Introduction: I'm no skater. I've never skated in my life. However, I've always loved the Tony Hawk games since I picked up my N64 controller and hit the on button. Every version has always been fun, however I skipped the fourth installement. The series got boring after nearly the same thing, but Activision and Neversoft have done something I'm glad they did. Tony Hawk's Underground. Very different from it's "ancestors", THUG is much more story driven and I believe the formula used hits the button perfectly. Just too bad it isn't online for the Xbox.

Gameplay: THUG offers a lot of what the past THPS games have. Tons of tricks to pull off! Try doing a trick combo that gets you points times 34 and not bailing! Just fooling around and doing tricks is just one of the things you can do. Create-A-Trick offers you the chance to make your own specialities. Making your own tricks and putting in simple buttons to pull them off can also help you when you're doing the story mode. Create-a-Deck is also another feature in THUG. Although it would seem like a great feature, the fact it's lacking and has a lot of ugly designs doesn't leave much to be desired from it. Also, the Create-A-Deck feature can only be unlocked once you've gone pro in the story mode. As far as the story mode, it becomes apparent that THUG is very story driven. You have to build your stats, sort of like you would in an RPG. The story itself is excellentley done. You've got to run away from drug dealers, you've got to make a video with other pros are some of the things you'll experience doing while playing THUG. Did I mention that at moments the game can get very frusterating? For instance, in the beginning of the game you'll have to jump a bridge after sketching(hanging on the back of a car) to get air and get over the cops. Most won't get this their first time. Or their second and third times. At moments as well, you'll be going down the street and passing through traffic to go to one place, and you'll accidentally grab onto a car and begin sketching. That can take you into the opposite direction and gets annoying. Other things such as learning new specials from pros can be frusterating at times. At times it may not be exactly clear to one what they mean when they ask you to do and hit such and such a combo of buttons to hit the special. This takes away a lot of the fun from the game, because who wants to spend three hours doing the same thing over and over again? That's something I experienced throughout the game. One thing I found fun was constantly changing my characters appearence. Going from a rastafarian skater to a gangster skater was fun. It's unfortunate however there's no downloadable content from Xbox Live, because there could have been more content to these aspects of the game. However, they aren't exactly lacking by any means.

Graphics: As stated before, I haven't played THPS 4. But THUG seems to be a nice improvement over THPS3 aside from certain camera glitches. For instance, at moments you'll have the camera angle close to the ground, and you'll see the road with endless blue under it. Aside from a few of those, the animation itself is greatly done. Doing a kickflip, you can see crisply how it's done. Although THUG doesn't take full control of the Xbox's capabilities, it does do a good job on giving us clean graphics. Frame rate wise, the game runs fairly smoothly. Look carefully at the road, you'll see your reflection. The enviroments themselves are each unique and very well detailed. Each locale has it's own "uniqueness" to it. From the ghetto in New Jersey, to the wonderful sand beach at Hawaii the game all round looks great.

Sound: The actual sound comes together very nicely. Music wise, the game gives us a pretty good selection of a few varieties of music, including rock and hip hop. As always, a feature widely used on the Xbox known as the custom soundtrack feature has been implimented in this game and helps for those who are neither fans of hip hop or rock, or simply find the actual songs poor. Minor things in the game such as falling down when you bail on a trick, or banging your head against the ramp as you mess up a lip trick are nice. Hearing your guy moan in pain as his head bashes against the ramp and blood going everywhere adds to a more realistic feel. The voice acting itself is greatly done, with every important character in the game voiced exceptionally good. From your old best friend and rival Eric Sparrow, to Tony Hawk himself the game does well. Some of the voice acting in this game is done better than a lot of adventure games for instance. The good voice acting helps the game out a lot, as you'll be meeting many people throughout the story mode. It keeps the game fresh, without dragging it down into a boring level. Some of the things you'll see Bam Margera say, especially during the Moscow stage are very funny. Your own characters voice isn't that bad either, which is a plus. Him actually speaking is a plus, as we've seen a lot of times the main person you play as not speaking.

Replayability: Tony Hawk's Underground offers a great story mode, and a few unlockable stages(such as the Hotter Than Hell stage). Unlocking all the videos, and completing the game with all 129 goals may or may not take a lot of time. You may have to go through the game 2 or 3 times to do all 129 goals. For those hardcore gamers, there's the sick mode which will take you some time to do. As far as THUG being worth your $50(or $70 for us Canadians), it all depends on you, the individual in question. Multiplayer with friends is a plus. The simple fact is however, the story mode will get boring after a while. Especially if you go back for a fourth or fifth time.

Overall: In closing, I think Activision made the right decision with going with the concept of the underground. It might have felt like a simple rehash if it were a "THPS5", however the original concept has brought new life to the Tony Hawk games. THUG redefines the series, and redifines the way a skating game should be. All though I do feel the story should have been longer, the game in it's entire form is definetly a superb accomplishment from Activision and Neversoft, keeping the series going with a fresh and original idea.