Tony Hawk's American Wasteland (Game)

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland

GAME » on October 18, 2005

GameCube (Platform)PC (Platform)PlayStation 2 (Platform)Xbox (Platform)Xbox 360 (Platform)

Skate throughout a virtual Los Angeles in the seventh installment of the Tony Hawk series of skateboarding games.

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Overview

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland is a skateboarding game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and GameCube on October 18, 2005, with a release for the Xbox 360 (Platform) on November 22, 2005 (as a launch title) and a PC (Platform) release on February 6, 2006.

The seventh installment of the Tony Hawk series and the sequel to Tony Hawk's Underground 2, Tony Hawk's American Wasteland revamps the story mode by having players skate through an "open world" of inter-connected levels set throughout Los Angeles (Location). In addition, the game revamps the "off-the-board" mechanic, adds some new trick types (such as bertsliding), and allows players to swap their skateboards for BMX bikes.

The game's story puts players in control of a customizable male skater, who moves from the American Midwest to Los Angeles and, throughout a series of misadventures, ends up helping rebuild a locals-only skate park known as "Skate Ranch" (led by former pro skater Iggy Van Zandt (Character)). Much of the game is collecting new objects from throughout the virtual L.A. by completing certain goals (such as pulling a specific trick off those objects).

It is the first Xbox release to support Xbox Live (Concept) online multiplayer, as well as the first of the series to be released on the seventh-generation consoles. The handheld versions of the game were released as Tony Hawk's American Sk8land.

Gameplay

The game's main selling feature was that it included one seamless LA level that contained no loading times. In it, players could skate various landmark areas such as Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica and East LA. While originally this led players to believe the map would be similar to the ones found in the Grand Theft Auto series, the end result was a bit underwhelming. While players could skate a giant LA, the areas themselves were essentially the size of past Tony Hawk levels. The only difference was that they were each connected by "tunnel" like areas that hid the loading times. Tony Hawk would get its true seamless skating city in its 8th installment, Tony Hawk's Project 8.

The second biggest addition to the game was the inclusion of BMX bikes. Players could trade in their skateboards for a BMX to complete bike specific goals. The bikes however did not control like the ones found in the Mat Hoffman Pro BMX games. Instead they were controlled using the analogue sticks (Left one controlling the players, while the right one controlling the bike to do tailwhips) and the shoulder buttons (allowing riders to spin and do body flips). Pro BMX riders Rick Throne and Mat Hoffman appeared in the game relating to bike specific missions. Bikes would replace the non-skateboarding vehicles found in the previous Underground games.

The third noteworthy additional features was found in the revamped Off-the-Board controls. Players were once again able to jump off their board, but they were no longer limited to just walking. Free-Running was incorporated to allow players to run up walls and do wall flips as well. Other new tricks included wall plants and bert slides.

Levels

Story Mode Levels

Unlike previous games, each of the main story level takes place in one location (making up the city of Los Angeles (Location)). The game divides each area with tunnels/pathways.

Hollywood
Beverly Hills
Skate Ranch
Downtown
Vans Park
East LA
Santa Monica
Oil Rig (originally from the Xbox version of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3)
Casino (originally from Tony Hawk's Underground 2 Remix)

Classic Mode Levels

Unlike Tony Hawk's Underground 2, the game's Classic Mode is only played in the following levels (all of which return from previous games in the series).

Minneapolis (based on "Downtown" from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater)
Santa Cruz (from Tony Hawk's Undergound 2 Remix)
The Mall (from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater)
Chicago (from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater)
Kyoto (from Tony Hawk's Undergound 2 Remix)
The Ruins (based on "Los Angeles" from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3)
Atlanta (from Tony Hawk's Undergound 2 Remix, exclusive to the Collectors Edition)
Marseilles (from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, exclusive to the Collectors Edition)

Soundtrack

7 Seconds - We're Gonna Fight
Alkaline Trio - Wash Away *
An Endless Sporadic - Sun Of Pearl
Bad Religion - We're Only Gonna Die
Black Flag - Rise Above
The Bled - House Of Suffering *
Bloc Party - Like Eating Glass
Bobot Adrenaline - Penalty Box
The Bravery - Unconditional
Breakestra - Champ
The Casualties - Get Off My Back
Circle Jerks - Wild In The Streets
Dead Kennedys - California Uber Alles
Death From Above 1979 - Little Girl
Del Tha Funkee Homosapien - "Burnt"
D.R.I. - Couch Slouch
The Doors - Peace Frog
Dropkick Murphys - Who Is Who *
El-P - Junkie Skate Rock
Emanuel - Search And Destroy *
The Faint - I Disappear
Fallout Boy - Start Today *
Fatlip - What's Up Fatlip
Felix Da Housecat - Everyone is Someone In LA
Frank Black - Los Angeles
From Autumn To Ashes - Let's Have A War *
The God Awfuls - Watch It Fall
Good Riddance - 30 Day Wonder
Green Day - Holiday
High On Fire - Devilution
Hot Snakes - Time To Escape *
Lair Of The Minotaur - Warlord
Mastodon - Iron Tusk
Mike V And The Rats - Vendetta
Molemen - Put Your Quarter Up
Mötley Crue - Live Wire
My Chemical Romance - Astro Zombies *
Nassim - Rawhide
The Network - Teenagers From Mars
Oingo Boingo - Who Do You Want To Be
Pest - Duke Kerb Crawler
Pig Destroyer - Gravedancer
Prefuse 73 - One Word Extinguisher
Public Enemy - Burn Hollywood Burn
Rise Against - Fix Me *
Riverboat Gamblers - Hey! Hey! Hey!
Rob Sonic - Sniper Picnic
Saves The Day - Sonic Reducer *
Scissor Sisters - Filthy/Gorgeous
Senses Fail - Institutionalized *
Sham 69 - Borstal Breakout
SNFU - Better Homes And Gardens
Spirit Caravan - Dove-Tongued Aggressor
Strike Anywhere - Question The Answer
Taking Back Sunday - Suburban Home/I Like Food *
Thrice - Image Of The Invisible
Thrice - Seeing Red/Screaming At A Wall *
The Thunderlords - I Like Dirt
Thursday - Ever Fallen In Love *
Tommy Guerrero - Organism
Ungh! - Skate Afrikkana
USSR - Live Near Death
Venom - Black Metal
= This song is in the Tony Hawk's American Wasteland soundtrack CD, which features covers of songs by other artists that are in the game.

Xbox 360 Game Installation

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland requires 5.0GB of space to install on an Xbox 360 HDD.

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