I was introduced to the franchise in college when a friend of mine scored a pirate pre-release beta copy of THPS2  several months before the game was due to be released. I was instantly hooked, I got most of the way through the game then bought the official copy for Dreamcast once that was released. I played the shit out of it, that is to say I not only beat every last challenge in every last area, I also completed 100% of the gap list and essentially drained every possible once of gaming possible out of it. Once I was done with that I went and bought the original Pro Skater and did the same with that. I missed Pro-Skater 3 simply because they didn’t release a version for the Dreamcast and I didn’t own a Sony console at the time, but I bought Pro-Skater 4  and I conqued that with the same vigor that I had the first 2.

I consider THPS4 to be the peak of the series, by THPS3 they had streamlined the game mechanics to a fine science and begun to give the game some intelectual depth. Not a skater myself or even really interested in skating at all I learned all kind of information about different proskaters though the game, what they were known for, who invented what, and I even got a small sense of their personalities through thir in-game avatars.

Things then went down-hill with Underground and Underground 2. with these games they had basically decided that doing tricks similar to and learning about real life skaters was boring so they took inspiration from Jackass and Bam Margera with a nod to Saturday morning cartoons and totally trashed any respectability the series had built up to that point. I put up with Underground 1, it was bad but bearable and the only thing that caused me to pre-order Underground 2 was the fact that it was going to have online multiplayer. I was excited about the prospect of seeing how well I stacked up against players around the world. Unfortunately when I brought it home and found out that they had dropped that feature from the Xbox 1 version, and the immature “storyline” was worse than the first Underground game, I promptly returned it to the store the very same day I picked it up.

The next game in the series, American Wasteland didn’t really interest me, but I had just purchased an Xbox 360 and there were very few games, the game was supposidly “returning to it’s roots” and offered a single large open world to skate in. Any release in a franchise that claims to be “returningto it’s roots” is usually too far past jumping the shark to be redeamed. I did enjoy American Wasteland though. I was somewhat annoyed by the bad writing and even worse plot line, but it was bearable, the world was interesting and fun to play around in, and I enjoyed it enough to fully conquer the game the way I had the older entries in the franchise.

This got me excited for Project 8, the new graphics engine another fun and interesting looking world, and a storyline more similar to THPS4 than the the later games.

I was let down again, not by the story, or the world,  but by the core fundamentals that made the previous Tony Hawk games so fun to play. They screwed up the game mechanics, in all their graphic updates and engine re-writes they lost their way. I first thought maybe I was rusty, but after dusting off my lauded copy of THPS4 I found that it was no I who had changed… but the game itself. I finished the main story. Not only that but the difficulty of the challenges were by far the most difficult of any Tony Hawk game I had ever played. The broken mechanics with the added diffuclty made the game feel more like a job than the fun and challenging pasttime I had enjoyed in the past.

I held off on buying Proving ground, waiting for the reviews to come in, only to find out it was a lot like Project 8 but with the difficulty turned up even higher, I didn’t buy it until I foud the game on a discount rack some time well after its release… I still haven’t played it.

Now we arrive at RIDE, a new developer, a new gimmic, and a new release that sees even less interest in the series than the previous titles. Its interesting, I remember long before I even knew who Tony Hawk was I would play Sega’s TopSkate in the arcade, I loved that game and I always thought to myself “I wish someone would make this for a home console!” Alas it is here but strangely I’m not at all interested in playing it.

I guess the Wii made me realize that simulation games at home just aren’t that fun for a gamer like me. I do enjoy playing DDR and the various sit-down racers in the arcade, among other physically engaging activities, but when I sit down at home to play I’m trying to relax. the prospect of standing in front of the screen trying to balance myself on a hunk of plastic isn’t nearly as appealing as crashing on the couch after a long day for something that is more mentally stimulating than physically. If I want to spend the energy doing an exciting activity, I’ll do it in the real world as opposed to in front of my TV.

Tony Hawk is apparently bitter that people don’t like his new game and not giving it a “fair shake”. I’m not saying it’s good or bad, but from my persective it is simply no longer the type of game I wish to play. It’s like falling in love with a certain model car, and buying a new model every few years, they make some changes here and there, some for the better some for the worse, and then all of a sudden they’re not making cars anymore and they want you to buy a motorcycle…. Well I just don’t want to ride a motorcycle, I have no interest in test driving one, nor does it matter how fast or well handled it is, so I guess I’ll buy my cars some place else.

At first I thought it’s me who’s changed, maybe my tastes are different now, but then again, the game is selling and reviewing like garabage, and the sales figures of most of the Tony Hawk games have seemed to reflect my own feelings on the series up to this point… so maybe it’s not me after all.

