Tony Hawk's American Wasteland

"Yes, it's a Tony Hawk game, but they got the formula wrong"

Boy, the Tony Hawk series has reformed the extreme sports genre. All of us poor nerds who could never ollie in real life can now tweak insane flips, grabs, grinds, and manuals in this virtual skate park. But dare I say it that Neversoft has lost some steam from its original release. Following the Tony Hawk's Underground series, Neversoft goes for a name change, otherwise known as the "American Wasteland" or Los Angeles, California. A major theme in this game is going back to the home of skateboarding where a semi-original (in Tony Hawk terms) story is told, but it appears the presentation is all flash and little substance; Tony Hawk's American Wasteland feels too gimmicky as a result. Even with new levels, a new story, several new skateboarding tricks, the ability to ride BMX bikes, as well as many carryover features from THUG 2, it still feels slapped together.

In this seventh installment of the Tony Hawk series, there is your standard Story and Classic Modes, as well as Free Skate and Create-a-Skater. Nonetheless, the interface received a cosmetic treatment from the Tony Hawk Underground series, but the menus feel too stiff. But why complain? This game is about skateboarding. Go ahead and choose out of a pool of professionals, ditching a lot of veterans such as Eric Koston for some newcomers, such as Tony Alva, Ryan Sheckler, and Stevie Williams. But Story Mode usually comes first since it is required to unlock new places to skate.

The game's story is about a young man who goes to Los Angeles to become the world's greatest skateboarder, only to meet a band of deliquent skateboarders: Mindy, the kind girl who lends you a hand when you arrive; Murphy, the guy with connections to Hollywood's finest; Boone, the bald tough guy; Useless Dave, the stumpy annoying dude who says random facts about Tony Hawk; and Iggy van Zant, the best underground skateboarder in the world. Everyone resides at the Skate Ranch, a dusty walled-up part of town, which soon becomes a "killer" place to skate once the crew steals pieces of random items around town, such as makeshift kickers and a giant dinosaur head, and scatters them around the property. There's also other sub-plots, such as Tony Hawk's Am-Jam contest, as well as Iggy's run-in with the law. Each character has their share of cheezy dialogue, with bits and pieces of hilarity, but if you found the pro-centered plot of Underground 1 and 2 too poor, this may or may not be a hit or miss, considering the plot is about as silly but without as many pros running around.

The Story Mode takes place in different sections of Los Angeles, beginning in Hollywood and going to Beverly Hills, Downtown, Santa Monica Beach, East LA, Vans Skate Park, and obviously the Skate Ranch. Contrary to what the box says, the game's areas are not laid out like a city but are sectioned off and connected by "tunnels," or passageways that tend to lag up due to loading. It's not all that bad, but it's a bit of "stretch" on Neversoft's part. Anyway, in these different sections of town, a large amount of missions are done by talking to individuals and doing what you are told. There won't be much of a problem finding missions due to the handy compass. However, none of the missions are really challenging like in previous Tony Hawk games. Part of this is due to the game's tutorial-esque setting--plenty of missions early on are about "getting a hang of" moves that you may have become acquained with in THPS4/THUG1/2. Other problems include lining up the skater with basic tasks, such as "wallplant the wall in front of you" or "bank transfer the police car in front of you." The good missions, such as "hit this dumb old line" or "get a high score" come a bit too late in the game.

The game's story mode is by no means difficult; it is too easy and flawed. The harder difficulty settings do little to turn up the difficulty, but they require more boring side missions, such as earning money by doing easy tasks for a hobo (I kid you not). Anyway, to break the monotony, money can also be spent on haircuts, clothes, accessories, and boards at stores scattered around Los Angeles. The problem with all these changes is that they stay in the Story Mode. There is no way to use this same skater in Free Skate, which is a bit of a pain for the dedicated Tony Hawk players.

Story Mode may be a real hassle, but Classic Mode is not much different. Classic Mode recreates the old Tony Hawk tasks such as getting high scores or collecting the skate letters. Nothing new this time, except a lot of the levels, such as Minneapolis or the Mall, feel old, especially considering these levels were tailored for the old Tony Hawk games with much fewer features. There are also the exclusive levels from THUG 2: Remix for the PSP available in this mode, but they tend to suffer the same problem as the Los Angeles levels and feel rather bland and unoriginal.

