When Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 was announced a few days ago, fans such as myself were excited. It’s been too long since the THPS series was prominent and while the excellent THPS 1+2 hinted at a bright future, Activision Blizzard put the kibosh on things after the game sold well. With the series making yet another comeback and featuring the best game in the series (3 is GOAT), it’s very disappointing to learn that there will be some dramatic changes for Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4.
On the store page available on digital storefronts, the description for THPS 3+4 mentioned that it would have a streamlined version of 4’s campaign that adhered to the “two-minute format” that the first three games had. For those unaware, THPS 4 was the first game in the franchise to break from the strict two-minute limit on each run by allowing players to freely skate around levels at their leisure. While some objectives did incur a timer, you didn’t need to race through and finish as much as possible in one go. This eventually evolved into Tony Hawk’s Underground, which was open-world. Developer Iron Galaxy has now clarified what the store page meant, and as you can guess from the headline, THPS 4 has been changed.
Various outlets have received word that Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4 will feature objectives more in line with the first three games. Players will also need to complete them in various two-minute chunks, which ultimately isn’t so bad but is most definitely not the original game. There actually was a PS1 version of THPS 4 that featured this structure, but its levels were smaller to compensate for its more rigid goals.
I was never personally a big fan of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4, but I also wouldn’t have expected a remake to dramatically alter what some fans have come to love. I think it would have made more sense to include both the original game and a classic timed challenge mode, which is pretty similar to how Tony Hawk’s Underground 2 and American Wasteland handled things. At any rate, diehard fans of the original version of 4 are likely to not be pleased by this change.
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Written by Peter Glagowski
Peter has been a freelance gaming and film critic for over seven years. His passion for Nintendo is only matched by the size of his collection.
