Animal Chin, where art thou? Review

Animal Chin, where art thou?

Skateboarding almost killed me at the age of 10. I was riding my Sims E

down the most threatening hill in the neighborhood, caught the front wheels

on a rock, flipped end over end for about 20 feet and landed square on my head.

I blacked out, only to awaken in a hospital bed. My mother, sitting vigilantly

at my side, swore that she’d never allow me to ride a board again, thus ended

my skateboarding days.

Or so I thought.

Late last year, Tony

Hawk’s Pro Skater blasted onto the scene and catapulted video game skateboarding

to new heights. Its excellent engine, slick graphics, amazing level design and

brilliant gameplay won it many accolades, including GR’s Best PSX Game of 1999.

It also managed to glue my old, jaded, Bones Brigade ass to the couch for literally

months at a time. Look ma, no hands!

Like any good game, Tony Hawk seemed destined for porting. The upcoming

Dreamcast version seems like a sure bet, but what about this N64 port? Considering

the quality of most recent N64 games, I was hardly expecting much…and was

totally shocked when I realized that this game is equal to, if not better than,

the original PSX version.

For the most part, this version is identical to its PSX predecessor. If you’re

not familiar with the game at all, go check out that

review to get a briefing on why this game rocks.

Too lazy? Fine, here’s a rundown. You choose one of 10 skaters (the same as

you’ll find in the PSX version) and skate your butt off on one of 9 levels.

There are several different ways to play, including a Career mode, Free Skate,

and multiple two-player modes. That’s all you’re getting out of me. Sure you

don’t want to read that

other review?

The bulk of the gameplay changes are due to the differences between the two

console systems. While it looked great on the PSX, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater

looks simply fantastic on the N64. The action is incredibly smooth and the skaters

move as realistically as ever. The game is RAM enhanced, and you’ll be hard

pressed to find many polygonal errors or clipping problems. While some levels

(particularly San Francisco) show some pop-up, this is to be expected and doesn’t

get in the way whatsoever. Pro Skater serves as an impressive reminder

of the N64’s graphical prowess.

New to the N64

version is the ‘Trick Tutorial,’ which is essentially a museum mode that gives

you a trick list and move demo for each skater. If you’re good enough, you can

also unlock some special moves to watch here. Nice.

The control is great. This is mainly due to a terrific stunt setup, at once

intuitive yet at the same time challenging. Tricks can be linked endlessly,

producing some epic combos. With a little practice, you’ll be pulling off some

20,000 point tricks in no time.

Multi-player has been retained as well, and has in fact gotten better due

to the more powerful hardware. Graffiti, Trick Attack and Horse modes are all

still here – without any slowdown whatsoever.

If there was one problem with the original game, it was the music. The songs

were fine, but hearing them ad nauseum was not. Turning off the music

was a necessary chore. The N64 version only includes about 20 looped seconds

of each music track, but still must to turned off to preserve sanity. The rest

of the sound, however, is fine. The sound of the skateboard on the various textures

(street, wooden ramps, metal pipes) is particularly well done.

The brilliance of Tony Hawk Pro Skater lies in its freedom, which is

retained perfectly in the N64 port. You can skate literally anywhere, from the

obvious ramps and rails to the more ‘mundane’ objects like tables, cars and

just about everything in between. If it looks skate-able, it probably is. This

leads to a very kinetic, realistic experience, a skating game that -gasp- makes

you feel like a skater!

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater is perhaps the best Playstation to N64 port

ever. Frankly, I just don’t have enough words to describe how pleasing it is

to see that so much time and care has gone into what is too often a rushed afterthought.

Fans of the original will love it, newcomers will love it, skaters and non-skaters

alike will love it…heck, even your mom will love it. I know mine does.