The hardest Tony Hawk game ever. Only elite Tony Hawk gamers will enjoy this one to the fullest.
Firstly, I have to get this out of the way. There are two moves in the game which are never explained to you. The Backflip/Frontflip and the Invert (aka: Lip Tricks). To do a Backflip, you hold L-Trigger whilst pressing Down on the directional controls. For Frontflip, it's obviously Up with the L-Trigger held once again. Now, the Invert must be performed by holding R-Trigger and Y just before you hit the place to start lipping from.
This game starts off decently but gets very hard, very quickly. With most Tony Hawk games, obviously, the Sick difficulty goals should be the hard ones, but sometimes in Proving Ground, even the Pro goals are a pain in the rear to complete. In my opinion it's the difficulty that drags this game down. But I suppose in today's generation of gaming, they want something a bit tougher. That's something I've learned from the majority of the Xbox 360 library.
So, difficulty aside, it is still a great Tony Hawk rendition. You have some nice updates and references to older games such as the Arcade Machines from TH Underground 2, which contain the nostalgic Classic Mode and some new modes too. There's Hi-Score Mode where you simply have to score big within a time limit and Hawk-Man, a completely hyper mode where you have to collect 75 (or 30 for the Amateur difficulty) coloured spheres!
THPG has lots of challenges to complete. There are the actual goals which float around in the cities, much like in Pro Skater 4 and you'll notice some mini-goals which are marked on the ground and the walls. The mini-goals can be quite fun, but also quite frustrating at times, given the game's difficulty. But some of the earlier ones you find hard you can eventually beat with advantages such as the new moves you acquire and the pieces you're able to place in the level to help you speed up. Which brings me onto the next topic...
You can, for the first time ever in a Tony Hawk game, actually place Skate pieces in main levels! This is a very useful feature to have and will help you overcome some of the harder goals like I mentioned above. As you complete stories from specific Pros, you'll unlock more pieces to be able to use in-game.
So, that's some of the features of the game. There's also the "Nail The..." modes which are quite annoying but basically, they allow you to perform extra tricks in slow motion (much like Focus from American Wasteland). It's a very hard game for Achievements so if you're after a lot of points, you should be aware of that. Like I said, this game is a lot harder than the Tony Hawk games before it, but if you coasted through those, you'll have minor problems with this one.