Professional skaters aren't born with the respect of their peers. They have to earn it. The next big leap for the Tony Hawk Pro Skater franchise is on its way, and as its name indicates, Tony Hawk's Proving Ground is all about proving yourself to the skaters you admire, your crew, and the rest of the world. NeverSoft is planning for this to be the biggest Tony Hawk game yet, not just in terms of scale, but also in innovation and customization.
West Philadelphia, Born and Raised...
Tony Hawk's Proving Ground is a rags-to-riches story taking you on a whirlwind tour of the Tri-City area, starting on the mean streets of Philly's inner city, then on to Baltimore, and culminating in the largest Tony Hawk map to date, Washington D.C. Recognizable skateboarding landmarks litter this trifecta of skate havens, including Philly's LOVE Park and Baltimore's Lansdowne skate park. Our nation's capitol includes all the recognizable government buildings, as well as eye-popping environments that are the stuff of skater dreams, like the interior of the Smithsonian National Air & Space museum. If you've ever wanted to break into private property in order to grind across treasured pieces of national history, now's your chance. The biggest shocker this year for die-hard Tony Hawk fans is that a little bit of Elder Scrolls: Oblivion may have crept into this year's game. Described by NeverSoft staff as part-RPG, players will now be able to shape their characters by specializing any way they wish in any combination of the three skater classes: career, hardcore and rigger. To advance in these character classes, you'll have to take on class-specific challenges which will in turn reward you with skating abilities tailored to their style of skating. Your characters will then change both physically and from a gameplay mechanics standpoint to reflect the choices that you've made during your career.
The first of the three skater paths is the career route. Career skaters like Tony Hawk and Stevie Williams are the guys that do it for fame, fortune, the promotion of the sport and for some, the pursuit of rockstar status. Their big incentives include making magazine covers and being featured in video games. These skaters will be able to get contracts with Birdhouse and other big labels, and with their big paydays end up wearing the hottest threads and all the blinging jewelry.
The events for career skaters will involve trying to get your skater as much publicity as possible, getting into the public eye and showing the other pros who the top up-and-comer is. One bit even involves participating in a huge demo in Baltimore's Downtown District with a slew of top pro skaters. In this challenge, you'll need to hit a death-defying Nail-the-Trick gap from a second-floor balcony. In another event, you'll attempt to earn the closing part in a skate video with Arto Saari by showing off technical skills over the gaps in Washington D.C. In order to earn cred, you'll have to face off against a local pro in a locals-only competition in Lansdowne, where you'll have to pull off Nail-the-Grabs good enough to win over the crowds. You can even earn a spot in a Skate Mag by filling in for some absentee pros in a Nail-the-Manual photo shoot with Stevie Williams in LOVE Park.
Hardcore Anger Issues
The hardcore path is for those skaters who don't care about publicity, trophies or stardom. The hardcore skater skates for the love of it all, and will stand up to anyone foolish enough to get in their way. Hardcore skater moves includes the aggro kick, a way to build up huge speed for obtaining equally huge air, as well as the skate check, which will send anyone flying if they don't take cover from your swinging elbows. The hardcore career route features hardcore skating legend Mike Vallely, as you go on a tour of Philly and earn a spot in an old-school locals' skate zine. Some labels and competitions attract the hardcore skater, such as the Quiksilver Bowl Competition. It's an invite to the world of fast skating, hard slashgrinds and intense carves. You'll have plenty of opportunity to put your skate-checking skills to the test when an unfriendly gang moves into FDR skatepark, and it's up to you to kick them out. The rigger is perhaps the most unconventional of the three skater classes. Envision the rigger as the visionary skater, who can see an awesome gap where anyone else would see nothing. These are the builders and innovators of the industry, who set up the craziest possible skate scenarios and then have the courage to pull them off.
If You Build It, They Will Skate
The rigger also happens to integrate one of Tony Hawk's Proving Ground's newest gameplay mechanics as part and parcel of their abilities. The rigger can kick into the skate editor at any time, on the fly, changing the world around them to suit their tastes. They can drop kickers, rails and all sorts of other unique items to create environments more conducive to impressive skate routes. Unlike previous skate park editors, any changes made by the rigger are part of the career mode world, allowing you to impact real change on the environment, without the hindrances of unwieldy grids or other restrictions on item placement.
By choosing to take your created skater down the rigger path, you'll have to show the world your skills at setting up exciting skating environments. One such skate demo takes place in the Baltimore Harbor, where a huge crowd is waiting to witness your talent, but it's up to you to set the scene with your creation tools. The rigger is also the master of breaking and entering, and by scaling walls you can gain access to secret areas with exciting places to skate. While jumping a fence isn't exactly new to the skating world, sneaking past security guards, scaling ivy-covered walls and solving assorted climbing puzzles will allow you to break into unique skating locations. Innovative skaters like Rodney Mullen, Daewon Song and Vanessa Torres are your guides through the rigger campaign, and they'll urge you to skate some of your newly created terrain for a Skate Magazine challenge called "Rig-the-World." From a gameplay perspective, we saw much of what was introduced in Tony Hawk's Project 8 being brought over and enhanced in Proving Ground. The nail-the-trick mechanic is back, and now you'll be able to nail-the-manual and nail-the-grab as well, which could make for a perpetual state of slo-mo' if you so wish. Still, there seems to be a much stronger focus on individual control of your tricks, allowing you to really get creative and come up with moves that could never have been pulled off before.
Make You a Celebrity Overnight
One of the more community-oriented aspects of Tony Hawk's Proving Ground is the new video editor. With it, you can record competitions, demos and skate videos from the career challenges, or you can just record your most well-performed goals or favorite lines. With the toolset, you'll be able to trim, edit or rearrange bits and pieces together, adding overlays, effects, slow-motion sequences, new cameras and music from the soundtrack to your liking. The finished product will be about two MB in size, and you can then upload this personalized skate video to the leaderboards for anyone to check out. Photos can similarly be taken at any time and place within the game, which can be sent to show unique areas you've skated or particularly impressive shots.
While we still haven't gotten any hands-on time with Tony Hawk's Proving Ground, we like the direction that NeverSoft is taking with this game. For the first time, choices you make during the single-player story/career mode may actually have a tangible impact on the growth and progression of your character. It'll be particularly interesting to see how career, rigger, and hardcore skaters face off against each other in the forthcoming online multiplayer modes. Being able to share your videos online, invite other skaters to your personal skater lounge, and take a bevy of trash-talking photographs could potentially make for an exciting community.
Sunday 24th June-2007
gamespy.com
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