Tony Hawk's Project 8

"About time Tony Hawk gets back to basics"

Last year, at the Xbox 360 launch, the Tony Hawk franchise made its debut with Tony Hawk's American Wasteland, but it wasn't the series' true next-gen debut. Think of it more as a PS2/Xbox port, but with optional widescreen support. The eighth iteration of the series, Tony Hawk's Project 8, is a more appropriate 360-caliber gameg built from the ground up for the newest generation of gaming hardware.

Every trick has been individually motion-captured for this entry in the series. I am happy to say the marketing hype doesn't lie; this does in fact feel like a new generation of Tony Hawk has begun. Besides the rebuilt visuals I'll touch on later, the new tricks found here help distinguish Project 8 from all other previous entries in the series. There are a couple of minor new tricks added in like stalls which looks like you are about to start a grind, but you just stand in place on a rail, much like hanging on a lip trick. Skaters can do 360-degree flip tricks now too, they seem somewhat goofy, but work well.

The standout newest addition is “Nail the Trick” that brings the skater into a bullet time-esque state that zooms in and focuses only on the skater's feet and board which is activated clicking in both thumbsticks. In Nail the Trick, the left and right thumbsticks correspond to your left and right feet, and moving them has their own action of how you flip and rotate the board.

Timing is very key here, and it took me a while to get use to it, but Project 8 does a tremendous job with the learning curve on it with some excellent tutorials. My only gripe with it is that the 360's controllers don't need a lot of pressure in order to push down its thumbsticks, so I found myself going into Nail the Trick a fair amount of times I didn't want to and it totally threw off my combo string. Other than that, I think it is one of the most innovative tricks introduced in the franchise to date.

A lot of Tony Hawk fans were probably let down that American Wasteland's much-hyped lack of load times in its one huge level were not-so-cleverly disguised by thin, boring tunnels. That is not the case here, Project 8 actually delivers one gigantic city with no load times, or disguised tunnels whatsoever. The game is divided up into several levels like American Wasteland, but they are all connected to each other with no invisible barriers whatsoever. This can make finding opponents in multiplayer a little bit of a chore, but there is also an option to thankfully just limit the gameplay area to certain sections of the city only.

The main mode of all Tony Hawk games has always been the career mode, and Project 8 delivers probably the best one the series has seen in quite some time. Your custom skater starts off ranked #200, and after progressing through goals and other objectives your destiny is to rank up into the top eight skater competition known as “Project 8.” Each section of the city has its own set of goals, but you aren't required to go through one set of goals at a time, it is more open-ended and you can choose whichever ones to do at your heart's desire.

One very nice theme to the goals I noticed was instead of bringing back the old “Classic Mode” with its own set of levels, each section of the city now has a “Classic” goal which gives you two minutes to nail a number of additional goals just like the earlier entries in the series did. There are also now instant challenges which make up a good amount of goals where as you are free skating around the city you can instantly hop right into a manual or grind challenge, which can be completed by reaching a certain distance defined by three difficulty levels. There are also lots of other special themed events in the Career mode like impressing crowds in tape demos and completing crazy stunts that the Pro Skaters bestow upon you.

:img: Mr. Earl Hickey himself, actor (and former pro skateboarder) Jason Lee (Mallrats, Stealing Harvard) helps the Career mode by serving as its unofficial narrator by sending you frequent video messages notifying you of new areas and goals that open up throughout your journey. He does a very good job setting the tone of the story with the usual wit the franchise is known for, but now thankfully the story isn't over-the-top lame like the Underground entries were. Overall, this is a damn good Career mode I had trouble putting down. My only qualm with it is the compass that leads you to goals gets very cluttered with other waypoints and it makes it troublesome to find where I'm going.

The Tony Hawk games have always been recognized for throwing in a plethora of creation options, but unfortunately during the next-gen revamp, the developers at Neversoft have severely limited the options compared to before. Create-a-Skater is still here, but the clothing and facial options are very limited. Regrettably the Create-a-Trick and Create-a-Park have been removed entirely and are nowhere to be found in Project 8.

A strong online component still remains however with excellent use of Xbox Live. Up to eight players can duke it out in all the previous modes Tony Hawk fans have grown to love like Trick Attack, Graffitti, Combo Mambo, and Horse. There is also a new mode called Walls where your grind path leaves a trail of newly erected walls and the objective is to knock over as many skaters possible with your walls of doom. I don't know if I was having lots of bad luck, but I did have a strong number of disconnects when attempting to start up online games, so keep that in mind when playing online.

Project 8 has a strong list of achievements, a good number of which heavily reward you for completing goals on the hardest difficulty level which only drives you to become a better overall skater. One thing to make note of is an odd achievement that is only awarded when you defeat one of the game's developers online or beat someone who has beaten one of the developers. I don't know if I had pure luck, but in my estimated 15 online matches, I only won just once and on that occasion I was rewarded with that achievement.

Other than a framerate hiccup here and there, Project 8 runs at a fine pace, and all the remastered trick animations look stunning as well. Now even though the graphics have been built from the ground up I can't say they left me with my jaw dropped. Even when going on my HDTV, everything looked quite clean and polished, but I couldn't help but want more. Don't get me wrong there is a big gap in the quality between American Wasteland and Project 8, and everything looks quite nice, it just feels like it could have been better.

Aurally, Project 8 delivers another strong performance. The sound effects have always been top-notch in the series with its hundreds of rail grinds and board clattering effects never growing old on my ears. Project 8 packs in a huge soundtrack that consists of 56 songs with its usual mix of punk, rock, and hip-hop tunes. There is at least a little something for everyone to be had.

Overall, Project 8 is a damn good game and should represent its true debut on the Xbox 360. Although Neversoft removed a couple creation options, and a few other little nitpicks there is definitely a lot of content packed in here. If you've been looking to get back into the series and was growing old with Tony Hawk's previous formula, then by all means jump back in again with Tony Hawk's Project 8.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/13/06