I think really this is a failing in the industry as a whole. The Wii brought the simulator home in a way that had never really been accomplished before, and even years later it’s still selling like crazy, the *music* Hero games have done the same in turn, but I think what the industry fails to realize is that the people buying these games aren’t the same who grew up on Mario, Grand Theft Auto and Halo, it’s a new group made up of soccer moms and single dads who wouldn’t otherwise buy video games before the Wii and <instrument>Hero. These kind of people might like playing pretend golf, and pseudo-classic-rock-star, but they’re not the kind of people interested in becoming a pro-skater.

I think the market of people who are interested in playing a realistic skateboard game, are out side practising on an actual board, if nothing else because it’s cheaper than buying the game, and probably more engaging too.

You should go read it, or at very least look at all the great cases I took pictures of.

For those of you who don’t know Rez is one of my top 5 favorite games of all time. I have a copy for Dreamcast and before now I would play through it about once a month. Now it’s on XBLA in HD with 5.1 surround sound, achievements and a few new game modes. It’s the first time in a long time that I’ve been really excited about an XBLA title. Now if only they could re-release the other 4 games on my list in the same fashion.

• Killer Instinct 2 (Arcade Version)
• Flashback
• Sonic Spinball
• Space Channel 5 Part 2 (in the original Japanese)

Space Channel 5 Part 2
SC5P2 might be a stretch, especially in the original Japanese. They did release it for Gamecube and PS2 in the States, I have the Japanese Dreamcast version. The English Voice acting is grating and where it’s a game with singing the translation just doesn’t work. Even still it’s got all the stuff that would make a great XBLA title. I’d be dreaming if I thought this would ever arrive on XBLA in this configuration. First of all the SC5 series was not a very popular game, I’m actually impressed they made a sequel at all. Secondly because of the amount of music and voice acting and CG cut-scenes the game would either take up a whole lot of space (possibly beyond what is allowed for an XBLA game) or they would have to spend a lot re-producing those cut-scenes with in game graphics. Considering the space constraints and the fact that no one in the US would likely want to listen to Japanese voice actors it’s a safe bet that they wouldn’t use them. I suppose my only hope for this game is that if they decided to release it in the Japanese XBLA, but that might be pushing it too considering how abysmal Xbox 360 sales are in Japan.

Sonic Spinball
Sonic Spinball has a much better chance than SC5, but still not a very strong one. In my personal opinion Sonic Spinball is the best videogame based pinball game ever made. The reason I feel this way is because 99% of all pinball video games out there simply try to emulate the feeling of playing a real pinball machine, and that’s a failing battle.

The allure, at least for me, of playing pinball is partly due to the fact that you’re directly interacting with a rube-goldberg-esque hunk of electro mechanics. The unique sound each solenoid makes with the slight jitter of machine on each ball bump. Maybe I’m jaded because I worked in an arcade repairing machines for 3 years and my favorite part was always stripping down a pinball machine, cleaning and waxing the board, replacing all of the rubber bumpers and lights, and then play testing it with the glass off… but I’m getting off-topic now.

The reason Sonic Spinball is so great while all of these other pinball games fail is because it doesn’t try to be something it’s not. No matter how accurate the rumble, how crisp the graphics and how well recorded the sounds, a video pinball game will never compare to the real deal. Sonic Spinball embraced the fact that it wasn’t a real pinball machine and added unique gameplay elements that made it a cross genre between a platformer and a pinball game. It did something real pinball machines could never do. As far as I know it’s the only game to embrace it’s medium and use it to it’s advantage and result makes it one of my all time favorite games.

The chances of this coming to XBLA are fairly low, again because the game wasn’t all that popular, but also it’s been released on the Wii’s Virtual Console service. If they brought it to the 360 they would definitely have to update the music I think. My least favorite part of the game was the over-distorted-midi music that plagued most Genesis games of the time. Updating to HD sprites or full 3D would be cool too, but not necessary. As long as the gameplay remained the same I would buy it in a heartbeat.

Flashback
If you’ve never played Flashback you need to find an abandon-ware website and grab it. The game was originally on PC, SNES, and Genesis. It’s an adventure game with an awesome Blade Runner meets Running Man meets Fifth Element Sci-Fi story. You wake up on some Jungle Planet with no idea who you are or what you’re doing. You find a holo-cube with a message you’ve left for yourself with some vague instructions and you work your way back to discovering how and why you lost your memory while a greater plot unfolds in the world around you. Graphically the game used some really crafty techniques to create pseudo-3D cut scenes and the result is a really great stylized look and feel to the whole game, the actual gameplay was in 2D but with super smooth animation. The game was ahead of it’s time and deserves some attention from the modern gaming world.

