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Oh boy, oh boy. Licenses are starting to get better. Last month we saw The Simpsons: Hit & Run, a good Simpsons game. Now Activision, Toys for Bob and Disney have teamed up to create Disney’s Extreme Skate Adventure. The game is certainly different from Konami’s sub par Disney’s Sports titles.
The biggest thing the game has going for it is that Activision also publishes the Tony Hawk Pro Skater games. The same powerful engine that powered Tony Hawk 4 is here, albeit with a facelift. The famous control scheme of the THPS series can also be found here; same with the open ended structure.
The Disney license is in full force in Extreme Skate Adventure. You can skate as many characters from Disney licenses like Toy Story, Tarzan and The Lion King. Among the characters you can choose are Pumbaa, Simba, Woody, Buzz Lightyear and Tarzan. Aside from the basic moves, each character has unique moves and a special move. They also have a themed “skateboards” which adds to the diversity. You won’t have all the characters available from the beginning, though, they have to be unlocked during the game’s progress. You can also make your own characters thanks to the ample Create-A-Skater options.
The game takes place in four worlds, one for each license: Toy Story, Tarzan and The Lion King as well as a “realistic” world called Olliewood. Each of the worlds contains levels for the characters where you’ll need to find certain items or perform certain tricks. As in Tony Hawk 4, you’ll get these missions by talking to NPCs. Those who kept up with the development know that Activision auditioned kids to be included in the game. You’ll find some of those kids in the game, originally in Olliewood but can go to the other worlds as you progress.
As expected, the Tony Hawk engine performs miracles. Since the game is targeted for kids, the controls are simplified a bit for new players. The easy configuration lets you use the same button for tricks, changing the tricks by itself depending on what area of the map you’re in. If you’re used to the Tony Hawk controls, there is a more similar control option which adds more depth to the controls and allows you to be more precise.
Once you’ve played through the single-player game you and a buddy can engage in split-screen multiplayer mayhem. You can play King of the Hill (keep the crown) and a high-score game in split-screen. The classic H-O-R-S-E is included where the low scorer gets a letter, enter they spell horse.
The visuals are quite nice. Much like the Tony Hawk series, they aren’t the very best in pure “look pretty” department but do their job quite nicely. The backgrounds are detailed and fit perfectly with the Disney license. Olliewood is a nice change from all the Disney-ness, although it doesn’t have quite the same detail to it. All of the characters from the Disney ones to the kids are wonderfully modeled and animate very fluidly.
The audio department is quite good as well. The PS2 version, at least, supports Dolby Pro Logic II. The sound effects accurately represent the action on the screen. The voice acting is good for the most part. The background music is pretty cool if rock is your thing. It seems a bit odd there aren’t licensed Disney songs but what’s included is cool. None of the rock songs have anything parents wouldn’t want their kids hearing.
Most of the recent Disney sports-related games have been decent at the very best. Disney’s Extreme Skate Adventure is a different story though. The game is probably the best Disney game I’ve played in a while and a good skating game to boot. This just goes to show you what a good engine and development team can do. -- Jose Liz, PGNx Media
---- Oct 6, 2003
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