Tony Hawk reveals what he really thinks about his own game
When the first Tony Hawk Pro Skater video game hit the shelves in 1999, skateboarding was starting to flourish after being considered a niche, unpopular hobby for years.
However, the video game (released on all the major consoles of the time including Nintendo 64, Dreamcast and Nokia N-Gage phones) changed the way broader society engaged with skateboarding.
Now, on the cusp of releasing a remake of two of the games, Tony Hawk's Pro-Skater 3 + 4, Hawk has sat down exclusively with news.com.au to talk about video games, skating, and what he's up to these days.
'[The video games] changed my life, certainly my recognition factor,' he said.
'My name is now synonymous with a game. When some people say Tony Hawk, they don't mean me as a person at all.
'I would say that happens more often than not now. It also changed the landscape of skating. It changed the popularity of skating.
'It got a whole new generation into the sport. And then, eventually, it actually changed how people skate because people that were first starting out were playing the game thinking all these combinations were based in real life, when we were putting them in because they were fantastical.
'Now, when you see the skaters of this generation who are competing in the Olympics and the X Games, they're doing these tricks that were only possible in video games 20 years ago.'
The game itself was made by video game studio Neversoft, fresh off its successful third-person shooter game Apocalypse.
One little known fact about the development of the original Tony Hawk Pro Skater is that it's built on the same engine as Apocalypse, and so the first prototype of the game Hawk was shown featured the likeness of Bruce Willis as the player character.
It came about after several other game publishers had released skateboarding games with varying success.
Sadly, Bruce Willis was never included in the finished game.
According to legendary skateboarder Rodney Mullen (dubbed 'the Godfather of freestyle skating', and inventor of many of skateboarding's most iconic tricks), the success of the game and subsequent growth of skateboarding is down to who Hawk is as a person.
'Tony is the perfect ambassadorm' Mullen beamed.
'He is that gifted, he is that core [of skating]. And he's able to navigate the outside world in a way a lot of us couldn't if we tried, I certainly couldn't.'
However, it turns out that real life skating skills don't translate to the digital world.
When asked if he was any good at the game, Mullen said 'I'm terrible, I don't even play it. It's easier to skate.'
The same goes for musician Lupe Fiasco, whose iconic skateboarding song Kick, Push is featured in the new release, and who performed at the recent THPS Festival launch party in Los Angeles.
While he enjoys playing the game, when news.com.au asked if he was any good at it he said 'No. I absolutely am not.'
However, Bam Margera, a professional skateboarder best known for starring in the MTV reality shows Jackass and Viva La Bam, is an avid gamer, who loves the game to the same extremes he pursues everything he's passionate about.
'I was so addicted to this game that I was missing flights over it and I had to put it away,' he said.
'I missed seven flights in a row because of it. So, that just shows how addictive this game is. It's very versatile.
'You can play it forever. And everyone, young and old, has played this game. That's why it's so rad that they're making a new one with all kinds of new features in it.'
One thing that was very notable in our interview was just how down to earth and normal Tony Hawk is.
It would be easy to get a massive ego when you've reached that level of fame and skill, and yet he was laid back and completely without the attitude that sometimes comes with fame at a young age.
He is still the most recognisable skateboarder of all time, and likely the only skateboarder most people could name, yet his hilarious interactions with people who half recognise him, but not really have gone viral to the point of becoming a meme.
Despite this trend first going viral in 2018, Hawk says it still happens a lot, but with a twist. 'Nowadays, I still get a lot of the same interactions of mistaken identity,' he revealed.
'In fact, just in New York last week at a coffee shop, 'Hey, did anyone tell you you look like Tony Hawk?'
'But the funny part about it now is sometimes I can't tell if they're joking or not because now it's become a sort of meme of its own and so when people say it, I'm taken aback.
'Like, wait, are we doing the joke or do you really? But this guy was not doing the joke.
'That's the thing about it that drives my daughter crazy, because I don't say I am unless they ask, because I feel like it's pretentious to be like, well, actually, that's me.'
Skateboarding is having somewhat of a renaissance at the moment, with more and more kids (and millennials) taking up skateboarding.
Part of this is because everything that was cool in the early 2000s is now back in style. But according to Hawk, there's more to it than that.
'It's because it's easily accessible and also skateboarding is prolific now,' he explained.
'There are skate parks in most cities. It's part of people's consciousness.
'So, almost any kid that is of an impressionable age is probably being exposed to skateboarding somewhere, somehow, and is probably interested in trying it.'
The early games were occasionally criticised for not including many female skaters as playable characters, something Hawk is trying to remedy now.
'I always wanted the game to represent real life skateboarding. So at the time of the first game, yes, there was a great imbalance of gender and race,' he said.
'I thought it was important to include everyone, but that was kind of a representation of the ratios at the time.
'I'm just thankful that now, I mean, skateboarding is the most inclusive sport.
'If you go to a skate park right now there's people of all ages, all races, all genders, all skill levels, all backgrounds, and they all are enjoying it equally and encouraging each other.
'There's just no other activity or sport like that. It's beautiful.'
The inclusion in the Olympics has likely drawn more awareness of the sport amongst younger
generations, but Hawk is adamant that the Olympics needed skateboarding more than skateboarding needed them.
'I thought that the Olympics needed our cool factor more than we needed their validation,' he said.
'I stand by that. The fact that it's now in has been great for international recognition of skateboarding and international growth and having skateboarding in more unlikely places. So that's cool. But yeah.'
As for what Hawk is up to these days. It's a pretty varied list.
He recently became a grandfather after his son Riley Hawk and his wife Frances Bean Cobain, daughter of iconic Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain and Hole singer Courtney Love, welcomed their son Ronin in September 2024.
'I'm a grandpa, so I'm doing a lot of that,' he said.
'In fact, I was doing that this morning before I left for this. Still skating as much as I can, but advocating for skate parks through our foundation and surprisingly doing a lot of speaking engagements.'
Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3 + 4 is in stores 11 July 2025. Alice Clarke is a freelancer writer who travelled to Los Angeles as a guest of Activision.
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