Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 – Review

Time sure flies when your backlog keeps growing at an exponential rate, as we didn’t realize that Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 was released almost four years ago. We loved the second lease on life for these iconic Tony Hawk games, and we were rather stoked when we learned that the third and fourth installments would receive the same treatment too. With Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 finally released, we were eager to dive back in and see what monster-combos we could chain together.

Story

Outside of an introduction by none other than Tony Hawk’s digital avatar, there is no story to be found in Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4. The game is all about its gameplay, and that’s perfectly fine in this case. You’ll just go from one stage to the next, or you can duke it out online with other players. If you like to take things slower, you can also opt to skate around freely to just zone out.

Graphics

Graphically, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 looks great. This new rendition of the old-school games has received more than a new lick of paint, as everything looks very detailed, the stages have never looked better, and the animations are extremely fluid. For THPS 4, the developers had to compress the game into small stages, in the same way as the first three games. This makes this release a lot more than a simple remaster. Considering Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 is also available on PS4, we still found the game to be visually appealing on PS5 as well.

Sound

In terms of sound design, THPS 3 + 4 does not disappoint, for the most part. When the game booted, and we were treated to the melody of Ace of Spades by Motörhead, we knew things were going to turn out great. We loved the rock and metal tunes of the album, while some of the hip-hop beats and lyrics missed the vibe of these titles by a long shot. Don’t get us wrong, it’s not that these songs were bad, but they didn’t get the blood pumping to perform sick tricks. Some of these songs didn’t match the fast-paced gameplay that this old-school THPS experience has to offer. The sound effects are great, and they provide players with realistic audio feedback when rolling across the levels, grinding across railings, or simply when falling flat on our digital face. There’s some voice acting present, but mainly during the expansive tutorial.

Gameplay

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 is an arcade-like skating game that is basically a remake of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 and 4, which were released back in 2001 and 2002, respectively. The formula for THPS 3 + 4 remains the same as that of THPS 1 + 2, which was released in 2020. You’ll play through different levels in the career mode with a 2-minute timer ticking away. During those two minutes, you’ll have to aim to complete as many tasks as possible, such as getting certain high scores, combo ratings, performing certain tricks, finding the letters for the word ‘SKATE’, and so on. You’ll have to replay stages multiple times to focus on different tasks, and you eventually unlock new levels and their assignments. It’s a pleasant gameplay loop that respects that authentic Tony Hawk’s Pro Skating experience. THPS 4 underwent a massive overhaul, as the current development team had to adjust the original game to align with the gameplay formula of the other three THPS titles. We didn’t mind this, as it made everything into one big cohesive whole.

Just like in the previous release, you’ll be able to level different skaters by assigning stat points, and you can also unlock different characters and cosmetics by spending in-game cash or by completing challenges. Casual players will still be able to make steady progress here, and if not, there are so-called game mods that can tone down the difficulty. You can adjust settings that allow you to keep perfect balance, prevent you from bailing out, or even increase the timer and raise the base combo score. This allows you to adjust the game to your skill level, and as you improve your skills, you can slowly take off the training wheels. It’s a fun inclusion, and it can help players nail a challenge or two to unlock the next level(s).

If you’re looking for some extra action, you can play some local or online multiplayer. We quite enjoyed the competitive online mode, which dropped us in random levels having to do random challenges, such as getting the highest score or tagging the most objects. The core concept is simple here, but still highly entertaining. There’s also a free skate mode and the newly added Hawk mode. The latter has you hide the letters that spell Hawk in a level, while you have to search for the letters hidden by other players. When looking at the extremely long matching times for this mode, it’s safe to say that the current player base is digging into the other online content at the time of writing this review. Crossplay is available, so you can add friends who have the game on different platforms. If you’re part of the players who played the original games when they came out, you’d probably want to stick to visiting a digital skatepark together, rather than breaking your back in a real one.

Conclusion

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 is a great sequel to the 2020 remake that made us fall in love with this series all over again. The gameplay loop is highly entertaining, the progression curve keeps players hooked, and it’s just an awesome blast from the past that deserves its time in the spotlight once again. While some of the new inclusions in the soundtrack didn’t blow our socks off, the general sound design proved to be top-notch, and the brand new visuals truly turned this old-school title into a next-gen game. We’ll be diving back into the game in the near future, as we still have quite a few challenges to beat.

Ibuki

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Aspiring ninja.