Skateboarding
We speak to the icon about going back to basics and making the Minecraft of skateboarding.
The Birdman is back. This year sees the launch of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5, the first brand new mainline game in the series since 2007’s Proving Ground and a return to roots with the Pro Skater name.
We headed down to this year’s NASS Festival at the Bath & West Showground in Somerset, south west England, for a celebration of action sports and music, and host to the British leg of Birdhouse’s European Vacation tour, which saw Tony Hawk & Friends shred up the half pipe. During the legend’s downtime at the festival, we spoke with the man himself, got hands on with the brand new game and found out what exactly it is that keeps the legend going.
Skateboarding games have never been the same since the first Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater launched way back in 1999. While it’s had its ups and downs, rivals and imitators, the franchise is going back to its roots with the upcoming Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5, both in name and spirit, taking a lot of what made the original games successful, while tinkering and tweaking bits and pieces to make it shine. Along with next-gen presentation, a new generation of featured skaters and online capabilities that really take advantage of what the latest generation of consoles are offering, it’s shaping up to be a return to glory for both Hawk and a genre that has been abandoned in recent years.
Pro Skater 5 itself, looks, feels and plays like a classic Tony Hawk game – if you only played the first few games, or you’ve been a die hard fan since day one, you’ll be right at home as it plays practically the same. While it has a few new nuances and tweaked features (the special bar and tricks handle differently, a new drop down mechanic makes it feel a little like OlliOlli), everything harks back to the classic titles, with dial-a-combo controls for flips, grinds and grabs, seamless trick link-ups via reverts and manuals, and huge airs you can pull off easily. You’ll be right at home if you’ve ever played one of the games before, while newcomers will be able to easily pick it up.
We dropped into a reimagining of the first game’s iconic Warehouse level, with extended areas and revamped interiors, and while nostalgia has an impact, it’s a fresh take with all new challenges and hidden secrets. The School level from the second game in the series has also been updated with a fresh lick of paint, taking elements of the original two levels with new and revamped parts, including lightning infused power lines for you to grind that electrify your board – while purists might not be too fond of these fantastical elements, they’re all still a part of the franchise’s DNA. After all, the insane combos you’re busting out are pretty removed from reality anyway.
Still, even in the early build we played, brand new features are already starting to shine – we headed up to a wide open outer space area to make our own dream park with the create-a-park tools, and it looks incredibly promising. It packs in a wide catalogue of easy to place parts that’s almost Minecraft in nature, letting you build your own huge parks with plenty of pieces for you to skate, tear up and hang out with your friends. And virtually skating with 19 other people in your own customised skatepark sounds exactly what Hawk and the team have always wanted – and it’s becoming a reality.
Before Tony & Friends hit up NASS’ huge vert ramp, (it’s crazy to see the 47-year-old veteran dropping in with 11-year-old pros, still tearing it up like the best of them) we spoke with the man himself about his new game, what to expect, past hits and misses, this year’s soundtrack and what keeps him going.
How involved have you been with the latest game? What made you guys want to go back to basics with the Pro Skater name?
I wanted to be authentic to the series so I've been very concerned about that… and as it's now being developed by Robomodo, and not Neversoft [Now defunct studio Neversoft started out on the franchise, before moving on to Guitar Hero following Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground in 2007] , there's been a bit of a learning curve. But they worked on THPS HD [2012’s PS3/360/PC remake of the first THPS game], and they knew what to improve on and so it wasn't that difficult. To be honest, it's really small nuances, like, I want the revert to be on R2 rather than R1, and we could babble on about that for a while – it's just things like that.
What made you want to go back to the basics with the Pro Skater name?
It's been mostly the fans. Obviously, the consoles have come a long way since our last game came out, and I felt we could take advantage of that, yet still deliver the classic THPS gameplay that fans are used to and come to expect from the series. So, it really was a calling from the fans though – they've been very loud and really consistent.
Were you waiting for next-gen to come out?
It's been a long while since the last game, not including the HD remake, came out. Why would you say now is the right time for the new game?
I feel in a couple of years, it wouldn't be just as fresh or timely – like I said, it's been awhile since we developed a game. Our last skate game besides THPS HD was around seven, eight years ago… There hasn't been a new Skate sequel, so I felt there's been a void in skating games. The online element is so huge now, that we can really utilise that in a way we never have. It just felt like the right time – and Activision's been behind it, and it was really a case of getting Activision behind it too. I've been pushing it for a little bit longer than we've been in development.
