Thrasher Presents: Skate and Destroy

"A game for real skateboarders."

This game is nothing like the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series. The only things similar about the two games are they are both skateboarding games and they both have point systems. Other than that they are completely different. Thrasher Skate and Destroy is the one skateboarding game that portrays how skateboarding actually is. There are no endless combos, linking tricks together with manuals or reverts, no unrealistic tricks, or anything of that matter. This game is made for the real skateboarders. If you don't skate in real life, then you probably will not enjoy this game. But if you do skate in real life, then this game is for you.

Gameplay: 10/10
There are two different modes in Thrasher Skate and Destroy. These modes are Skate and Multiplayer. Skate is the game's main mode and Multiplayer is pretty obvious, it's the multiplayer part of the game.

In skate you can choose from six fictional skateboarders. Their names are Axl, Scab, Kahli, Jasmine, Roach, and Cyrus. Each one has their own different skills, some are horrible at one thing, but great at another, and some are average at everything. The skateboarding skills in this game are ollie, tech, spin, balance, landing, and speed; and they do not change throughout the game like the do in the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater games, so each skater is unique and different throughout the whole game.

The point of Skate Mode is to rip up a spot in two minutes and then away from the cops when they come. To rip up a spot you must get the amount of points required to pass each level. Oh, and for all the non-skaters reading this, ripping up a spot means doing a lot awesome tricks there. If you rip up the spot, then skating companies notice you and they want to sponsor you. You choose the sponsor for each thing. The sponsors are for decks, shoes, clothes, and shop. When you beat each level you have to go back to each level and beat it again. By beating each city you get on the cover of Thrasher Magazine. Once you get on the cover of Thrasher five times, then you become Skater of the Year, and you have beat the game. This game is basically a quest for a young, unknown skateboarder to become a pro skater. There are also some tournaments in the game and to beat the tournaments you must get a certain amount of points. Every time you fall in a tournament you get 500 points taken off of your score. Before every level you get as much time as you want to warm up. When you are ready to start the level you press select. One of the really awesome and realistic things about this game is that when you fall, there is a red number on the left of the screen and if it is a really bad fall, then you die.

There are five main places you can go and each place has three or less levels. The four places are Hometown, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and International. There is only one level in hometown. New York has three levels, Los Angeles has three levels, San Francisco has three levels, and International has two levels. The levels in this game are better than in any other skateboarding game. This is because they are real skate spots. It's fun to do realistic tricks in skate spots that most skaters wish they could skate, but don’t have access to.

Multiplayer is pretty good, but I have one problem with it. It is not split screen multiplayer. You and the person you are playing with take turns. This is really annoying and takes twice as long. You also get very bored when the other person is playing and you are waiting for your turn. The good thing about multiplayer is there are so many modes. The multiplayer modes are Sessions Two Minutes, Nickel Bag, Horse, Top Dog, Sick Fix, Long Grind, and Big Wallride. Sessions Two Minutes is where you and the person you are playing with take turns skating a level for two minutes. Nickel Bag is where you do a trick and the other person tries to do a trick worth more points. The one who beats the other person five times wins. Horse is where one person does a trick and the other person has to do the same exact trick. If you don't do it, you get a letter. If you spell out Horse, then you lose. Top Dog is where you take turns doing tricks at five different places, and the highest combined score wins. Sick Fix is where you each have three turns to try to fall the hardest. The person with the hardest fall wins. Longest grind is where the person who does the longest grind wins and Biggest Wallride is where the person with the biggest wallride wins.

Story: 6/10
The story in Thrasher Skate and Destroy is the player you are an unknown skateboarder and you are trying to get noticed and become a pro skater. Your main goal is to first get sponsored and then get on the cover of Thrasher Magazine five times, and you will then become the skater of the year.

The only thing that I do not like about this story is that sponsorship and getting famous is not what skateboarding is all about. The main reason people skate is because it is their life and it is so much fun. Most skaters are not out there to get sponsored and to turn pro. That is my only problem about the story; it's just not what skateboarding is really about.

Controls: 8/10
When you first play this game, you will hate the controls. You will hate this game and you will think this game sucks. You will want to throw this game away and never play it again. Well don't stop playing it. These controls take getting used to, especially if you play Tony Hawk's Pro Skater a lot. You are probably used to ollieing and then doing the trick like in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater. In this game you do not do that on the flip tricks. You do on the grab tricks though. For flip tricks you press triangle and a directional button. For grabs you ollie, by pressing square, and then you press circle and a directional button. To do grinds, you ollie and then press X and a directional button. To get speed you press X and to stop you press square. You may think it's a problem that you press square instead of down to stop, but it works because your thumb is placed on the square button at all times if you are holding the controller right.

Graphics: 8/10
The graphics in this game are pretty good for a Playstation game. The only thing I do not like about these graphics is the skateboarding company logos on the ramps are very, very pixilated. This gets very annoying to look at. Other than that the graphics are great. The character models are very smooth and the levels are very well designed and look great.

Sound: 7/10
I hate rap music. And sadly, rap music is the only music in this game. Yet somehow, I am not annoyed by it. The rap music in this game is actually not that bad, and this is probably because the rap music is not mainstream rap. I actually like some of the songs, which surprised me because I hate rap with passion. Besides there only being rap music in this game, there is one other flaw in the sound department. On each level, there is only one song, so if you are stuck on one level, this can get very annoying.

Difficulty: 8/10
This game is actually pretty hard. At first I breezed through the levels, but the last levels are very hard. The high scores are hard to reach because you only do realistic tricks in this game. Sometimes you can end up doing an unrealistic trick, but nowhere near as unrealistic as in the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater games. You don't do endless combos and you don't link tricks like in the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater games. The most linking you can do in this game is flip trick + grind + flip trick + grind + flip trick. It gets very hard to score in this game, but that's also why it is so fun.

Replay Value: 10/10
You will want to keep playing this game over and over. You will want to just go through the levels un-timed and do realistic tricks. The fun in this game is never-ending if you are a skater. Also, there are so many multiplayer modes in this game that you can play for hours straight against friends. The multiplayer in this game boosts this score up as does doing realistic tricks on all the levels.

Rent and/or Buy: Buy
If you are a skateboarder, then you should go out and buy this. It is a game made for skateboarders. If you are not a skateboarder, there may be a small chance that you will like it. If it seems like it might interest you, then you should go out and buy it. This is just an awesome game for skateboarders.

Overall (Not an average!!): 9/10
Everything about this game is great. It's one of my favorite skating games out there. If you are one of those people who like to do realistic tricks in the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater games or you are a skateboarder in real life, then this is a game for you.

The Final Results:
Gameplay: 10/10
Story: 6/10
Controls: 8/10
Graphics: 8/10
Sound: 7/10
Difficulty: 8/10
Replay Value: 10/10
Rent and/or Buy: Buy
Overall (Not an average!!): 9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 07/12/02, Updated 07/13/02