Tony Hawk
While some gaming franchises can claim to be victims of changing times, the Tony Hawk’s were also victims of a notable dip in quality in the 2010s.
Once a staple of sports games, the Tony Hawk’s games were in a decent place going into the 2010s. Sure, Skateboarding as a whole was beginning to fade from Mainstream popularity, and the last few entries in the series hadn’t been as polished as fans would have liked.
However, the franchise’s brand recognition alone was enough to help it weather these missteps and changing fads. So long as the new decade’s games could reclaim a certain level of quality, the series had the chance to rise back to its former glory and remain a series fans could stand behind.
Unfortunately, the opposite would happen. The four entries put out between 2010 and 2015 all proved mediocre at best and awful at worst, sporting flaws such as poor graphics, game-breaking bugs and being unplayable without massive day one patches.
It proved too much for the series’ brand to make up for, and led to declining sales and fan support as the decade went on. Tony Hawk even went so far as to announce in 2018 that he was no longer working on games in the series with publisher Activision, hammering the final nail into the series’ coffin.
Though there is a new entry in the series currently in development, it’s safe to say it won’t be greeted with the same hope and anticipation as it would have ten years ago; and even if it is a step up from past entries, it may not be enough to save the franchise from falling for good.
