Nice One Tony (Tony Hawks Pro Skater 3 (GC))

Member Name: winsy

Product:	Tony Hawks Pro Skater 3 (GC)
Date:	29/11/02 (420 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great game, Fun, excellent multiplayer game, Itsa THPS game it has to be good

Disadvantages: None really,

The Tony Hawks games have always been a well known and well recognised bunch of titles. The Original THPS started off what has become a big batch of shall we say extreme sports games. There where others before it, not very good ones but Tony Hawks started it all and spawned quite alot of numorous titles. Its a great one player game and also a fantastic 2 player game.

Tony seems to get better every time he comes around, bringing more moves, more combo's more complex skating environments and so on. With this installment its stick to the pattern, same game, but its far better the THPS2. At first for the PS2 it seems a bit to fast compared to the other ones and it makes it harder for me and most of my mates anyway this is what they thought. But you get used to it and you'll then start to think that its actually not that fast at all, when really it is.

This game is renowned for its sound track, with the like of 'The ace of spades' - Motorhead, 'Fight like a brave' - The Chili Peppers, and quite a few other heavy, skater type rock songs, with a few hip hops numbers the soundtrack is 'Awesome DUDE', this game has got me talking the lingo, OH NO.

Obviously its a skateboarding game but with a difference, its the best skate boarding game ever, and it will probably stay that way for quite sometime.
The reason why Tony Hawks Pro Skater is so popular is that you can look cool and not hurt yourself, you can do moves that even Tony couldn't do. You can do combinations of 20 - 251 tricks i think it is. And thats a hell of alot of tricks, hell 20 is alot of trick it take some skill to get bid combo's, and when you do, WOW the scores come reeling in.

The best feature of Tony Hawks is the career mode, where you get your skater, wither one of the regular character, of which theres around 10 of them im not exactly sure, or you can create your own, give him goofy hair, stupid clothes, you miodel him or her h


ow you want them then punish them in the half pipe LOL. You start off with one level and there is a goal list, with goals of the likes of grind this rail, collect 'SKATE' and so on. It envolves skating around the level, collecting stat points and other items, getting big scores and so forth. Once you have done a specific amount of goals the next level in unlocked and so forth.

As you go throught the levels you collect stat points which make you skater even better then before, as the levels progress they get harder and bigger, with more complex parts but your skater is better. Once you complete all of the goals theres still that pesky last stat point to get which you will be trying to get for quite some time then it hits you and they way to get it is quite simple. When you also do all the goals you are rewarded with a nice video of either the pro skater who you where, or some nice 'bails' tricks gone bad. And these videos can be quite gringing, nuts hitting rails, faces smashing of the floor and so on they are quite entertaining. There loads of videos on show, one for each skater and then the few vextra's incase you do career with a created character or one of the special characters.

The levels in THPS3 are great they vary from a iron foundary to a cruise ship, there a neon lights tokyo level with big loops, theres aairport level, and a few more greatly designed level to wet your skating taste buds. There also secret characters, including the like of, the regular 'Officer Dick' a tubby skating copper, X-Men's 'Wolverine', 'Darth Maul' who skates around on a hover board with his light saber out, 'Kelly Slater' one of the best surfboarders in the world and he skats on his surf board. There 'Ollie the Magic Bum' who was a alcho tramp feature in a level in THPS2. Theres also the Neversoft eyeball, who is enlodged within a dummy's body, its quite fun skating around with a dummy
that
has
a huge eyeball for a head. There a few other characters to unlock but you'll have to discover them yourself.

The vairety of stuff to unlock has always made THPS a great series of game, this title number 3 is only £20 for the PS2 plus its the best version if you don't include the latest one THPS4 which is either out now or very soon. This is a game were you will be pushing yourself to unlock every last bit, as you wanna get the big socre amnd you want your characters to have full stats. Plus also this is a great feature that was in THPS2 and is also in thsi one, the 'Park Editor', yep you can creat your own skate park, with infinite grinding loops, so that you can score millions in one trick, or you can make a simple fun low scoring park with a few good half pipes and a few nice grinds. But there also pre made levels that you can load in then edit or use. Some of these pre made ones are a bit too weird and congested so i suggest loading one in, editing playing it, and then using some ideas from that one and the other pre made parks to then go and create your own master piece.

I haven;t mentions anything about the game really in terms of tricks and so on, the game is easy enought to play, you have a button to jump, grindd, grab and flip. Grind move involve skating along a rail type object, grab and flip moves are move for doing in the air, where the skater will wither flip the board, or grab onto it. You press a trick button along with a direction and that perfroms specific trick depending on the skaters trick set. There is then special move which rake in the points of which there are special grinds, grab and flip tricks.
Theres also manuals, which is a move that is performed when skating along, these are used to link tircks to create a huge combo, to reel in the points. There are special manuals some of which are quite stupid but funny. Most of the special moves have enver been performed in real life, some o
f them are
stupid bu
t they look good, special note towards Jackass' Bam Magera's specila move 'The Jackass' where he smacks himself in the face with his board STUPID LOL.

On THPS2 you could only manual after a grind move of a jump, you couldn't go on a half pipe then continue your combo, well omn this one you can, you can do a combo of tircks off any piece of skating scenery. This is thanx to the revert, with a simple tap of R2 when you land off a half pipe the skater flips the board round then you go quickly into a manual and your fof to get some points.

With this game you skill really does show and when your are pullimng out huge specials in the middle of your combo's you mates will be loving it, thinking WOAH look at that move.

This is a great game with a good lifespan that is certainly worth £20. You don't have to be a skate boarding fan to like this game, as tis fun and exciting to play. Plus oh yeah its online compatible is you have a USB modem, sorry about forgetting that :-).

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