Back in the middle of 2022, it was claimed by Tony Hawk himself that plans were on the table for a THPS 3+4 remake before they were scrapped by Activision - and now we've got more information about what apparently happened here.
According to researcher Liam Robertson over at Did You Know Gaming, a former developer at THPS 1 + 2 studio Vicarious Visions confirmed the original plan for that collection was to include the third and fourth games as well, but it was ultimately deemed to be too ambitious. Therefore, plans were stripped back and there was hope that a Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3+4 remake could be developed at some point in the future instead.
"We settled on adding some handling features from the later games to reflect the way people remember the old THPS games. The improvements from 3 seemed to bleed into people’s memories of the first 2."
"Eventually it became clear that we didn’t have time for more than 1 + 2, so the idea that we’d continue on and release 3+4 in some fashion was on the table."
Sadly, that didn't end up happening. THPS 3 + 4 was seemingly a possibility when the 1 + 2 remake launched to excellent reviews and sales, but Activision apparently rejected a fresh pitch from Vicarious Visions, opting instead for the studio to focus on support work for the likes of Diablo 2: Resurrected and the Call of Duty series. According to Tony Hawk, the idea was shopped around to other developers around this time, but Activision "didn't like anything they heard" from those studios - and therefore nothing materialised.
There's obviously a chance these Tony Hawk's remakes could make a comeback under Xbox leadership, but in terms of Vicarious Visions, the development studio is no more - it was migrated into Blizzard Entertainment back in 2021, shortly after former Studio Head Jen O'Neal decided to leave the company.
Fingers crossed we'll see more Tony Hawk games on Xbox eventually... the 1 + 2 remake was so much fun!
What are your thoughts about a THPS remake for the third and fourth games? Tell us in the comments.
[source youtu.be]
Comments 7
They are much better games just for the story/ Campaign mode makes a big difference but all great games I used to be so good back in the day on these not anymore unfortunately I was really rusty ha
My skater friends swear up and down about Skater XL for what it's worth. They say it plays like real skating feels. I ride BMX my self so I can't attest to it myself, but figured I'd sharing for people that may be interested. I have personally never heard of the game before them mentioning it.
I think it could take a while for MS to re-organise and/or implement changes that ABK made under Koticks management.
Call of Duty was Infinity Wards creation to 'compete' with EA's Battlefield/Medal of Honor games. However, IW wanted more time to create CoD4 so Treyarch was shifted from their games (like Spider-Man, Quantum of Solace etc) so CoD wouldn't miss a year. By the XB1 era, games were taking longer so more and more Studio's were pulled from whatever IP's/Games they were making to work on supporting CoD. Studios (like Neversoft) were merged into other studios to support CoD.
Call of Duty was ABK's biggest IP and it seemed that Kotick would rather ensure CoD released every Oct/Nov time regardless for the Holiday season than have multiple games out in a year, put all their eggs into one basket. There was talk of another Crash after the success of 4, but CoD took priority.
Therefore you have all those Studios at Activision who were all working on Call of Duty. Blizzard too has many studios but in recent years haven't exactly been prolific.
Of course I'd like to see more Games from these Studios - not just more 'CoD', but a range of games. They had a LOT more Studios and Developers than the entire 'Xbox Game Studios' yet seem to release far fewer games.
Hopefully with MS now owning Activision they will release 3+4. 3 was my favorite THPS and it's the reason I still have an original Xbox hooked up.
It's my main hope with Xbox owning Activision, stop rewarding good studios braking CoD support studios.
I hope they release 3 or 4 smaller games through the year and a AAA game at the year near Xmas - Crash 5, COD 9 MILLION, etc
I'm desperate for remakes all the way through to Underground. It's such a shame what happened to Vicarious Visions.
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