#Skatebird soundtrack pro#

The bad news is that while the ambition soars, the concept doesn’t exactly land. As well as racking up points, you need to explore the levels and can take on collect-the-item challenges, finding well-hidden or hard-to-reach spots as you go. Your bird can find lines through its miniature environment and tie combos together with grinds and manuals, building momentum for bigger tricks.

#Skatebird soundtrack pro#

The original soundtrack and licensed tunes provide a good vibe to proceedings, occasionally evoking the series that inspired the game but mostly keeping things relaxed.Ī reasonable facsimile of the Pro Skater gameplay is present and correct, with the same basic moveset and controls. The bird characters themselves look wonderfully daft in their various selectable garments, from bucket hats to 3D glasses, and move with endearing twitches and bobs. The story that plays out is, of course, absurd – but SkateBIRD knows how silly it is and delivers it with charm. The environmental storytelling in the first level paints a picture of a person losing pride in life, who has let their housekeeping slide due to overwork (but has nonetheless maintained an elaborate bird-sized skatepark in their bedroom). The scenario of skating birds is framed by a story of lonely pets whose “big friend” human has started a miserable new job. What we have here is basically Tony Hawk’s meets Micro Machines meets New Zealand Story.Ī huge amount of love and effort has clearly gone into SkateBIRD. The bird skaters’ wings let them double-jump with a second mid-air ollie, for example, and since they’re tiny, they can skate tiny environments made of furniture and stationery. There’s a sense of fun in the concept of SkateBIRD and it brings some twists to an idea that is otherwise very closely modelled on the Tony Hawk’s series. But considering how much it has in common with a 3D platformer – open environments with an emphasis on acrobatic exploration and discovery – there is surely an opportunity for others to try some new ideas.Įnter SkateBIRD, the game that answers the question, “What if Tony Hawk was a tiny hawk?” Whoever flippantly asked that question probably wasn’t expecting an answer in the form of a video game released several years of work later, but here it is. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater defined it with such finesse in 1999 that there has barely been any room for improvement – as borne out by the continuing appeal of that first game two decades later. The skateboarding game, as a genre, has been under-explored. Captured on Nintendo Switch (Handheld/Undocked)