Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X
Developers	Treyarch Neversoft
Publishers	Activision
Platforms	Xbox
Rating(s)	ESRB: T
Release Dates
First release date	November 15, 2001 (NA)

“The next level in skateboarding!”
—Game slogan

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X (abbreviated as THPS2X) is a skateboarding video game, originally developed by Treyarch and published by Activision, under the Activision O2 sports brand. It was released exclusively for the Xbox in North America on November 15, 2001.

This game is a remaster of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, with features from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater and additional bonus content exclusive to this game. Some elements from the then-recent Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 are also included.

New Features

• 3 types of Career Modes - THPS2, THPS2X, and THPS1.
• 5 exclusive new levels
• Custom Soundtrack support
• 8-player System-Link support
• Create-a-Park adds 2 additional themes: Skate Park and City Lot (based on New York level assets)
• 4-player local multiplayer support
• Improved graphics (i.e. new lighting and particle effects, as well as updated models for the skaters and levels.)
• Motion Blur support
• Detail texturing technique to improve most of the game textures appearance.
• A balance meter has been added for grind tricks
• Female skaters can now be made in Create-a-Skater, a feature carried over from Pro Skater 3.
• An updated menu interface compared to Pro Skater 2.

Available Characters

• Tony Hawk
• Bob Burnquist
• Kareem Campbell
• Rune Glifberg
• Bucky Lasek
• Chad Muska
• Andrew Reynolds
• Geoff Rowley
• Eric Koston
• Steve Caballero
• Elissa Steamer
• Jamie Thomas
• Rodney Mullen
• Officer Dick (unlockable)
• Spider-Man (unlockable)
• Trixie (unlockable) (replaces Private Carrera)

Levels

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X includes every level from the two mainline instalments, plus 5 new levels created exclusively for the game.

From Tony Hawk's Pro Skater

• Warehouse, Woodland Hills, CA
• School, Miami, FL
• Mall, New York City, NY
• Skate Park, Chicago, IL
• Downtown, Minneapolis, MN
• Downhill Jam, Mojave County, AZ/Clark County, NV
• Burnside, Portland, OR
• Streets, San Francisco, CA
• Roswell, NM

From Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2

• Hangar, Mullet Falls, MT
• School II, Southern CA
• Marseille, France
• NY City, New York
• Venice, CA
• Skatestreet, Ventura, CA
• Philadelphia, PA
• Bullring, Mexico
• Crane Drop, Hawaii (a remixed version of Chopper Drop from the original game and is replaced)
• Skate Heaven, Outer Space

Exclusive to Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X

• Club, London, United Kingdom
• Construction Site, Dallas, Texas
• Skate Park, Tampa, Florida
• Subway, New York City, New York
• Sky Lines, Detroit, Michigan

System Link

THPS2X supports Xbox System-Link functionality, for up to 8 players. System-Link includes 3 modes:

• Trick Attack (Best score wins) - 8 players supported
• Graffiti (Who ever tags the most spots wins) - 4 players maximum
• Free Skate (No time limit / practice) - 8 players supported

Thanks to software like XLink Kai, THPS2X can still be played online as of 2021. There is a very active community for THPS2X, found here Niche.

Career Mode

Career Mode begins as the standard career found in THPS2, keeping the original goals intact. Completing the THPS2 career will unlock the bonus 'THPS2X Career'. Once that is completed, the bonus 'THPS1 Career' is unlocked.

Soundtrack

Full article: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 Soundtrack

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X features the original 15 songs from the soundtrack of Pro Skater 2, along with the addition for players to create their own Custom Soundtracks through the Xbox Dashboard.

Changes from the original games

Due to the game being a remaster, dozens of changes were made due to the Xbox's superior hardware at that time.

• The game now runs up to 60FPS, though some Levels have slowdown issues.
• The game has redesigned HUD and menus, using the design basis from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2.
• Multiplayer layouts now cover the entire Level as opposed to several parts of it.
• The FMVs showing live performances and music videos were removed, usually being replaced with the static Treyarch logo.
• Private Carrera was replaced with Trixie.
• Skater skins from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater aren't available.
• The songs from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater aren't included in the game. They would be included in Pro Skater HD and Pro Skater 1 + 2.

Reception

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2X received positive reviews. The game was praised for it's improved graphics and it's value, however critics claimed that those who have played the two games wouldn't miss out on anything and those who played the sequel would find the game sluggish in comparison.

The game's exclusive levels had a mixed reception; Jeff Gerstmann of GameSpot explained that "the [level] design is quite dull when compared with the standard set by the real levels". In Vincent Lopez's review on IGN he said "while the new levels are beautiful, they mimic the general size and architecture of Tony Hawk 2 levels... That's not to say they aren't great levels -- the construction yard is a dense, small structure with tons of vertical space to explore, and the Disco, while eerily empty, has a lot of tiny secrets that make it well worth unlocking."

Trivia

• The Cheat code to unlock Trixie took years to be discovered until August 2021 by Niche. It spells "Rad Cool Baby": Right, A, Down, Black, Up, Up, Left, B, A, B, Y). Confirmed to be tested and working.
• Gap checklist only includes THPS2 levels.
• THPS2X is one of two Xbox Tony Hawk's that supports more than 4 players; the other being Underground.
• In the level Skylines, the other side of the giant billboard is advertising Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer - another title from the Activision 02 series. Kelly Slater would later be featured as an unlockable character in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3.
• In the level Skate Park there are posters outside on the wall of the metal structure that say 'Lost Dog' with a mugshot of a dog. If you get enough speed, you can use the loop to get onto the roof top. The southwest corner of the roof, from where the loop is, has a telephone line you can grind to get on the other roof. This roof has the missing dog lounging on a chair with some soda. Player can jump over the dog for a secret gap.
• THPS2X features camera lens flare effect; the first Neversoft game that used this effect was THUG2.
• THPS2X uses a special technique to draw three-dimensional grass. This technique was poorly reused in THPS4.
• THPS2X introduced a new motion blur effect that you could toggle on and off in the options menu. This feature would not be reused until much later in the series.
• In certain levels with speakers, like the Club and Marseille when the skater skates towards the speakers and the music's playing, the camera shakes and the controller vibrates, representing the music blasting through those speakers.
• There is a bug in the game, that allows to rotate certain special tricks such as Indy Frontflip using the left stick. Rotation is blocked for such tricks in the original game.
• Some levels were partially reused later in both Underground titles, including Hangar and Philadelphia. The Tampa level in the first Underground reused the Tampa Skate Park seen in 2X as the location for the Tampa AM contest that Eric Sparrow and the player participates in.
• Robomodo probably used the updated level models found in THPS2X as the reference for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD rather than PSX originals.
• The Skylines level and the Construction Site level seemingly were partially recycled for use in the Rooftops level in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5.