Skateboarding Games

Since 1986, when Atari released 720 Degrees, skateboard fans have been able to grind, ollie, pop and flip virtual boards for high scores in the realm of console gaming. Skateboarding games are now a well-populated genre, and over the years, they have featured regularly on the bestseller lists.

This article will focus on two legendary game franchises and their most recent offerings for seventh-generation gaming consoles: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii. Some titles in the two franchises are also available on handheld consoles, mobile platforms and/or personal computers.

You can not talk about this genre without paying homage to the Tony Hawk series. Sixteen titles have been released in this series since the first one, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, smashed onto the scene in 1999. The latest TH title, Shred, with its arcade look and gameplay style, is rumored to be the final title of the series. Activision announced in February 2011 that there will be no 2011 installment of the series.

Tony Hawk: Shred has been developed for younger gamers. Older gamers may still be enticed by some of the game’s features, though.

It comes with the cool skateboard-deck motion-controller (first seen alongside the last TH title: Ride), has social gaming features and a ‘Go Big’ trick system.

Like all TH games, the tricks in Shred are huge and crazy and cool. If you feel like carving through powder or shredding down a treacherous alpine mountainside, have your skater strap on a snowboard. TH: Shred hit retailers in October 2010. TH titles are all developed at Neversoft, published by Activision and, of course, endorsed by professional skater Tony Hawk.

The next big series is the Skate franchise from Electronic Arts, and comprises of Skate, Skate 2, Skate 3 (PS3 and Xbox 360) and Skate It (Wii). EA’s Skate series has impressed both hardcore and casual gamers and has garnered critical acclaim with its fresh ‘Flick-It’ control scheme, great features and beautiful urban environments. Flick-it departs from the button-combos (and occasional button-mashes) of traditional control systems by using patterns of flicks, pushes and pulls on the analog sticks to pull off tricks. This trick-system gives the player a sense of immediacy, tactility and precision. The Flick-it control scheme gets better with each sequel.

Skate 3, released May 2010 for the Xbox and PlayStation 3, is set in an all-new fictional city called Port Caverton. In contrast to Skate 2′s San Vanelona, which featured stark and gritty visuals and learnt an ‘underground’ feel to the game’s skaters and skating, Port Caverton is openly skater-friendly and its cityscapes are much more colourful.

There are new easy and hardcore difficulty levels, and a Skate School which will keep your basic Flick-It skills in nick. Online game modes have been nicely expanded to include three new online team play modes: 1-Up, Domination and Own The Lot. This adds a particularly fun dimension to an already cool game.

EA Black Box’s Skate franchise may be comparatively new (the first Skate debuted in September 2007), but it is immensely popular. The first Skate arrived at about the same time as Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground, yet has amassed nearly double the amount of sales. Shred had a bit of a dismal opening week in comparison to Skate 3′s too. Gaming fans have many predictions – the continuing dominance of Skate, the return to glory for TH in 2012 – but only time will tell which (if either) of these skateboarding games franchises will come out tops.