JiggyJay's Full Review: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 for PlayStation 2
What's better than reading Tony Hawk's autobiographical book, "Hawk Occupation: Skateboarder"? Playing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4, which is the best in the whole franchise for its imaginative goals and levels. This game has so much in it; it would make Grand Theft Auto 3 cream its pants.
This is the fourth Hawk game since the debut game in 1999 and it's had so many facelifts and adjustments, it would make any series jealous (especially the Tomb Raider games). THPS4 is my favorite because one of my favorite skaters, Bob Burnquist, is in the series again (he wasn't in THPS3 because he was licensed to Konami for the X-Games game.). Also I love this game because the biggest change is the free roam around levels sort of like the way Acclaim's Aggressive Inline was. Instead of how before each level you got a list of goals to accomplish in the other games, you actually track other skaters, photographers, friends, etc., and they give you goals to do. This makes the game fresher than the rest of the franchise. Instead of having to collect "SKATE" or having to get a High, Pro, and Sick Score in each level over and over again (which makes the game incredibly stale and boring after a while), there are imaginative and fun/interesting goals to do. Like in the Alcatraz level, when you skate over to the prisoner, he'll ask you to help him escape from the island by causing tons of commotion, so that it will distract the guards, thus letting him get away. Or how about the goal in the Zoo level where you have to skitch (hang on the back of a vehicle/animal, while it is running or driving away, which gives you speed and a score.) on the back of an elephant while itˇ¦s running and pooping for 30 seconds? These goals are fun and they have a sense of humor, which will even make a Scrooge-type person to chuckle at least once.
The graphics are greatly updated from THPS3. The fps moves at a steady pace even when tons of tricks or characters are on screen. I didn't notice one HINT of slowdown. The camera angles are wonderful as ever (directly behind the skater) and there are tons of bright colors to make a mime sick. The levels are humongous compared to THPS3's. Alcatraz and London will have you skating around for hours at a time. What I've always liked about the series' graphics is that whenever you grind, it makes sparks that just light up the screen. The characters (skaters) are awesomely done and they actually RESEMBLE the real skaters this time (which is a great improvement on the series). One thing that I have to b**** about is that whenever you complete a goal, the person who gave you the goal, does the same dance every time you complete the goal. They wave their hands triumphantly in the air and that's all. Whoop-dee-doo. Another thing I just HAVE to address is that when you're skating around, you always have you're feet on the board, they never push off from the ground like they do in real skating...that's physics for you! Graphics: 8/10 Although the graphics were good, they were very forgettable and I just hate the skating-without-pushing-off thing.
The Money Thing from THPS2 is back (which some people didn't like, but I loved) and it's funner than ever now that you can buy so much crap that would make Bill Gates blush. You can buy decks, skaters, levels, movies, cheats, and above all others, accessories for Create-a-Skater.
A big step forward in the series, are the mini games. OMG, they are so good and fun. There are tons of different mini games like Tennis (where you use your board as the racket) and Baseball (where, you guessed it, you use your board as a bat). These games are fun and addictive and better yet, you can earn money playing them!
My favorite part about the whole game: Sound! Holy crap, the soundtrack is killer. The music that's on it has a balanced amount of rock and rap that you can customize, whether you want to turn off all the tracks that you hate or just turn off all the rock or rap songs, you can do whatever you want. There are 30 tracks that are awesome from bands like Flogging Molly, Bouncing Souls, Sex Pistols, U.S. Bombs, AC/DC, The Distillers, Offspring, Avail, System of a Down, and Iron Maiden just to name a few and great rap songs by N.W.A., Run DMC, and Gang Starr. THPS4's soundtrack totally blows all the other games' soundtracks away. I know, I know, Rocky (Rock_On, I gave you that nickname and your selling it out, so you gotta give me some profit, homey) said that AC/DC's song "TNT" is his favorite song on the game and I have to say that it is pretty (really) good, but for my favorite song, it's totally a tie between "Drunken Lullabies" from Flogging Molly and "Anarchy in the U.K." by Sex Pistols.
One of the other cool parts about the audio in this game is that there are voices in it. No, it's not my imagination! The people who give goals tell you what the goals are and the skater's talk, too. It's not fake, the real skaters voice their counterparts and I want to add: they do it nicely. I also like the grinding sounds that happen when you grind on a rail, they are genuine and are great to hear so I give THPS4's Sound Department a perfect 10/10. My ears were amazed and still are!
One of the other cool things about this game is the demo that's in it of Shaun Murray's Pro Wakeboarder. Thanks to this demo, I'm really looking forward to it and I hope Shaba! Games (I think they worked on Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX) do well on it, which they are. I'm pretty sure it's not going to go downhill and suck like THPS's Activision partner Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarder.
One of the things I just DESPISE about this game (and I'm sure some people feel the same way) is that it makes you feel lazy, fat, and that you don't have a life. Being the opposite of me, it makes me feel bad that I don't know how to skateboard. I mean, while I'm sitting here with pretzels and Pepsi (my two basic food groups) and playing THPS4, there are people hanging with friends, skateboarding and exercising while I'm sitting here in my boxers eating stale pretzels. It's heartbreaking, I know.
Another good thing about Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 is that even though it's on it's fourth cycle, it's still fun and addictive to play and that's ALWAYS a good thing. It's also good that it's staying to strictly good game play and its fans instead BMX XXX, which Dave Mirra ditched (heck, I would too if I was in his position).
Speaking of game play, like always, THPS4 gets a perfect 10/10. Not only are the levels and goals fun to play in but also the controls are easy to do. I'm happy to say that I've nailed "The 900" and "The Misty Flip" in the same day with the touch of a couple buttons. It's true, the controls are so easy to learn, a person who's never played a THPS game can pull off a "Sack Tap" in 5 minutes--guaranteed. The controls have been the same since THPS2 (since they introduced the terrific manual) and THPS3 (when they introduced the fantastic Revert), and now with THPS4, they have introduced the OK trick, the Skitch. The controls are simple to learn and child's play to master. By pressing Square while jumping (pressing X), you do a flip trick (like a kick flip, hard flip, or finger flip) and by pressing the Circle button while jumping, you can do grab tricks (like a melon, nose grab, or cannonball). To grind all you have to do is jump on a rail and press the Triangle button and you'll do a grind trick like a Smith Grind, Crooked Grind, or a Board slide. And when you build up your special while doing tricks, you can do special tricks like the recently mentioned "900" and "Sack Tap". Each skater has different special tricks. As I said before, the controls are so simple, you're grandma's will even learn them easily. It's not hard to navigate through the Create-a-Skater, this time through, so it's a HUGE relief. :)
JIGGYJAY'S FINAL WORD
With 190 goals (about 10-20 goals to each of the 9 levels), the replay value is high and extremely fun. I guarantee you will have a great time with this game. Also, just to make myself feel better, read my review on Tony Hawkˇ¦s Pro Skater 3 since you're already on Epinions. Although, Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX 2 and Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer are good games, I think that you should definitely buy THPS4 first, and then go on to those games. And before you get ready to tackle THPS4, I would recommend that you get the Bradygames strategy guide for it (because this game can get really hard, really fast, which sort of sucks). Thanks for reading and I hope I helped you. If I didn't help you that much, sue me. This is my second review in friggin' 3 months or whatever. Anyway, I'm going to go take some caffeine pills drank down with some Red Bulls, so I'll talk to you peeps later. Peace out.
Non-linear career mode lets skaters choose the level and goals they want. Challenge pros head-to-head to beat their best tricks, take off to a compet...More at Amazon Marketplace
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