Two of the biggest games of the PlayStation era were Tony Hawk's Pro Skater and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2. For those of you that never played these classics, they required players to skate around various parks and rack up combos by chaining together inputs. The more difficult the trick, the harder it was to nail the combo. This made for some addicting gameplay, but sadly, the franchise has largely been on ice with the last Pro Skater arriving in 2015 and the last Tony Hawk game as the iOS and Android title, Skate Jam. But now the first two games are returning to consoles where they belong.

According to THR, Vicarious Visions is re-releasing remastered versions of Pro Skater and Pro Skater 2 "with modern 4K, HD visuals and feature the original maps, professional skaters, soundtrack, tricks and modes from the original games, packaged together. The remasters will also include new features such as online multiplayer, new tricks, secrets and an expanded skatepark creation tool."

Vicarious Visions previously remastered the Crash Bandicoot series as Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy back in 2017, and it went on to sell more than 10 million copies worldwide. I imagine that the Tony Hawk remasters will be equally successful if not more so.

Personally, I'm surprised it's taken this long to revive the Tony Hawk series. It's not like people stopped liking skateboarding, and while it's clear that the gaming landscape has changed (I'd argue not for the better, but I'm old and stuck in my ways), there's probably a market for these remasters, not just as a nostalgia play, but also as a way to get younger gamers on board, especially if there's now online multiplayer and skatepark creation. It will be interesting to see if the Pro Skater series gets a new lease on life if the remasters are a hit.

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2 will arrive PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC on September 4th.