Tell us a bit about Tony Hawk: Ride (2009’s peripheral-based skateboarding game that worked with a skateboard controller) – it felt like it came out a bit too early, and merely rode the peripheral wave?
The timing on that was weird, but Activision were really behind it. I brought the idea up with them, and I developed it with Robomodo, and literally, the hardware, we had the most ridiculous test boards with tons of different doodads on them. But they were on such a deadline that I felt that [Ride] was released before it should have been. So the kinks weren't worked out and people had a hard time controlling it, and when we released the second, peripherals were pretty much dead. But to be honest, the second game [Shred] is the one I had envisioned for the board. But by the time it came out, people lost faith in not only that series, but in peripherals too. It was just bad timing for us.
What about Xbox Kinect? Did you guys ever consider tapping into that?
Yeah, well… the one lesson I learned with Ride is that as much as people like the simulation, people don't want to get off the couch. And the same goes for Kinect – there's a faction of people and kids that are interested in it, but they're not really into it… they want to emulate skating but without exerting energy.
Way back when with Tony Hawk’s Underground, that title let you put yourself in the game – is that something you ever considered for this title?
Yeah, but to be honest, the character customisation wasn't too much of a priority for this title. It was more about online elements and building parks for us. We really went back to the basics in that sense. That's not to say we wouldn't go back to the that in the future – there's so much we can do with everything online now, with DLC, and so on. There's so much we can do.
Tell us more about Create-A-Park – how does it differ from what we’ve seen in the past?
The whole idea is that you can create a park and share it online and invite people in. That's something that we've never been able to do, and with the community out there, there'll be parks that rise to the top, and some may even live on their own... and as of right now, you can invite up to 20 players into a level, and you can create your own challenges. We've got this idea that you can really make the game yours and also, your own community, inviting people to play from all over the world. That's something we never imagined before. Even when we got to do online stuff on the PS2 and PS3, it still felt like a novelty. We didn't feel like there was a community established out there. It's come a long way – it was inevitable, really.
How’s it been working with Robomodo?
Yeah they're good – they're really diligent, and they're great about getting the latest builds to me. The whole dev kit thing is a nightmare these days, as you have to have the latest build – basically, dev kits expire now and you have to update them through Sony, and get them approved. When I travel so much, it was very hard for me to stay on top of it. But Robo was great in making sure I had a build ready to play when I got home, or when I'm on the road, so I can really make all the comments I need to. In fact, I was just on an hour call yesterday with them about the soundtrack – so we're getting down to the wire, and I'm heavily involved.
Do you feel it's important to get a mix of old bands and new up and comers for the soundtrack? You hear Bad Company or Millencolin, and it's instantly reminiscent of the Tony Hawk's games – do you want to replicate that?
Yeah, well, it's funny, as those bands, when we first started were new. And now we're in that third generation of bands, but we definitely have some old, really old punk stuff that hasn't been on our games before. We've got some hip hop, we've got some new rock metal stuff – I'm really happy with it. It's got a real good mix of music. They never let me say exactly who though, as it's always changing, but I've got a much better idea about it now and I'm proud of it.
How does it feel coming to the UK and skating with 11-year-olds who can really shred? It must be great to see a new breed of skaters come through.
Oh yeah. It also just shows how accessible skating is now. There are people my age still doing it actively, and some professionally. And there are kids like, five years and up who are taking it seriously and who are being groomed for a career in it. That just didn't happen when we were young. There just wasn't that support.
You must be quite proud that the reason these kids are skating is from your video games.
I'm definitely proud of it. It wasn't my goal – I didn't set out to be an ambassador for skating, or for promoting it. But I was happy to, through our games and through hard work. It's fun. To be honest, it's more fun in that I still get to be part of it, and still get to be relevant and skating in the mix. It would be a different story if I had lost my skill set, or if I was truly too old to do it. I don't know what age that is yet, as I'm still pushing it.
How do you feel about kids popping out video game style tricks in real life?
Yeah, it's unbelievable. I see the type of stuff that happens in competitions or in videos, and it really was the kind of stuff that was only possible in video games years ago. I feel like now, that generation of skaters grew up playing games, and you know, seeing videos of just the best of the best stuff and thinking, ‘That's my starting point'. And it's unbelievable the stuff I see, and the combos that go down. It's almost impossible to name.
Have you ever invented any tricks in real life specifically so you can replicate it in the game; or vice versa?
I think that I had the idea for the sack tap, and then we put it in the game [THPS2] – and then I went out and learnt it. It was just so silly – and I kind of knew if I go somewhere, kids are going to ask me to do this trick. I'm going to have to learn this trick.
