BETTER S-K-A-T-E THAN NEVER
There is a severed eyeball with a spear through it looking inquisitively around your television screen, as intrigued about what’s about to happen next as you are.
“THE TAPE-GRABBING, COMBO-TRICKING SKATE FRENZY WOULD GARNER A CULT FOLLOWING.”
The song Police Truck by anti-corporate punk rockers Dead Kennedys starts to pummel through your speakers. Tony Hawk fades in, completes a full loop, nails a back smith, then cuts to Bob Burnquist sending a one-foot backside 360, a fakie 5-0 and a method air. You are brought to the main menu of a game that will launch one of the most famous series in videogames history, change the face of skateboarding, and make you disproportionately happy about finding weird, glowing videotapes hovering in inopportune places.
NEARLY NEVER
It is now 20 years since the launch of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, on 31 August 1999, on PlayStation. Few realise it’s a miracle developer Neversoft stayed afloat long enough to make it happen.
The company was founded by Mick West, Joel Jewett,