I think a remake of Flashback would need to be in HD but it would also need to continue to use 2D sprites just like the original, including the cut-scenes. I say this because they had re-released the game some years later on Sega CD with the Sprite-based cutscenes stripped out and replaced with pre-rendered FMV and the game was much much worse for it. It lost it’s charm. They released a sequel titled “Fade to Black” in full 3D some years later and that ruined what could have been a great franchise. I think this game would do well on the XBLA, it may not have been popular in it’s day but the concept is still quite fresh and the gameplay is still unique. Even a straight port would have graphics and sound of a high enough quality to sell well, but I’d still like to see it get some special treatment.

Killer Instinct 2
I’m a fan of fighting games, and while these days I play Soul Calibur and Dead or Alive my all time favorite fighting game is Killer Instinct 2, the arcade version. I specify the Arcade version because they released console versions for SNES and Nintendo 64 and quite frankly those versions of the game were complete garbage compared to the Arcade. Killer Instinct in it’s day got pegged a generic 2D fighter that knocked off gameplay elements from other popular fighters of the time. While that’s partly true but I view it more along the lines of taking the best parts of other fighting games and making them work together. It took fatalities from Mortal Kombat, it took basic controls and special move motions from Street Fighter, but in addition to that it innovated in the graphical style, it innovated in the combo system and it innovated by redefining “rounds”, not only that but together there was some synergy between these elements, nothing felt slapped together, it was a solid and well balanced fighting game.

Out of all the games in this list KI2 has the highest probability of reaching the Xbox Live Arcade. It was a game originally developed by Rare and Microsoft now owns Rare. Further more is that the fighting game market is pretty stale these days, and MS has this ace up their sleeve not only to use as a re-release of a classic but also to continue carrying on the franchise. My biggest question is: Why haven’t they done it yet?

Someone recently asked me about resolutions on 360 games and I started thinking about it and then I started digging since I recalled a few other less notable games running at lower resolutions. I eventually found an interesting French fellow who is dedicated to finding all of the next gen games that aren’t as HD as they claim to be.

Quaz51 of the Beyond 3D forums has an interesting setup he’s got an HDMI enabled 360 and PS3, and a native 1080p display capable of mapping the incoming graphics at a 1:1 ratio. He then uses the built in pause feature of the display to extract a single frame from the game’s actual gameplay. At this point he’s got a pure unadulterated snapshot of the game on his display as it was output from the console. He then takes a photograph of the image at resolutions many times higher using his digital camera and analysis it on his computer. Using basic geometric maths and and a very strong understanding of image scaling and anti-aliasing functions he’s able to determine what the original rendered resolution was and how much AA was used. The process is repeated from several screenshots within the game to ensure accuracy.

His results range from interesting to shocking. You’d be surprised how many games don’t actually support the “guaranteed” minimum requires set by MS, more so, you’ll be surprised which ones they are.

Xbox 360

• Not True 720p

• Call of Duty 3 – 1040×624 – 2xMSAA
• Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare – 1024×600 – 2xMSAA
• Conan (demo) – 1024×576 – no AA
• Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion – 1024×600 – 2xMSAA
• FIFA 2006: Road to FIFA World Cup (demo) – 1024×576 – 2xMSAA
• FIFA 2007 (demo) – 1200×675 – no AA
• Halo 3 – 1152×640 – no AA
• in photo mode – 8064×4448 – no AA
• Lara Croft: Tomb Raider Legend (demo) – 1024×600 – 2xMSAA
• NCAA Football 08 (demo) – 1024×600 – 2xMSAA
• Perfect Dark Zero (demo) – 1152×640 – no AA
• Pro Evo Soccer 6 (demo) – 1024×576 – 2xMSAA
• Project Gotham Racing 3 (demo) – 1024×600 – 2xMSAA
• Ridge Racer 6 (demo) – 1440×810 – no AA
• Tony Hawk’s Project 8 – 1024×576 – 2xMSAA
• Virtua Fighter 5 (demo) – 1024×1024 – 2xMSAA

• 720p with Reduced AA

• Assassin’s Creed – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA
• Bioshock – 1280×720 – no AA
• Burnout Paradise (demo) – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA
• Forza Motorsports 2 – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA
• FIFA 08 – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA
• Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA
• Half Life2: The Orange Box (demo) – 1280×720 – no AA
• Project Gotham Racing 4 – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA
• Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground – 1280×720 – no AA
• Viva Pinata – 1280×720 – 2xMSAA

• True 1080p Games

• NBA Street Homecourt (demo) – 1920×1080 – 4xMSAA
• Virtua Tennis 3 – 1920×1080 – 2xMSAA

While some of these numbers were generated from market place demos the list is far more expansive than one would have expected. Most interesting is the wide use of the 1024×600 resolution with 2xMSAA. Apparently that resolution is popular due to the size of the Xbox 360′s frame buffer it can be generated without tiling the frames (rendering sections at a time) which makes life easier for the developers. At 2xMSAA the 1024×600 resolution fits perfectly to accomplish this task. Clearly this is popular option for those who feel that their game game would benefit more from 2xMSAA than true 720p and lacking the optimization for both or better. Clearly this resolution isn’t as bad as some make it out to be considering notable games such as Oblivion and Call of Duty 4 were able to sneak it in without anyone so much as sneezing doubt over their graphical prowess.

