Tony Hawks American Wasteland is the latest in the Tony Hawks series of skateboarding games.

American Wasteland continues in the vein of the more recent Underground games, in that it is story-led. The story this time is a better one than in previous games, focussing more on the skating. The player is placed in the position of a wannabe skater who travelled to LA to pursue his dream. Mugged on arrival, he is left with nothing but his skills and a newfound friend who shows him around and introduces him to local skating figures. Of course, an introduction is not enough, and the player must prove their skills, learning tricks and performing combos to impress the skaters.

The skate shop allows you to customise your board, and you can also customise your skaters look with a huge variety of options for hair style, clothing and accessories.

Thankfully, its mostly skateboards in this version of the game, although there is also the option of riding a BMX bike. I didn’t spot any lawnmowers or other irritating to control vehicles in this version.

There is a park editor, and a classic mode in this version of the game. The classic mode features areas from previous games, and its a lot of fun to go back to them, re-explore, and see if you can still remember how to perform some of the old combos and stunts. I found myself wanting to spend more time in here than exploring the new plots.

The graphics are decent - they look a lot better than the graphics in Tony Hawks Underground, but they are not earth shattering by any means. It was nice to see no texture bugs in this version (the last PC Tony Hawks game we played had gaping holes all over the maps.).

The one thing that lets this game down on the PC is the controls. Perfoming a long combo is fiddly and irritating compared to on the PS2. The keys to perform tricks are located on the numeric keypad, and it takes a lot of tapping and finger twisting to perform, say, a grab trick. Forget even trying to combo using manuals unless you have a decent keyboard. If you have a game pad for your PC you could easily set something up to make it feel like the PS2, which will make for a much more pleasant gaming experince.

The soundtrack, as usual is top notch, with songs from both well known and indie artists from the present day, and some classics from the past. It was a nice suprise to hear Motley Crue and Venom in there.

This is a return to form for the Tony Hawks games, and a lot of fun. If you own a console, I would buy the console version. If you are a PC only gamer, then this is worth getting, but I would buy a game pad at the same time if you don’t already own one - it will save your sanity, and make the game a lot easier.

Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 9/10
Game Play: 8/10
Longevity: 8/10

Overall: 8/10