It's impressive how much Neversoft improved on their first game within just one year of development. THPS 2 had more skaters, more levels, more tricks, more everything. Finishing the game with each skater was enough to keep you playing the game for dozens of hours, even though that did get repititive, but after that you could look for every hidden gap in the game or create your own skate parks and skaters or save replays of your best runs. It doesn't sound like a big deal, but the addition of manuals was a pretty big change in the gameplay of THPS. They added another dimension to combos. Without manuals you were just grinding the lines in the levels that were designed by the developers. Now, at any point, you could choose to jump to either side of the rail and maintain your combo and even use quarterpipes during combos, though these would usually end your combo.
Not only was it a brilliant arcade game, but it also appealed to casual gamers, even got me into skateboarding back in the day.
- Presentation
Very stylish menus, real skate parks, custom created parks, real skaters, real (and made up) tricks, skate videos etc. - Graphics
This is a PS1 game so don't expect much and that's what you'll get, not saying it's a bad looking game for the system though. - Sound
Great soundtrack with plenty of memorable tracks, sound effects weren't bad either. - Gameplay
It's classic THPS gameplay with manuals. - Lasting Appeal
Plenty to do although repetitive.