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Tony Hawk's Underground, also called THUG and loosely referred to as Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5, is a skateboarding video game for the PS2, GameCube, Xbox and GBA platforms released in 2003. It is the fifth game in the Tony Hawk's series. PC version was released exclusively in Australia and New Zealand as a budget release in 2005. This version was ported by Beenox. The game is rated "T" for teen because of the strong language, mild violence, blood (colored brown due censorship) and suggestive themes. THUG is widely regarded by fans as being the best game in the series for allowing players to edit almost 100% of the in-game content, and having the ability to share all created content with other online users.

New game mechanics and features[]

Walking/Caveman/Combo Run-Out[]

For the first time in the series, the player can get off the board in order to walk, run and/or climb around. This is necessary to reach some locations and challenges. The player is now able to leave the skateboard in the middle of a combo and continue it elsewhere using Caveman, as long as he or she fits in the time limit. This time limit is known as Combo Run-Out and it is another skill that can be improved.

Wall Push[]

Skater is able now to push himself off the wall while in manual and continue combo in opposite direction which is called Wall Push. This move will cost skater a certain amount of speed loss.

Wallplant[]

Wallplant is Wall Push in the air, naturally, skater hits the wall in the air and jumps out in the opposite direction losing some speed. Note that Wallplant trick from THPS4 was renamed to Wallieplant.

Hip Transfer[]

Hip Transfer is much like Spine Transfer, but it links nearby quarter-pipes that are perpendicular to each other.

Acid Drop[]

Acid Drop allows skater to jump above QP and land into it. It is widely used to land high launches in combo.

Double tap grind tricks[]

While the extensions system was refined in THPS4, THUG added double tap grinds. Some special tricks from previous games became double tap tricks in THUG, including Darkslide, Crail Slide, Hang Ten Nosegrind, etc. The double tap grinds are predefined - player has no ability to change the double tap grind.

Pressure flips[]

The game introduced pressure flips, performed using only one foot. In the game it works the same way as Nollie modifier: choose pressure mode first then perform the flip.

Driving[]

On each level, the player has the opportunity to use vehicles. Driving was a controversial addition though as some thought that it extended the gameplay a tad, others that it didn't fit inside of a skateboarding game.

Face Mapping[]

Basically this feature allows to replace skater's face texture with any other image, most likely the player's real face.

Plot[]

The following applies to Tony Hawk's Underground when the game is played in story mode.

Unlike it's predecessors, Underground focuses heavily on the story mode, and to this extent includes a large number of in-game cutscenes. It is the first of the series to really incorporate narratology, which is the extent to which a game follows a storyline or the events occur in a structured timeframe.

The story follows the trials and tribulations of two at-first unknown skaters, you (the Custom Skater), and the player's friend Eric Sparrow. The game's story begins in their hometown of New Jersey, with the main character and Eric exploring the area and helping prepare for Chad Muska's skate demo. After the demo, the player performs in front of Chad as he explores the New Jersey skating scene to grab his attention. Once accomplished, he suggests the player earn a sponsorship from the local skate shop, and gives you his skateboard out of respect. After impressing the local sponsored skaters, one of your friends, Shawn, says that the local drug dealers have stolen a skateboard from Peralta's shop. The player goes on a dangerous odyssey to retrieve it, after which Eric proceeds to light the drug dealer's car on fire, as "revenge" for stealing his skateboard earlier in the game. The player then meets up with Stacy Peralta, and asks for a sponsorship from his skate shop. He makes an agreement, as long as you show him something original, and don't film in any local spots as he's seen them too many times. After Eric hears the good news, he says that the drug dealers have been following him, angry that he destroyed their car. The pair realize they're no longer safe in their hometown, and board a last minute train to Manhattan, New York.

Once they arrive in Manhattan, they decide to make a skate video hitting famous lines and tricks in well-known areas of Manhattan, and complete the sponsorship video by performing various tricks over a burning taxi. Once completed, the Custom Skater talks to Stacy who tells you to join the Tampa AM skate event in Florida. The duo arrive in Tampa and get in trouble with the police for driving a shoddy vehicle (an old hippie bus borrowed from Peralta) with a broken tail light and a dodgy bumper sticker. Eric gets arrested for talking back to the officer; requiring the player to do errands for the local police force to bail out Eric, and proceed through to your Tampa experience. By the time the event starts, the Custom Skater gets into an argument with Eric when he "forgets" to sign you up. After impressing local pros, and doing some doubles with Tony Hawk himself, the player is allowed to participate in the Tampa AM 2004.

Once the player dominates the event, they join the sponsor of their choice (choosing from Birdhouse, Element, Flip, Girl, or Zero), which sends you to San Diego to do a demo. Eric soon joins your team, introduced to the player during a party-induced hangover sequence. After the pair impress team manager Todd with their performance at the demo, both guys are sent to Hawaii to film for a team video. In Hawaii, they search for a spot that has been untouched by previous skaters. The Custom Skater eventually finds the rooftop of a tall hotel, and calls Eric to film them skating off of it. When a police helicopter arrives to investigate the disturbance, Eric insists you get out of there, but not wanting to miss the moment of a perfect photo opportunity; the player performs a McTwist off of the hotel's roof, over the helicopter, and onto the rooftop of the neighboring building, with Eric capturing it on film. Your team then travels to Vancouver.

