Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD
Developers	Robomodo Disruptive Games
Platforms	PlayStation 3 (PSN), Xbox 360 (XBLA), PC (Steam)
Release Dates
PlayStation 3	August 28, 2012 (US) August 29, 2012 (UK, AU)
Xbox 360	July 18, 2012

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD, or THPSHD, is an extreme sports video game developed by Robomodo and published by Activision in 2012 for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC. The developers promised to combine the best elements of original game, upgraded for today with sharp visuals and fresh content. Game was removed from Steam store on July 17th, 2017.

Differences

Since this is a remake of the original games, a lot of features from modern games were cut off. Even though the developers explained the lack of most features using the "classic feel" argument, there are obvious differences between the original games and the remake.

The most notable differences are:

• The game lacks skater and park editors from THPS2.
• White screen instead of bail recovery animations.
• The game doesn't support local splitscreen.
• There are no skate videos in the game.
• Manuals were not in the original THPS.
• Reverts were not in both THPS and THPS2.
• Rail balance bar only appeared in THPS3.
• Players couldn't balance lip tricks in the original games.

Levels choice

The original tweet.

The level list was a subject to discuss during the development. Since Tony Hawk asked fans about their favorite level on Twitter, tons of "Top 5 levels" articles spawned around the web. However, it's easy to spot that every level from the final level roster was already reused once: Venice, Hangar, School 2 in THUG, Warehouse (as Training), Downhill Jam and 3 DLC levels in THUG2, Mall and Marseille in THAW. It is known that Robomodo used THUG2 source code, which might explain the level choice.

Game modes

• Career
• Single session
• Free Skate
• Hawkman
• Big Head Survival
• Projectives

Online mode

Online mode allows up to 4 players to join the host game. Unlike in previous installment, players are forced to wait for another players in lobby without being able to play (ironically, this is mostly how LAN play functioned in THPS2 on PC). Online play is not available in the PC version of the game.

• Free Skate
• Trick Attack
• Graffiti
• Big Head Elimination

Levels

• Warehouse
• School II
• Hangar
• Mall
• Venice
• Downhill Jam
• Marseilles
• Canada (DLC)
• Airport (DLC)
• Los Angeles (DLC)

Playable skaters

• Tony Hawk
• Rodney Mullen
• Eric Koston
• Nyjah Huston
• Lyn-Z Adams Hawkins (Pastrana)
• Andrew Reynolds
• Chris Cole
• Riley Hawk
• Jake Harrison
• Emily Westlund
• Avatar (Xbox 360 Version)
• Steve Caballero (DLC)
• Geoff Rowley (DLC)
• James Hetfield (DLC)
• Robert Trujillo (DLC)

Secret Skaters

• Officer Dick
• Ollie the Magic Bum
• Roberta the Robomodo Mascot
• THPS Tony Hawk

Achievements

Full article: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD Achievements

Soundtrack

Classic

• Goldfinger - Superman
• Anthrax feat. Chuck D - Bring the Noise
• Powerman 5000 - When Worlds Collide
• Consumed - Heavy Metal Winner
• Lagwagon - May 16
• Millencolin - No Cigar
• Bad Religion - You

New

• Pigeon John - The Bomb
• Lateef the Truthspeaker - We the People
• Pegasuses-XL - Marathon Mansion!
• Apex Manor - Teenage Blood
• Telekinesis - Please Ask for Help
• El-P feat. Trent Reznor - Flyentology (Cassettes Won't Listen Remix)
• Middle Class Rut - USA
• Metallica - All Nightmare Long (DLC)

Reception

This title caused a huge resonance in the community. Franchise fans hoped that Robomodo will use this chance to develop a succesful title that will bring the franchise back on the track after two not very successful games. Game is mostly criticized for bad skater controls, poorly working game mechanics (like Wallride) and lots of glitches. Most of the noted glitches were tracked by players and reported on Robomodo facebook page, though they were ignored. One of notable examples was AndyTHPS proposing the way to fix wallride glitch. Players also did not like the lack of revert move and threw in lot of negative feedback about it, a likely reason why the DLC pack was released. This game currently holds a score of 67 on Metascore.

Community Mod

Since the game is built using Unreal Engine 3, it was found that user can change most of default graphical settings manually, however, no UI was implemented in the game itself. This and the fact that Revert was found in the game code before DLC led to the apparition of the Community Mod that adds a classic launcher and a few game fixes. It is likely that this release forced the developer to come up with a free patch that enabled reverts before THPS3 DLC.

External links

• Debut VGA trailer
• THPSHD Launch trailer
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD on IGN
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD on GameSpot
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD review for the Xbox 360 on GameSpot
• Gamespot video review
• Community Mod

Gallery

Chris Cole sketch

Riley Hawk sketch

Rodney Mullen sketch

Tony Hawk sketch