Tony Hawk’s American Wasteland controls just as you would
expect from seven years of tweaking an already good simulator. They’ve added a few new moves, but by and
large the game will still feel just as you remember from last year’s model (or
really any before it). If you haven’t
played a Tony Hawk game in a while (or ever), don’t worry, the game does an
excellent job of explaining how to do just about everything in the American
Wasteland universe. Unlike earlier
entries this one feels like it is more geared at new skaters, those gamers who
somehow missed the last six Tony Hawk games.
While I like to see that the game is accessible to everybody, it would
have been nice if they had given us series veterans a little attention, too.
Unfortunately it’s not just that the game is extremely easy,
it’s also very short. No matter how bad
of a Tony Hawk player you are, chances are you will bust through this in a
dedicated weekend, it’s just not all that long.
The story stays interesting all the way through, but the whole
experience is over far too quickly. All
of the small missions seem like they are building to something big (like a big
skate-off or something), but that never happens and the ending just feels like
it comes too early. There are barely any
missions that require you to actually skate against other players, something
that made the first few Tony Hawk games so much fun.
The story mode is not the only way to play through Tony
Hawk’s American Wasteland … but it is if you want to actually skate in L.A. Like Tony Hawk's Underground 2, THAW allows
you to choose from the story mode and a classic mode, one that offers the types
of challenges found in the first few Tony Hawk games – collect S-K-A-T-E, find
the hidden tape, get a certain score, etc.
Instead of simply recycling the story mode levels for classic mode,
Neversoft has gone ahead and recreated some of the best loved levels from the
six other games. Sadly this too feels
short; it’s one of those experiences that you can easily beat in only an hour
or two. Considering that these were old
levels to begin with it would have been nice to see more than six areas to
skate in.
One of the big improvements in American Wasteland that had
been talked about was the addition of BMX bikes, in effect combining the worlds
of Tony Hawk and Mat Hoffman. Just as
promised, these bikes are indeed around town … but they come with their own set
of problems that will keep almost everybody from picking them up. For one thing you don’t even need to touch
the bike until late in the game, which makes it feel more than a little tacked
on. Controlling the BMX can be a real
pain, especially when you’ve grown accustomed to the skateboard game play. My experience with the bike was pretty bad,
often it did not want to do what I wanted it to and it always felt too loose
(even when I knew what I was doing). I
can only assume that they are going to improve this aspect for next year’s
model, but in its current state it would have almost been better if they had
left the bike out altogether.
Although this is the seventh game in the series, American
Wasteland is the first Tony Hawk title to feature online play over Xbox
Live. After being able to play friends
online with the PlayStation 2 versions, it's awfully nice to finally be able to
do the same thing over Microsoft's network.
For the most part playing online with the Xbox 360 is a lot like what
was available on the PS2, only with a better buddy list and the ability to talk
to the other players with the headset.
You can fit eight players in a room which can make for a fun time, no
matter if you're new to the franchise or a seasoned veteran. There are a number of different games to
play; everything from team based games to a simple skate competition. Playing the game online is a lot of fun, even
if we’re bogged down by the lackluster levels found in the game.
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