Many look back fondly on the early years when Tony Hawk's Pro Skater was first released to the masses. Many fans grew up with the original Pro Skater games, and while skateboarding isn't the mainstream pop culture behemoth that it used to be, the desire for more skateboarding games has slowly crept back to fans over time. After laying dormant for a while, some of the best Tony Hawk games are finally making a return with Pro Skater 1+2 Remastered coming later this year.
There's still a huge catalog of Tony Hawk games left to explore, though, including many of the story spin offs like Underground and American Wasteland. Considering the last proper sequel to Pro Skater wasn't the greatest, it'll likely be a while before a proper sequel is released. At the same time, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater Remastered could also potentially serve as a gauge for further remasters of Tony Hawk games.
Been A While, Mr. Hawk
Pro Skater was special because it exaggerated the fun factor of being a skater, gamifying the real life sport through eliminating physical restrictions and making the game fantastic. Tony Hawk's landmark skateboarding franchise was primarily arcade-like, unlike subsequent games like Skate that aimed to closer simulate real-life skateboarding. Skaters could grind up and down rails at unreal speeds, clear insane gaps without breaking their legs, and seemingly rent out entire warehouses and schoolyards for their own personal use. The games were all about capturing the spirit of skateboarding, to which they exceeded greatly.
In terms of traditional Pro Skater entries, the last sequel actually came out pretty recently with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5 in 2015. Unfortunately, due to the rushed nature of development, the fifth Pro Skater had a slew of performance issues and lack of content that received a lot of criticism from fans and critics alike. Setting aside Pro Skater 5, it's been about 13 years since the last traditional Tony Hawk game with Proving Ground in 2007. There was an HD version of Pro Skater released to middling reception due to its missing features, along with several experimental Tony Hawk games that involved the use of third-party peripherals instead of traditional controllers. It's safe to say the desire for a traditional, high quality Tony Hawk game has been around for more than a decade.
Success Could Lead to Future Remasters
Fans have rejoiced with this new remake coming from Vicarious Visions, but with just the first two Pro Skater games being remastered, these initial games could serve as a gauge for potentially more Tony Hawk remasters. Obviously, since the Pro Skater remaster is a complete and total rebuild from the ground up with modern assets, only remastering the first two titles for now makes sense. They were the first two Pro Skater games released, the foundation for what would become an incredibly popular franchise. At the same time, the sales numbers and reception of this remaster will likely influence and could encourage more titles remastered down the line.
Vicarious Visions, the developers behind this remaster, cut its teeth with a similar remaster for Crash Bandicoot. Not only that, the developer also made the Game Boy Advance versions of Pro Skater 2 and onward back in 2000, so the developer has experience with the Tony Hawk games already. With rumors flying around about about further Crash Bandicoot remasters thanks to the success of N. Sane Trilogy, it's very possible the success of Pro Skater 1+2 Remastered could lead to further remasters throughout the series. Subsequent Pro Skater games do have a timeless quality to them, but to the story-heavy games like Tony Hawk's Underground and American Wasteland, a remaster could seriously do those games justice.
Of course, this all depends on the success of the upcoming Pro Skater remaster. That's not to say there's a chance the game will fail, quite the opposite in fact. Considering the revelry for Tony Hawk games is massive and reactions to the announcement have been near-universally positive, sales shouldn't be a problem. Hopefully, this remaster will be enough of a push to develop further Tony Hawk games as well.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 Remastered will release September 4 for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.