Tony Hawk's Underground

If the story has been completed more than once, an alternate ending occurs, where the protagonist knocks Eric unconscious, taking the tape back instead of holding the skate-off.

The members of Neversoft in 1998

The GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Xbox versions of Underground were developed by Neversoft,[7] while the Game Boy Advance version was developed by Vicarious Visions[10] the mobile version by Jamdat,[11] and the Windows version was created by Beenox. Activision, which had acquired Neversoft in 1999, published all versions of the game.[7][10][11]

Underground was created with a theme of individuality: it stars an amateur skater in a true story mode, whereas each previous Tony Hawk's game had starred professional skaters and had lacked a plot.[7] One reason for only allowing the player to use a custom character was that certain criminal acts completed in the plot would not reflect well on real-world skaters.[9] Previous games in the series had included character-creation features as well, but Neversoft expanded customization in Underground by implementing face-scanning for the PlayStation 2 version:[7] if the player emailed a photograph of their face to faces@thugonline.com, the company would digitize it for use in the game.[2] Regarding the customization options, especially the park editor, producer Stacey Drellishak stated that Neversoft was "trying to create the most customizable game ever".[9] The developers used storytelling and exploration to distance their product from the plotless, task-based format of previous Tony Hawk's games, which led Neversoft president Joel Jewett to describe Underground as an adventure game.[7]

Levels in the console versions of Underground were significantly larger than those of earlier Tony Hawk's games. Neversoft expanded each level until it ceased to run correctly, then shrunk it slightly.[12] Most of the levels were modelled closely after real-world locations; the designers traveled to locales representative of each city in the game and took photographs and videos as reference. The New Jersey level was a replication of a neighborhood where team artist Henry Ji had grown up as a young skater.[13] Neversoft wanted the player to become familiar with the basic game mechanics quickly and to notice Underground's differences from previous Tony Hawk's titles immediately. To accomplish this, they introduced the ability to travel on foot, and the ability to climb along ledges in the first few missions of the game.[14] While Neversoft wanted to keep Underground realistic and relatable for the most part, they added driving side-missions as an enjoyable diversion and to push the boundaries of freedom in skateboarding games.[13] However, these missions were intended not to take away from the main experience of skateboarding.[14]

Pro Skater 4, Underground's predecessor in the Tony Hawk's series, had received criticism for its difficulty: Neversoft had not realized that each game in the series was drawing new fans who were unaccustomed to the demanding tasks. As a result, Neversoft added four difficulty settings to Underground's story mode,[15] ranging from "Too Easy" to "Sick". Neversoft wanted players to develop skills for higher difficulty settings on Too Easy while still progressing through the story. The company had included extremely difficult missions in each previous Tony Hawk's game; the methods used to create these missions were the inspiration for Underground's Sick mode.[13] Development of the basic gameplay mechanics and structure began quickly but by the end of August 2003, only two months before the game's American release, work was still in progress.[12]

While the game's cutscenes are animated with 3D graphics, the team recorded live-action videos to introduce the real-world skateboarding teams, so that players could better understand each team before selecting one to join. Neversoft interviewed professional skaters about their experiences of becoming known in the skateboarding world, then compiled elements of these stories into the game's script.[7] Every skater who appears in the plot helped to craft their own scenes and voiced their own character.[2]

The game was promoted with a playable demo at Microsoft's "GameRiot" event held at Lollapalooza in July 2003.[16] Activision stirred up enthusiasm for Underground with the "Tony Hawk's Face Off Mobile Tour", a series of promotional events across 29 cities in October. Attendees could play the game early and compete in it for tickets to Boom Boom Huck Jam 2003, which Tony Hawk himself attended.[17] Activision, which sponsored the October Gravity Games extreme sports competition, promoted the game at the event and used its rendering engine to model tricks performed by the real-world skaters.[18] The console and Game Boy Advance versions were released on October 28 in the United States,[2] November 14 in Europe,[19] and May 2004 in Japan.[20] The mobile version was released worldwide in January 2004.[11]

Tony Hawk's Underground received "universal acclaim", according to review aggregator Metacritic.[21][22][23][24] GameZone's Michael Knutson wrote that Underground is "one of the best skating games around" and that players of every skill level would enjoy it.[29] Eurogamer's Tom Bramwell concurred: "As a 'pick-up-and-play' sort of game, THUG is endlessly rewarding once you get your head round the basics, and it's the best entry point for the series to date".[4]

