For three years, Tony
Hawk has been conspicuously absent from the video store shelves. For most game
developers, that’s little more than a blip between titles. When your name and
face are attached to 16 titles in 15 years, however, everyone starts to notice
when you’re gone.
“It’s usually the
first topic of discussion with me,” Hawk laughs. The first, that is, once the
world’s most famous skateboarder’s identity has been firmly established.
That question was
finally answered this week with the arrival of Skate Jam, the first of Hawk’s
titles created exclusively for a mobile platform. The game also marks the
skater’s first collaboration with mobile app acquisition group Maple Media —
marking a split with longtime publisher Activision.
It was a partnership that
ended with a whimper, with the arrival of 2015’s Tony Hawk Pro Skater 5. The
final installation of the beloved series was heavily criticized for being
uninspired and rushed, and Hawk ultimately opted to move on from a relationship
that helped turn his name into a $250 million a year brand at its peak.
The unceremonious end
of the Activision deal left the future of the franchise in jeopardy, with Hawk
exploring his options. “My contract with Activision ended, and I was exploring
a few options, including some VR stuff,” he tells TechCrunch. While he says
he’s still open to a future Tony Hawk virtual reality title, the medium
ultimately proved too tricky for the first skater to land a 900. “It’s a pretty
daunting task to figure out how to make skateboarding work in VR without people
getting sick.”
Advances in mobile
platforms, on the other hand, have made a smartphone version far more appealing
than it would have been at the height of the franchise’s success. “Maple Media
came and said they would like to expand on their skate games,” says Hawk. “When
I played their most recent engine, I felt there was something there, akin to
what I felt when I first played the THPS engine. I felt that, with my input and
expertise, we could make something that would be truly authentic for gamers and
skaters alike, for a new generation.”
As far as whether
Skate Jam’s release portends the rebirth of the franchise, Hawk is ultimately a
bit more cagey. He explains that the team is more focused on building out the
current title than committing to Pro Skater’s annual release schedule.
“We’re going to see a
lot more development in terms of growing this title,” Hawk says. “It’s much
more streamlined and we can do it on a regular basis. We’re not planning to
develop a new title, per se, but are planning to grow and develop this one.”
Skate Jam is now
available for Android and iOS.
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