Tony Hawk, for someone my age, is an iconic person. Hawk is responsible for one of the best arcade sports games of all time, which is the Tony Hawk Pro Skater series. The first game was released on Sept 29, 1999. I was at that age where skate boarding was one of the cooler activities you could do. Hawk is currently 57 years old and I became concerned about his health as they are still skating. After watching several recent videos, however, he is still really good at skating.
I am going to reverse my opinion here and instead say that as long as someone is healthy and has the drive to do an activity like skating safely, who am I to say they should stop? He is still able to skate and by the looks of the videos, he can skate quite well. I also believe it is a case of legacy. Everyone who likes skateboarding, whether that be actually skateboarding or playing video games about skating, I would venture Tony Hawk is responsible for a good chunk of the skating community.
I remember when I saw the 900 performed by Hawk for the first time. It was a fantastic moment and one that I have remembered for years. Immediately after seeing that video I asked my parents to get me “Tony Hawk’s Underground 2,” which features a story that involves another famous skater, Bam Magera. I loved that game as a kid and still have it to this day for the Nintendo Gamecube. I spent hours learning the ins and outs of arcade skating games and I still play THUG II occasionally to this day.
The main games that I play for Tony Hawk are the fantastic remasters of the first four Tony Hawk Pro Skater games. These two games were released in 2020 and 2025 respectively.
What I love about the remasters is that it reinvigorated the arcade sports game idea for me. After playing the first remaster, I started playing a lot of other arcade sports games. So, in an indirect and probably unintentional way, Tony Hawk added to my backlog of games I would like to play.
To finish off my thoughts here, I want to thank Tony Hawk for being a great influence to so many people. Especially those who like arcade sports games. I will always love playing these games and I cannot wait to do some more 900s in my next session.