The story was well received. Joe Rybicki of Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine celebrated that "for the first time I can remember, an extreme-sports game actually has a real story [with] honest-to-goodness characters".[30] IGN's Douglas Perry called it "a kick, albeit relatively lightweight in nature". He especially praised the pervasive sense of humor in the narrative and in the portrayal of real-world skaters.[2] Knutson called the story "unique" and stated: "I really like that Neversoft had the guts to try something this radical and ditch the formula that they know works so well".[29] Ben Silverman of Game Revolution described the game's plot as a "silly" cross between those of the 1980s films North Shore and Gleaming the Cube, but he praised it for giving context to the level goals and keeping distance between the skill unlocks.[27] Bramwell called it "hackneyed".[4] Rybicki found that the plot hurt the game's replay value and caused missions to be overly simplistic.[30] By contrast, Game Informer's Justin Leeper thought that "it serves to make some of the less-entertaining goals tolerable, because there's a reason for doing them".[26]

The game's aesthetics were generally well received. Bramwell called the graphics "unchanged and increasingly antiquated" and criticized the presence of "sharp, angular character models, eerily unrealistic lighting and odd little moments when the player is trying to turn round and ends up banging into a curb".[4] Knutson, meanwhile, was positive regarding the graphics, art, and animation: he called them "nearly flawless" and praised the realism they brought to the inherently fantastical skateboarding genre.[29] Williams said that "THUG's cityscapes are incredibly well designed" and singled out the GameCube version of Underground as exceptionally well rendered.[28] Rybicki called the levels "big and beautiful".[30] Knutson commended the soundtrack's large size and the sound effects' realism.[29] Perry appreciated the "hilariously hurtful" injury sounds and the extensive song list.[2] By contrast, IGN's Craig Harris praised the graphics of the Game Boy Advance version but was more mixed on the soundtrack.[10]

The alternate gameplay modes were received very well. Knutson lauded the game's high degree of customization; he summarized that "everything is expounded a hundred fold: from create-a-skater to create-a-park mode, it is simply amazing". He singled out the level editor as one of the deepest he had ever seen.[29] GameSpy's Bryn Williams identified the level editor as an "extremely well-designed" feature that contributed to the overall "brilliance" of the full product.[28] Leeper said that each customization mode is "intuitive and user-friendly", and both he and Rybicki especially enjoyed the trick-creation feature.[26][30] Reviewers for Famitsu magazine praised the story mode, whose open world format they compared to the Grand Theft Auto series.[25] Knutson and Perry enjoyed the multiplayer, particularly the online Firefight mode.[29] Williams thought similarly and stated that "the most notable disappointment" of the game was the lack of online play for non-PlayStation 2 owners.[28] Harris found the board customization of the Game Boy Advance version to be poorly implemented, though in-depth.[10] Despite his praise for the customization modes, Leeper admitted that his greatest enjoyment still came from "seeking out great lines and beating my scores".[26]

The walking and driving controls were criticized. Bramwell claimed that these modes felt "like they've been attached with an old stick of glue that's about as adhesive as baby oil".[4] Knutson agreed, though he praised the novelty of these diversions. He stated that "the Tony Hawk series has always had exceptional controls" and that Underground, overall, was no exception.[29] Perry felt that the feature increased levels' replay value.[2] Similarly, Famitsu reviewers noted that, although the game's fast pace makes it extremely challenging at times, the high difficulty provides a sense of accomplishment when jumps and tricks are performed correctly.[25] Williams found the GameCube version's controls mediocre, albeit manageable.[28] Damon Brown from GameSpot said that the mobile version's restrictive controls—many tricks require three button inputs—were that version's only caveat.[11]

Underground won Best Sports Game at the 2003 Game Critics Awards hosted by Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3).[31] The 2004 MTV Video Music Awards introduced a new category, Best Video Game Soundtrack, which Underground won.[32] In Europe the week after the game's release, the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and GameCube versions were respectively the fifth, sixth, and eighth-best selling games for those consoles.[33][34][35] It would remain uninterrupted in the top twenty of every week until January 24, 2004, for the Xbox and GameCube[36][37] and February 21 for the PlayStation 2, inclusive.[38] As of December 2007, the PlayStation 2 edition of the game had sold 2.11 million copies in the United States.[39] The GameCube version made Nintendo's Player's Choice list by selling 250,000 copies in the United States.[40] Its PlayStation 2 version also received a "Platinum" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA),[41] indicating sales of at least 300,000 copies in the United Kingdom.[42]