Another Interesting discovery is that Halo 3′s special overlaid 640p resolution isn’t anything new, because the same technique was utilized on the 360′s first major in house shooter, Perfect Dark Zero. Of course photo-mode in Halo 3 provides massive super-sampling (SSAA) by way of rendering to a 8064×4448 and scaling down. This essentially tiles the image across the frame buffer 7 times. It can afford to do this of course because it’s not rendering in real time.

Anything not listed above can be assumed running full 720p at 4xMSAA, Quaz51 has tested a vast majority of the Xbox 360′s catalog including XBLA titles. The 360 isn’t the only console that’s getting his treatment though, he’s also going over Playstation 3 titles and finding similar results.

Playstation 3

• Not True 720p

• Call of Duty 3 – 1088×624 – 2xMSAA
• Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare – 1024×600 – 2xMSAA
• Conan (demo) – 1024×576 – no AA
• Def Jam Icon – 1152×648 – no AA
• Jericho (demo) – 996×560 – no AA
• MX vs ATV (demo) – 1024×576 – no AA
• Pirates of the Caribbean – 960×720 – no AA
• The Darkness (demo) – 1024×576 – no AA
• Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground (demo) – 1024×576 -no AA
• Virtua Figther 5 – 1024×1024 – no AA

• Not True 1080p

• GTHD – 1440×1080 – no AA
• in Vehicle Selection – 1920×1080 – no AA
• GT5 Prologue (demo) – 1280×1080 2xMSAA
• in garage/pit/showroom – 1280×720 4xMSAA or 1920×1080 no AA
• Pirates of the Caribbean – 768×1080 – no AA
• Rub’a’dub – 1600×1080 – no AA
• Transformers – 960×1080 – no AA
• Virtua Figther 5 – 1024×768 – no AA

• True 1080p

• Blast Factor – 1920×1080 – no AA
• Calling All Cars – 1920×1080 – 4xMSAA
• Full Auto 2 (demo) – 1920×1080 – 4xMSAA
• Go Puzzle – 1920×1080
• Locoroco Cocoreccho – 1920×1080 – 2xMSAA
• Marvel: Ultimate Alliance – 1920×1080 – no AA
• NBA07 (demo) – 1920×1080 – no AA
• NBA08 (demo) – 1920×1080 – no AA
• NBA Street Home court = 1920×1080 – no AA
• Pixel Junk Racers – 1920×1080
• Ridge Racer 7 (demo) = 1920×1080 – no AA
• Stardust HD – 1280×1080 – no AA
• Sudoku – 1920×1080
• Tekken 5 Dark Resurrection – 1920×1080 – no AA
• Virtua Tennis 3 (demo) – 1920×1080 – 2xMSAA

The PS3 renders a few games in native 1080p, though half of them are Playstation Network games it’s still a better showing than the Xbox 360 for the resolution. The Less than 720p group sees pretty much the same cross platform games that were in the Xbox 360 list. Perhaps most interesting here is that the Gran Turismo series, isn’t rendering in True 1080p, similar to Halo 3 it does actually reach it’s proper resolution when in the menus and areas where fast processing isn’t required.

While it’s interesting to look at what the actual resolutions of these games are I think it more proves the point over how over valued the resolution battle is. No one questioned Oblivion, or Call of Duty 4, or Tomb Raider because those games look amazing, and are often used as shining exmaples of the best graphics the 360 and PS3 have to offer. How is it then that the most graphically impressive games have apparently underwhelming resolutions?

The answer is simple, and that is there is much much more to what makes good graphics than resolution. Arguably the horsepower required to pump out those extra pixels could be detrimental to other aspects of the image’s quality. Surely the creators of Halo 3, Gran Turismo, and Call of Duty 4 realized that they could produce an overall more impressive image if they allowed the resolution to suffer a bit. On the other end of the fence games like Ridge Racer 7 and NBA Street Homecourt are lacking a lot of detail and run at much lower frame-rates in comparison to their 720p-ish brethren.

Often tell people that 1080p could actually HURT the quality of their graphics and that they need to stop drinking the Sony “Full-HD” Koolaide. If seeing that list and thinking about how good those games actually look doesn’t convince you then nothing will.