So there's a few new mechanics in the game; you can set your board on fire, ride electricity and so on – some fans think that’s going really over the top, and are a bit outraged. What are your thoughts on that?
It doesn't change the experience of the game – we're not removing really any other features, and if you look at the series, from the first title all the way to Project 8 and American Wasteland, we've always had some new thing you can do. You know? I think they're thinking that we only have to stay core to whatever, THPS1 and 2, somehow. But we've always been improving, and adding, to what you can do in the game. You don't have to set your board on fire if you don't want to.
You could set your board on fire and still ride it, right?
I think it's cool – because, well, it was an iconic picture of Lance Mountain with his tail on fire at this Tahoe competition a long time ago. So it's a part of skating. It's something that's in the knowledge of skating.
EA’s Skate series shuffled up what skating in a video game was like – did you have any experience with it?
I thought it was interesting. I thought there was an element that it's much more based in the reality of skating, and the difficulty of learning skating, but you know, I always wanted a game that had these fantastical elements where you could grind power lines and do giant gaps and things like that. I don't want to learn to skate in a video game! There are fans of that series who say, 'Oh I hope it has the Skate controls', but then it wouldn't be THPS. That's not even an option.
Tell us a bit about the mo cap process – is that something you guys have done this time around?
Some. Yeah. A lot of the mo cap is easily transferred to the newer stuff, and some tricks are just too hard to do in mo cap suits – so a lot of them are done from video. Even in the first game, the 900º was done completely from video, and a lot of the hardest tricks too. You know, 'put on that mo cap suit, and do the hardest thing you can do' – it just doesn't work like that.
What was the process for picking the pros who appear in the new game?
I wanted to be diverse in personalities and style and terrain, and ways people skate. So I try to make it very diverse. It's hard, as there's so much talent out there. There's an homage to our first series with Andrew [Reynolds] in there. There's a new generation; we’ve got my son Riley in there, there's a strong female contingent with Lizzie [Armanto] and Leticia [Bufoni], and there's all kinds of style with David Gonzales, Ishod [Wair], Jaws [Aaron "Jaws" Homoki], Nyjah [Huston]… I feel like we've really picked people from the best of the best.
It must be cool seeing your son rise up on his own too.
He really has taken his own direction, and forged his own way in skating. The request for him to be in the game didn't even come from me, as I thought he wouldn't want to be. When I asked him, and he said yes, I thought it was pretty cool. It all came from the fans and Activision.
Talk to us about the multiplayer – you can have up to 20 players hanging out, but what kind of modes are there? Are there classic things like Horse?
Yeah, all the different two minute challenges from before, and there's a lot of free skate elements in there too. You can create your own too, and set your whole crew on its own mission. Online's been challenging to play right now, being on the road, and there's a very limited community out there right now.
What's your favourite game you love?
I was a huge fan of Missile Command. I feel like that's what brought me into the arcade. Everyone was talking about Pac-Man, Space Invaders… but Missile Command was what I was really drawn to – the chaos, thinking fast and things like that. I don't know if it's my all time favourite game – that would probably be Marble Madness. As that led me to home computers. Eventually, through that channel – as I bought an Amiga, which has Marble Madness, and they were the first non linear video systems, and it let me edit video on there. It just took me to this different route of doing things, and doing it yourself.
How about your favourite THPS level to play? School II? Burnside?
Downhill Jam. It had a huge half pipe – and it was at the time the only start to finish level that we had, which I felt was a cool element.
What keeps you going after all of these years?
Because, well, it's so incredible how far skating has come, and I wouldn't have given it up anyway. To have all of these opportunities is amazing; I get to travel the world at someone's expense, bring my family along, all while doing the thing I love – and why would you quit that? I do feel like my skills are still there, I can justify being pro – it would be sad to be the old guy that can do only some of the tricks, and I don't want to just be playing the hits.
What’s the one piece of wisdom you’d give to the younger skate generation?
Break out of your comfort zone. Learn other types of tricks. Learn to skate other types of terrain you don't expect to, and keep challenging yourself. If you only focus on one aspect of skating, you'll get lost in the shuffle and you gotta be ready, as if you try to make your career out of it, if you're going to be a professional, people expect you to be a professional – you gotta rip no matter what. If you're sick, if the ramp sucks, if the park is less than perfect, you're not above it. So go at it, get some.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5 hits shelves September 29 in the US and October 2 in Europe on Xbox One, PlayStation 4 as well as Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
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