Review: Tony Hawk’s American Wasteland

Tony Hawk’s Cash Cow
Neversoft / Gamecube Xbox Playstation 2 Xbox 360 / Teen

In the grand tradition of the many Tony Hawk games, when one gimmick gets stale a new one must emerge to keep the franchise fresh. The put yourself in the game appeal of the Underground series has worn off and it’s time for something new. In comes American Wasteland, which promises a continuous skatable city to keep fans of the most popular extreme sports series ever happy.

In THAW gamers play as some random skate rat who, fresh off the bus to Los Angeles, meets a suspiciously well-connected punk princess who promises to lead him along the path to skating superstardom. Along this well-worn path are various challenges designed to build a reputation, get sponsorships, and rocket oneself to the top of the L.A. skating scene. Seeing as this is pretty much the plot of every Tony Hawk game it’s up to the gameplay to provide something fresh

The main thing that’s new this time around is that all the game areas are connected. The game does make good on it’s promise of no load screens between levels but the levels are connected by long, drab, hallways that really don’t add to the skate experience. What does provide some worthwhile improvements are several new moves such as Bert Slides (riding with a hand on the ground), Nata Spins (spinning on poles), and Grind stalls (stalling on rails).

Despite what the ads say the biggest draw THAW has to offer is the BMX bike. Since the Matt Hoffman’s Pro BMX spin-off was abandoned several Tony Hawk’s ago this is the first time in a while that gamers have been able to ride a BMX bike in a game that wasn’t horrible and offensive (BMX XXX). Gamers can switch to a bike at any time in the story mode and the bike has it’s own (smaller) move set and story challenges. The icing on this extreme cake is that the Condor himself (Hoffman) can be unlocked as a playable character.

The list of playable skaters has undergone its most drastic changes in any Hawk game. The list is intended to showcase newer talent and some L.A. legends alongside Tony Hawk, professional parent tormenter Bam Margera and some other familiar faces. These, as well as some story characters, will be the people who provide challenges and make cameos in the story mode. The story is less about the pros and more about a customized shredder that, rather than being created from scratch like in the Underground series, starts as one of five basic templates and is clothed to a player’s liking.

Beneath all these features and veneer the mechanics are as solid as they’ve always been. There is, as there has always been, a solid and fun skating experience to be had and the game engine consistently shows why this franchise has held such a tight grip over the skateboarding genre for so long. It’s just that there is not much to warrant a purchase for those who bought the last game.

When one looks at THAW as a hole, the game makes very little changes from previous iterations. The promise of no load screens allows no room for graphical improvements and the story and dialogue seem a bit canned at times. This counts as the fifth Tony Hawk for this generation of consoles, and at this point, Neversoft may be running out of ideas on how to keep its hit franchise fresh. That’s sad because all the Tony Hawk games have held a special place in gamers’ hearts, this reviewer included. Unless the developers find a way to freshen the franchise as THUG 1 did, it may be a downhill ride from here for a franchise that has always shunned the use of helmets.

8/10
By Zack Rovinsky