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Monday, July 27, 2009

Random Blog #2: Why all the hate?

When Tony Hawk's Ride was first announced, the masses silently booed, which rose to an audible "Durr... wut r dey thinkng? We dun need no mo' periferrals...."
I for one wanted Tony Hawk to go back to the arcade roots, be different from skate. Return us to what the series once was.

And now it has. It just took me a few months to realize it.

The skateboard peripheral that it introduces has been done before. Example 1:


I'm sure plenty of you have seen this piece of carbon in an arcade before. It's Sega's Top Skater. During the demo it'll spew out random phrases such as "Radical!" "Awesome!" and other phrases that died with the early 90's. It was a straightforward, downhill-style game (and ironically, a Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam on the Wii and DS are of the same style. But that's another part of this situation I don't want to get into.)

And speaking of arcades, Tony Hawk's first game, believe it or not, was in the arcades. The aptly named 720° (Degrees is pronounced when saying the name, btw) was brought about after Tony Hawk landed the, you guessed, 720° rotation.



Although he was never mentioned in any part of the game (at least I don't think he is) the credit goes to Hawk for inspiring it.

The Tony Hawk games have been all about pushing the limits, inventing new ways to play. Albeit Project 8 and Proving Ground were overcooked (Nail the Grab? Seriously?) Neversoft developed it's own thing once again.

So to those haters who say Tony Hawk needs to quit: Stop whining. The man has done so much for the sport of skateboarding and skateboarding video games meanwhile the only thing you can do is try to guess a kickflip from a heelflip. I would dare to go as far as to say that if it weren't for the TH games, skate. wouldn't exist.
I also want the haters to recognize this: have you ever compared Need For Speed Underground to Gran Turismo? If you did, hand over your Gamercard now. They are two seperate genres: arcade racing and sim racing.

Tony Hawk games = arcade skating.
skate. = sim skating.

Am I getting through to anyone?

Keep Playing.

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