Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 Turns 15 Years Old Today

THPS3

The Tony Hawk’s series was a staple of my angst-ridden teen years. I remember playing a demo of the original Tony Hawks Pro Skater (THPS) on the original PlayStation. At the time, slang around my school had labelled anything “cool” as “sick”. It was 1999. Bleached hair was “sick”. The Budweiser “wassssuuupp” ad was “sick” and this game was “sick”. The success saw Activision spawn a sequel, which was even better than the original in 2000, and next up, THPS3 was released – the first of the series on the new PS2, GameCube and Xbox systems.

Well, wanna feel old? That was 15 years ago today.

That almost means it’s old enough to get married or join the army. Still, quality games stand the test of time, and THPS3 has certainly done that. Graphically, it was brilliantly rendered and looked super smooth compared to the previous instalments, the levels were larger and the gameplay was pretty much as perfect as you could ask for. Times have moved on, and there have been many skateboarding games since, but when anyone mentions a game, the first thing you think about is the Tony Hawk’s series.

The game has many memories for me – everything from soaking the foreman in the Foundry, to the constant ads for Nokia cellphones plastered all over the game (now that’s a real sign of the times). The levels were imaginative and brilliantly sculpted (my personal favourite being the “Japan” level), plus you could play as Bam Margera of “Jackass” fame! I was 16 at the time, and discovering how not to get texts from girls on my Nokia 3310 whilst watching Jackass on MTV, I think it’s safe to say that this game definitely knew its target market. The soundtrack was excellent too and introduced me to bands such as Mad Capsule Markets, CKY and Alien Ant Farm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdmWvQl3keA

It was also the first game in the series to feature pedestrians (or, as I knew them “people to terrorise with a skateboard”) and also had the option to create your own female custom skater. Let’s be honest, we all tried to make Avril Lavigne, didn’t we? No? Just me? Never mind then.

The game was, again, a huge hit and was praised by both fans of the series and critics alike. It spawned a few spin-offs including the brilliant “Tony Hawk’s Underground” where you played the part of an up and coming skateboarder, plying his trade and working his way up from the suburbs to become an international star and the open-world, “American Wasteland” which was fun, but borrowed heavily from Activision’s “Spider-Man 2”, which was released the previous year.

Sadly, the series has taken a nosedive since then, with the most recent instalment, THPS5, being plagued with technical issues and glitches. It is generally regarded as one of the worst games ever made. It’s a shame, the franchise had lasting potential, but in recent years, lazy development has really let it down. Here’s hoping there’s one last kick-flip left in the series.

God, I feel old.

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