solid, tight controls when you’re playing. Mario 64 is a great example of that. You can pick that up and it still feels awesome. I think that’s the same with Tony Hawk. With that, paired with the levels and how they were designed, those kind of go together. Your base foundation of how your character feels and how the world interacts with that were very well done, so as a result it becomes timeless in a sense.”
I received a really feel for that the deeper I received into my demo, as I discovered extra methods to fluidly chain collectively my combos. Iron Galaxy has created extra alternatives for that with delicate tweaks. Wall planting is an effective way to increase my rating after I’m about to crash, as is skitching on the again of a automobile, a THPS4 characteristic that’s been added to 3. Old ranges like Suburbia give gamers alternatives to include the latter and in addition characteristic some delicate setting tweaks to offer gamers extra rails to hop to from a skitch. Those adjustments are tastefully applied, holding the texture and spirit of THPS3 intact.
Keeping up with the current
Though it’s very trustworthy in lots of respects, there’s rather a lot in regards to the bundle that feels completely new too. THPS4 could as effectively be a brand new recreation, imagining what would have occurred if the unique builders by no means experimented with the unique trilogy’s beloved construction. The skateparks I performed (College, San Francisco, and Alcatraz) all felt good in that two-minute arcade construction, regardless that they had been designed for extra of a free skate expertise with NPCs that handed out missions. I collected misplaced packages, photobombed vacationers, and skitched off the again of a professor’s stolen automobile all throughout the time restrict.
For those that need an expertise that’s a bit nearer to the unique recreation, the bundle does let gamers alter the timer in ranges. It might be set for as much as an hour, which ought to assist dial the tempo again to the unique recreation’s. It is an odd change although, as we’re not precisely getting a correct THPS4 remake right here. It feels extra like a degree pack for THPS3. It nearly makes me marvel if this whole remake collection would have made extra sense as one dwell service providing that added new parks from the collection’ previous, skaters, and equipment over time.
Activision
While that change would possibly ruffle some purists’ feathers, different new additions really feel extremely pure. The soundtrack is, predictably, a spotlight right here, as all the newly included songs pair completely with the unique listing. Tracks like Wavves’ King of the Beach and Fontaines D.C.’s Boys within the Better Land hold the vibe feeling updated with what at present’s skaters, and people who got here up between the originals and their remake, are listening to. It’s after I discover my head bobbing alongside to Run the Jewels that I actually see past my private nostalgia and see THPS 3 + 4 as one thing that’s attempting to bridge the hole between generations of skate tradition.
That was particularly vital to Tony Hawk himself. Rossi tells me that the Hawk Man was extraordinarily concerned within the improvement course of, personally testing builds on a month-to-month foundation. He had important enter that went past including new songs to the playlist. Rossi tells me that Hawk’s job was to ensure the entire thing didn’t really feel outdated.
“A big thing for him is to make sure the trick names are accurate and the tricks are representative,” Rossi says. “It’s important for him that it’s properly representative of how the current culture is referring to things. So, if a trick name has changed, or how they’re referring to a trick in the current vocabulary of skate culture … or we have icons in the menus representing certain tricks. He’d be like ‘This icon looks more like this other trick.’ And then he’d send some reference images of what that trick looks more like and he’d be like ‘I think this pose captures it better.’ He’s clearly very passionate about it!”
My expertise with skate tradition is that it feels prefer it’s far more inclusive and open to all people.
Making certain that trendy skate tradition wasn’t disregarded was equally vital to Iron Galaxy. Rossi and I communicate at size in regards to the variations between the 2000s skating scene and now. He factors to how inclusive and community-driven skating is, one thing that naturally discovered itself mirrored within the remake’s bigger roster of skaters (together with eight new ones) and genre-spanning music. Rather than attempting to recreate somebody’s thought of the “good old days,” Iron Galaxy held a mirror out its window and created a skating recreation that mirrored what it sees at present.
“For me personally, skating feels like another place where people can go and have a community,” Rossi says. “My experience with skate culture is that it feels like it’s much more inclusive and open to everybody. It originally was much more punk and rougher, whereas I feel like now it still has that tough exterior, but at the same time you’ll still get a lot of support. I always feel very awkward when I’m at a skatepark. I can’t do very much, so I’m always working on my basics. But I can still have a chat with someone who’s doing way cooler stuff, and I don’t feel judged or dismissed.”
Looking to the long run
The finest moments of my demo weren’t spent reliving traditional ranges however slightly skating in a completely new one. THPS 3 + 4 peppers in model new skate parks right into a Tony Hawk recreation for the primary time in over a decade. This was Iron Galaxy’s probability to show that the collection isn’t totally tied to the previous – and it nails that task.
I spent a substantial period of time exploring Waterpark, a brand-new degree that drops me right into a run-down amusement park. It’s stuffed with big slides I can grind down, a goofy pirate ship attraction, and cutouts of a beaver mascot that I have to smash by way of. Missions have me grinding on pipes to interrupt valves and on the lookout for a method to get right into a shuttered arcade. It’s a superb playground with extra secrets and techniques and pathways than I can discover in two quick minutes.
Activision
What’s exceptional about it’s how a lot it seems like an genuine Tony Hawk degree slightly than an inexpensive imitation. It’s not simply that it’s crammed with tapes and “SKATE” letters to gather, however that it’s so sharply designed. I start every run atop a row of slides that I can hop between to increase my grind. Iron Galaxy seemingly knew precisely how I’d attempt to hop off of that construction, too. On one run, I soar off to my left, touchdown on one other rail that deposits me completely down to at least one on the bottom beneath. It nearly seems like a very good Sonic the Hedgehog degree, giving me loads of methods to carve a path across the park in an uninterrupted trick string if I’m expert sufficient. It has the identical precise spirit of the previous parks and that’s by design.
“One of the directives I gave the level design team was that this needs to feel like this was left on the cutting room floor,” Rossi says. “Like we found the collision and markup on a hard drive from 4 and revitalized it. With Waterpark and any of the new stuff we added, we wanted to make sure it felt like something that was always there. One of our engineers came up to me one day and said ‘I’ve been playing a lot of Waterpark, it’s really fun! I looked online to figure out how to complete a goal and I couldn’t find anything. And I was like dude, you have just made my day!”
Sure, there’s nonetheless room for remakes if Activision decides to reheat Underground, American Wasteland, or the dreaded THPS5. But Waterpark leaves me looking forward to a completely new mainline Tony Hawk recreation, as a result of Iron Galaxy understands each the collection and at present’s skate tradition at giant. I’d take one other dozen ranges like Waterpark, a fair wider vary of contemporary skaters, and a soundtrack that lastly places Pup in a Tony Hawk recreation. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 seems like yet another temperature test to see if the world is actually prepared for a brand new installment. I actually am based mostly on what I’ve performed right here, and I hope this new technology of skaters will get an authentic recreation to name their very own quickly.
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 launches on July 11 for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.