Skateboarding games are back!

Table of Contents

Back in the days

Tony Hawk

In the era of 1999 to 2007, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater ruled the digital skateboarding scene. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 was the first part I played and I loved it. It even got me skateboarding in real life. I played most games in the series but lost interest after Proving Ground in 2007.

Skate

Then, Electronic Arts stepped up and released a skateboarding game called “Skate” which put an emphasis on realistic skateboarding. Skate was nothing like Tony Hawk (except for the skateboarding of course). You couldn’t ollie twice the height of a person or do a 1080 double treflip indy. Instead of pushing a button to do a trick, you had to flick the right control stick in a way similar to how you would move your feet on a real skateboard. It took some time to get used to but it was awesome.

The death of skateboarding games

Skate was successful enough to receive a second and third part. But after the release of Skate 3 in 2010, nothing… Skateboarding games became extinct. Tony Hawk kept trying it with Ride, Shred, Pro Skater HD, Pro Skater 5, and even a mobile game. But they all failed.

Dramatic silence

OlliOlli Bailing — The silence before the fall.

The revival of skateboarding games

Tony Hawk remake

But what do game companies do when they can’t come up with cool new games? Yes, they revive their old games! Activision wiped the dust from Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 and 2, gave them a little polish and released them on one disc on all consoles in 2020. And where most remasters and remakes nowadays disappoint, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 did not.

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2 — Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2

I really had a blast playing those two games again after such a long time. The remake brilliantly captured the nostalgic feeling without feeling old. The games look fresh and on par with other current generation games, but the muscle memory of 21 years ago still works.

New skateboarding games

At the same time, two promising skateboarding games which could fill the Skate-gap (pun intended) were in early access on Steam: Skater XL and Session. Skater XL was released on PC, Playstation and Xbox just before the Tony Hawk remake and Session will also be released on the consoles once it leaves early access.

Skater XL_20210705165357 — One of my screenshots in Skater XL

The OlliOlli series also made its comeback by combining part 1 and 2 (which actually are the only games in the series) in one game on the Nintendo Switch and the announcement of a third part (OlliOlli World) coming to all consoles later this year.

Then, there’s Skate City which recently made its way from Apple Arcade to the consoles and a new Tony Hawk-like game called “Skatebird” also releasing later this year.

And to top it off, EA revived the Skate 3 servers and announced Skate 4!