In Vancouver, after doing some local favors, the player goes to Slam City Jam and views the team's video premiere, after hurriedly finishing parts for it. To their surprise, Eric had edited your footage of the rooftop jump in Hawaii to his own benefit. Todd immediately makes Eric a Pro, and presents him his own pro-model board. After confronting Eric, who couldn't care less about your plight, you enter the Slam City Jam contest, and (despite still being an Amateur) lie that you are a Pro and take on a series of Pro competitions. The competition resolves into a one-on-one session between you and Eric. You win, and are declared a Pro by Todd. After designing your own deck and gaining a shoe sponsor, the team decides to go to an international Pro skateboard demo in Moscow. While practicing for the demo, you are reconciled with Eric, and the pair of you perform a double performance together.

In Moscow, the player follows a drunken Eric when he steals the keys to a Russian tank, and he takes it on a joyride through town while standing on the tank with a can of beer. After unsuccessfully attempting to stop it, the player loses control, and crashes into a building, and becomes trapped inside the tank under a pile of rubble. Eric runs off, leaving you to be arrested by the Russian authorities. The team expels the Custom Skater, denies liability for damages, and leaves you stranded in Moscow. The American Embassy bails you out, but you must get home to New Jersey by doing favors for locals.

When the player returns home to the States, they find that Eric has changed. He now has many sponsors, has a record label in the making, and now only skates for money. Eric reveals that he has been plotting to bring you down from the very beginning, and that the money is all that matters in professional skateboarding. You resolve to show Eric how wrong he is by making a "soul skating" video; a collection of pure skating exhibitions featuring a team of the best pros selected by yourself and Peralta. This is very successful, and provokes Eric into challenging you to a last skateboarding line in return for the Hawaii tape he refused to let air at the Slam City Jam. After you win, you take the tape and walk away with a snobbish attitude from Eric, who curses as you leave, thus ending the story.

On a second run-through of the game, there is an alternate ending. Instead of you following Eric's line again, a cutscene shows him flashing the tape at you, but in a final frustrated move, the player elbows Eric in the jaw, grabs the tape, and walks away as Eric faints onto his car. If all of the challenges are completed in Normal mode first, the player is rewarded with a collection of game cheats, presumptively done to assist the player in a replay under Hard mode. The game's producers admitted that by virtue of the difficulty of Eric's line (even in Normal mode), both the alternate ending, as well as the cheats, were added on following playthroughs to spare the player that frustration.

Available Characters[]

Note that in the GBA version you have to unlock the skaters in the levels that were introduced in home consoles

Levels[]

In Tony Hawk's Underground there are 9 story mode levels and 3 bonus levels:

Story Mode[]

Bonus THPS2 Levels[]

GBA Levels[]

Skaters[]

The game's default in story mode is the Custom Skater. By playing the levels and challenges, the player can pre-emptively access the professional playable characters in Free Skate modes, as well as unlock secret and bonus characters through Story mode.

By completing certain difficulties in the game, the player is rewarded with secret characters. Easy unlocks Marvel Comics' Iron Man, Normal unlocks Gene Simmons of Kiss, and Hard unlocks a Sewer Monster known as T.H.U.D, which can be seen in the Neversoft intro cutscene.

Soundtrack[]

Full article: Tony Hawk's Underground Soundtrack

Tony Hawk's Underground soundtrack features 78 songs, 72 used in the in-game and 6 more songs used in the in-game skate videos, the soundtrack is split into three genres rock, punk and hip hop from the late 1970s to the present day. The soundtrack is also the biggest in the Tony Hawk series to date.

Trivia[]

  • If you go to Create-A-Skater mode and go through the pre-set skaters, you can find "Sheena" and she is a punk rocker. Obviously, it's a reference to the Ramones' song "Sheena is a Punk Rocker".
  • First appearance of DC Shoes as a selectable brand in the series, and the final appearance of 411VM Video Magazine as an in-game sponsor.
  • There is poster in CAS room which portrays Daisy from THPS4.
  • All versions of the game feature incomplete versions of School, Downhill Jam, and Philadelphia in the game's data. They can be restored through a mod or hacking device such as GameShark.
  • The PS2 disc also contains files from some of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4's levels, such as College, and London, but can not be accessed without significant editing.
  • Iron Man is the third Marvel character to be featured in a Tony Hawk game the other two being Spider-Man and Wolverine appearing in THPS2 and THPS3 respectively.
  • In the beta version, all the traffic vehicles stayed on the road rather than vanishing when you entered a vehicle.
  • This is the first game in the Tony Hawk series where the player can get off their board and explore the levels on foot.
  • This was the last game to feature Kareem Campbell, Rune Glifberg, Bucky Lasek, Elissa Steamer, and Jamie Thomas as playable characters in 17 years, until Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2. Same for Steve Caballero until Pro Skater HD, where he was available as a downloadable skater.

External Links[]


Tony Hawk's Underground levels
New JerseyManhattanTampaSan DiegoHawaiiVancouverSlam City JamMoscowHotter Than Hell
School IIVeniceHangarSchoolDownhill JamPhiladelphia
Tony Hawk's Underground novelty characters
Paul RodriguezArto SaariGene SimmonsIron ManT.H.U.D.
Tony Hawk's Game Series
Pro SkaterPro Skater 2Pro Skater 3Pro Skater 4UndergroundUnderground 2American WastelandProject 8Proving GroundPro Skater 5
Downhill JamMotionRideShredShred Session
Pro Skater 2XUnderground 2 RemixAmerican Sk8landPro Skater HDSkate JamPro Skater 1 + 2
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