However the missions turn out, there is still the reliable Free Skate mode to lean on. Go ahead and grab a buddy or play online or by your lone self. To keep the skating "fresh," Neversoft has gone out on a limb to add a ton of new tricks to the table, and even reform new ones. The first distincion between THUG 1/2 and THAW is the reformed running system. No longer is running off the board done in a stiff manner, but now the skater runs and sways left to right like any normal person would. The problem is that along with the off-the-board action comes a lot of goofy, hard-to-control moves called parkour. Jump and press X to do spastic backflips. Weird huh? Run up walls by holding X and the arrow button, but this makes it difficult to scale walls easily; much harder than the utilitarian system in THUG 1/2. Comboing in and out of parkour is much more difficult than one would imagine, and I have bailed too many times to consider trying it again. Thankfully, the other new move, the burt slide, involves sliding with one hand to the ground, and it is the only really useful move to come out recently, as it can be a substitute for manuals.

Among other things are moves carried over from THUG 2, such as the Natas Spins, mid-air flips, focus mode, and the bail freakouts. Along with the parkour, these moves are hard to use and are usually distracting from the basic "grind-manual-grab-flip" formula, but being able to do rapid 720 while pulling a Melon or a Benihana is just distracting and ruins the balance in the game. Thankfully, they are only optional, but whatever tweaking Neversoft has done to the game has brought up more glitches in the engine which usually result in some nasty unexpected bails.

The apperance of BMX seems like a novel feature, but the controls are "redone" to meet Tony Hawk standards. This means using the joysticks to pedal and to pull of tricks and whatnot, but a lot of the tricks are snappy and awkward to pull off. Considering that Neversoft also made Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX (with Mat Hoffman making cameo appearances once again), one would think they have a good idea of how to make a polished bike-riding simulator, but it doesn't work out in American Wasteland.

The levels themselves are chock full of city-esque detail, but therein lies the problem. Tony Hawk games have become to urban-oriented, and these levels grow old fast, especially considering that Story Mode takes place in these same old levels over and over again. Only three or so levels in the game do not take place in the city, and finding good lines to skate becomes more of a pain than ever before. Also, not to mention that the levels have lost a lot of their charm from the good old THPS days (Los Angeles from THPS3 wasn't bad). Thankfully, the Vans Skate Park, as well as the Custom Park feature, are saving graces for American Wasteland, but the Skate Ranch feels too sloppy for comfort, even if it is "original."

Graphics-wise, Tony Hawk's American Wasteland isn't breaking new ground for the PS2. Probably the most noticeable feat involves several new trick animations, particularly the flip tricks, which do help the game feel more realistic. Othewise, character models and level texturing are basic; nothing flashy, but everything resembles what it should look like. Character models tend to repeat the same old animations, such as the "point and look" or the "cross arms and nod head" poses, but it's only minor. Probably the lowest point in the graphics department is the lighting and contrast of some of the levels. The environments tend to look too dull at certain times in the game, and that stands out a bit from previous Tony Hawk games. Regardless, credit is due to Neversoft for emulating the likes of Los Angeles in a video game.

Like graphics, the sound gets an overhaul in some places. To accompany the new trick animations come new skateboarding sounds. I must admit that I had like the sound of the kicking and the grinding this time around, but everything else is a standard fare. At some points in the game, it feels as if some sound clips were omitted (no music inside stores) or were done very mundanely (Rick Thorne giving you the umpteenth bike mission comes to mind). The soundtrack is the standard Tony Hawk fare, full of silly no-name rock and rap bands, but it gets more silly when they bring "emo" bands such as Green Day, My Chemical Romance, and others into the picture. There are some unique tracks, particularly the ones involving Los Angeles and whatnot. However, I tend to be lenient on official soundtracks since whether or not they are a hit or miss depends on the person playing the game, not me.

Most of the game's problems revolve around the gameplay. Neversoft hasn't done a very good job making a truly genuine Tony Hawk. The levels, the added features, and the same-old same-old story line grow weak pretty fast. However, there appears to be a bit of effort on Neversoft's part, so it's not all that bad after all; it just needed a lot of polish before it was released. If you are a big Tony Hawk fan and are wondering if this game fits the bill, go ahead and rent it and check out the scenery. However, this game really falls behind the prestige of Tony Hawk's 2, 3, and 4, so if you're dying to get the best Tony Hawk game out these, this one should be one of the last ones on the priority list.

Presentation: 7/10 - Neversoft prides itself in making the Los Angeles skateboarding game, and it follows through, except for some lackluster menus and weak story mode.
Gameplay: 5/10 - Hey, it's still Tony Hawk and you can still do kickflips, but the environment is sub-par.
Graphics: 7/10 - Some new animations, but nothing really major has been changed this time around.
Sound: 7/10 - Some improved sound effects, silly soundtrack, voice acting is on par.
Replay Value: 6/10 - Lots of goals to complete, but the story and classic modes are rather weak. Levels aren't very great either.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 11/06/06, Updated 10/15/07

Game Release: Tony Hawk's American Wasteland (US, 10/18/05)