Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4 - The First Few Hours (Version Tested: PS5 Standard)

 

The first Tony Hawk's 1 & 2 Remasters were a soothing balm in a game industry in severe danger of enshittification, breaking the mould for remasters by actually doing exactly that - remastering two brilliant games into something even more brilliant, and properly updated for the modern world and modern PCs / Consoles. 

For a while it looked like sad news, that we'd never get to see any further editions in the series given a similar treatment, but blowed if Activision didn't actually see sense (and probably some respectable sales figures) enough to do another round of these, taking on one of the best in the series (THPS3) and coupling it with its direct sequel (THPS4 which wasn't super-great but still a fun time to be had back in the day when I owned these on the OG Xbox). 

Here we are though, generations later with some super-sharp visuals, buttery smooth 60fps (or if you're rigged up with the right kit, 120hz mode that's even more spectacularly smooth). 

Kicking off career mode, I realised that the other thing these remasters do is give you an absolute SHITLOAD of game in the box. No asset-stripped DLC-driven empty box here, but a chock-full smorgasbord of skating goodness capturing the original spirit of the series and that blissful game mechanic of slowly chipping away at each level until you've nailed all the goals. 

Things kick off with the iconic "Foundry" level and THPS3. I remember the demo of this being something I spent ages on before I bought the original game, and seeing it all picked out in shiny new HD clothes with all new visuals, I was completely impressed by how it all looked, and this has set the scene for the whole game so far. Digging into the tutorial (just to remind myself of the muscle memory this game requires) was all well and good, but playing this level just brought it all slamming back, all the little ways you had to tweak your skills to get to some of the trickier goals, and all the ways you could use the layout of the level to rack up a truly monumental score. 

You know what? Well done Activision and well done Mr Hawk for putting your efforts towards something that feels like a genuine breath of fresh air these days, a game that's well worth the entry fee, and well worth the time you can invest in it as your career progresses. And well done again for all the shiny clothes, great deck designs, fab skaters (all updated as their 'older grown up' selves if they were in the original games plus a roster of newcomers who are all awesome too). 

Now I'm wondering whether Activision will see the wisdom of bringing us the rest. I can only imagine what Tony Hawk's Underground 1 and 2 would look like given a similar treatment, or American Wasteland (where the series got truly weird but still awesome), and even Project 8 (which tried to emulate EA's Skate series in adding a little bit more controllability to your skates). I think I've actually forgotten the other entries but as long as they keep making 'em I'll keep buying them at launch. 

And you couldn't wish it on a nicer bloke. Mr Hawk is a true legend, and really does deserve his second wind as a videogame icon, after all a hell of a lot of us became skateboard obsessives just because of him!