Producer Kragen Lum talks about taking Tony Hawk Downhill Jam to the PS2
By Michael Lafferty

“The biggest draw of the title is that Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam can be enjoyed by all players, regardless of their style of play.”

Unless you have been hiding under a rock when it comes to video games, the name Tony Hawk has a familiar ring to it. These have been top-flight skateboarding titles that have featured eye-popping, high-flying tricks, and triggered by the controller players hold.

The series has done a lot of things but until Downhill Jam popped up, the franchise had never really tagged the sheer adrenaline rush of racing skateboards down a hill. But Downhill Jam does a lot more than merely provide a racing tool. The courses are innovative and, of course, you can pull off tricks as you race.

Already released on the Wii, Tony Hawk Downhill Jam is heading for the PlayStation 2 console system. GameZone caught up with producer Kragen Lum to chat about this title.

Question: Downhill Jam greatly benefited from the control scheme of the Wii. How will the PS2 version be as inviting to players? Will you bank on the sheer entertainment value of the title, or do you have other surprises in store? 

Kragen: Fans of the Tony Hawk series know the control scheme from those games like the back of their hands, particularly on the PlayStation 2. We wanted to give those fans the opportunity to play Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam as well, with a familiar control scheme on a system that they already own. When we reconfigured the controls for Downhill Jam, we really tried to be faithful to the previous titles in the Tony Hawk series by setting up the button assignments the same way. The goal was to give fans of the previous games something that they could pick up and play instantly. We do have some other surprises exclusive to the PS2 version, including an additional 10 new events, 3 new playable characters, new multiplayer modes and new live action downhill skating movies featuring Tony Hawk.

Q: The Tony Hawk franchise has been going on for a while now, and Downhill Jam proved to be a bit of a directional change for the title. Can we expect this to be the start of a trend in exploring other facets of the skateboarding world?

Kragen: Changing direction a bit by creating a more arcade style, pick-up-and-play Tony Hawk title was definitely the main goal with Downhill Jam. I can’t say if this will become a trend or not, but we had a lot of fun making a downhill skateboard racing game this time out.

Q: Downhill Jam is, on the surface, a simple title. There are tricks but the core game is the downhill runs. Do you think that, at times, developers over-think titles and make them much more complicated than they need to be?

Kragen: I do think that there’s a tendency to over-think things when it comes to making a game. The basic question should always be, “is it fun?” That’s why we play games in the first place, right? Complicated doesn’t always equal fun, as we’ve seen with some other games… We wanted to make a fun and easy pick-up-and-play skateboard racing game that gives players the ability to play the game however they want to.

Q: What do you think is the biggest draw of the title?

Kragen: The biggest draw of the title is that Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam can be enjoyed by all players, regardless of their style of play. Whether they want to play it as a straight racer, perform the tricks and find cool skating lines, look for the numerous shortcuts or just knock down opponents and pedestrians, the gameplay is always fun and interesting.

Q: If you had had the time, what would you have liked to add to the game?

Kragen: One thing that I would have liked to add would be picking up and throwing objects at the other players. This would have been a lot of fun, especially in multiplayer.

Q: Why do you think the Tony Hawk franchise has been so popular for so long? What are the "ingredients" in this recipe of success?

Kragen: At its core, the Tony Hawk gameplay is all about the controls. The games in the franchise have evolved over the years, but they’ve never lost the key component that makes it so enjoyable to play. Being able to pick up a controller and do any number of cool skateboarding tricks with such ease is a lot of fun.

Q: What is your favorite element in the game? Favorite track? And why?

Kragen: One of my favorite elements of the game is the way that the concept of racing has been merged with the Tony Hawk trick lines. This encourages the player to find cool skate lines by rewarding them with shortcuts and areas that can’t be reached by staying on the normal path of the track. There’s a really cool example of this in the Edinburgh track. One of the shortcuts in the level leads you to a section where you can grind off several cannons mounted on the top of the castle walls, and then through the top of the high bell tower to do some awesome air tricks.

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