Tony Hawk – Ride: Feet-on Impressions

Coming in the following months: Tony Hawk: iRide. Same game, white controller!

It’s a little bit disconcerting the amount of plastic peripherals that seem to clutter up the modern day gamer’s lounge room.  If you’re a rhythm game fan, you’ve already got enough plastic instruments to equip a Devo reunion, and if you’re like me, the plastic DJ turntable to remix said reunion on.  And if you own a Wii and can navigate your way across a floor at night without stubbing your toe on a Wii-mote expansion, well then you’ve gained my respect.

For this very reason, when Tony Hawk: Ride was announced and shown off this year I wasn’t very enthusiastic.  Not just because I don’t think they’ve made an entertaining Tony Hawk title since Underground, nor because I’m not actually a fan of full-motion games.  It’s because Activision seem to be determined to take up every nook and cranny of my rather small lounge room with peripherals that we may never see used again, for games that it’s impossible to try before you buy.

However, my feelings about my jeopardised personal space aside, the concept for Ride did sound intriguing.  The skateboard must be one of the very few sporting apparatus that can translate well into a wireless motion device.  So I was quite interested when I found out that the preview would be available for play at the recent Xbox Insider Tour around Australia.  In fact (after nabbing myself some graciously free booze), it was the first game I made sure I played on the night.

I assumed this stance for my full first try

Before I stood all over it, I took a look at the new controller and asked the attendant about it.  Ride‘s controller is actually quite light, which was honestly something I wasn’t expecting from the look of it, and is seemingly sturdy enough to take the varying weights of many eager gamers I observed.  It’s basically a standard double-kick skateboard deck, with a black grip top and a smooth plastic underside.  It houses two motion sensors (one in each kick) and has four infared sensors studded at the front, back and on each side of the deck.  The controller’s buttons and D-Pad are embedded in the controller’s side, sunken into the controller so there’s no chance of bashing them during play.

The preview unit had it’s own carpet set up on an otherwise hardwood floor, something I was told was to assist in the controller’s “optimal grip” during use.  I was assured that the controller was safe to be used on hardwood floors, but something told me that playing this on hard surfaces will probably be one of those situations you’ll want an extended warranty for.  While the controller definitely seemed sturdy, on non-carpet floors you’d have to feel a little pessimistic about a piece of plastic you have to continually kick down upon.  My guess would be anyone who buys Ride and plays games in a hard floor room will be taking a detour on the way home to pick up some carpet offcuts.

Anyhow, hardware inspected, it was time to skate.  The game starts off by asking your skating stance (so it can accurately reflect what you’re trying to do in game), and then sends you off on your merry way.  To push off, you have to wave your foot past a side-sensor in a pushing motion, and you can do this to gain speed at any time during a run.  You do however have to make sure that you’re well planted on your board while you push, however, as tilting your board up at either end will begin a Manual trick (a two-wheel balance).

You don't even want to know what trying this with the controller will look like

The course I played was a downhill aqueduct skating area.  Players are simply placed on a planned out direction path (for those of you wondering how you were supposed to steer), which deviates into forks in different parts of the course.  When these forks arrive, the player has to lean their board to the desired direction, which will be taken as soon as the character passes the fork.  I’m not certain how the game works with vert skating (half-pipes and the like), and apparently neither did the attendant, which is a pity.  I’d really love to know how the controller registers hand-plants.

There are also trick bonus and slow-motion areas that will help increase your score if you can acticate a trick at just the right moment (in the demo these were typically located before large jumps).  Again, these points are indicated by a large coloured logo in the chosen skate path.

Apart from that, you’re basically freestyling.  The game doesn’t expect you to actually 720 Kickflip (with a stale fish?) in real life, as it incorporates a variety of tricks into simply making the controller hop.  During jumps, grabbing any one of the four infared sensors will activate a grab trick that corresponds to your hand’s position.  Rail slides are still an important feature of the gameplay, although it’s considerably harder to tweak a trick while on a rail now, because if you move the controller too fast it’s assumed you’re trying to jump off the rail again.

If I had maybe been drinking less, I probably could have taken away the high score prize on offer at the event, because while Ride does do a lot of new things to the series, some things never change.  For instance, any fan of the Tony Hawk series knows that the key to impossibly high scores in stringing all your tricks together with a Manual ground balance, and in this regard the game remains the same.  Manuals are activated, rather simply I might say, by leaning either forward or backward enough to raise one end of the controller off the gound.  From here a little balance meter pops up on screen, and shows you the sweet spot you have to balance at to keep your Manual going.  Using these to string together tricks and jumps is obviously still going to play a big part in score attacks.

Wii owners can use their Mii avatar in-game

I skated the demo track three times to get a feel for the game.  From my own observation, and watching other people give it a go, I’ll warn anyone with a confined playing area that this title isn’t going to be for them.  Even with the rather strong-gripping carpet underneath, players had a tendency to be shuffled ever so slowly backwards, which is something you can’t really correct while in the middle of the game.  Understandably, as with most balance games, you’ve also got to have a fair amount of room to swing your arms around in counterbalance too.

In fact if I had of worn a loud 2D jacket, I could have pulled off a servicable impersonation of Stan from Monkey Island during my first game.

In the end, I’ve got to say there’s no doubt that this is an enjoyable title, but it somehow misses the “wow” factor that would compel me to go out and buy it for myself.  It’s more of a game that you hope that one of your friends picks up, so you can go and play it at their place for an hour or two, rather than shell out the required funds just to lean it against your lounge room wall within the week.  This is probably going to make a great game for the younger gamers out there, who’ll have it bought for them by their parents in the hope that they’ll gain a little exercise while they play.  Apart from that, I’m sorry to report that this is probably a title to pass on.

Tony Hawk: Ride is due out on the 17th of Novemeber in the US, and the 20th of November for the rest of the world.  We previewed it on the Xbox 360 at the Melbourne leg of the Xbox Insider Tour.  Visit the official website for more release details.