Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 Has a Reference to Guitar Hero, Will be Removed in Update
With the recent release of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4, players have been finding several Easter eggs all over the title, referencing other classic games and franchises of the era. One player even took to Reddit after having found a less-than-flattering reference to the Guitar Hero franchise in the game. As caught by IGN, the reference involves a box for a Guitar Hero-type game in a trash bin in the Waterpark stage.
Some fans in the comments have called this disrespectful of the original developers of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater – Neversoft – who would eventually go on to work on Guitar Hero games from Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock to Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock. Others have called it a great joke. Developer Iron Galaxy, however, has also commented on the Reddit thread, apologising for the reference to Guitar Hero in the game. In its post, the studio wrote that it has respect for anyone who makes games, and that it will be removing the asset in the next update while also investigating how it got there to begin with.
“We have the utmost respect for anyone who makes games, we’re investigating how that got in there in the first place,” wrote Iron Galaxy. “Thank you to the community for bringing this to our attention and we’ll be removing that from the environment art in the next update.”
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 was released over the weekend on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and the Switch 2. At the time of publishing, Iron Galaxy hasn’t yet confirmed when it will be releasing this update for the game that will remove the Guitar Hero reference.
Just a couple of days after the release of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4, Iron Galaxy had released a new trailer, this time showcasing all of the positive critical reception it got. The game is a complete, ground-up remake of the classic arcade-styled skateboarding games. Leading up to its release, Iron Galaxy had published a detailed post where it revealed some of the accessibility features of the game. These features range from an in-depth tutorial to teach players all aspects of the gameplay, to more granular options, like being able to alter gameplay speed.
In a fun twist, the gameplay speed option, noted Iron Galaxy, can also be used to turn the difficulty up. For players looking for a high level of challenge, the feature can be used to have gameplay take place at three times the intended speed, giving players much tighter windows to pull off all of their trick combos.
It is worth noting, however, that among the changes made as part of remaking the classic titles, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 does not feature the open world maps of the fourth game in the franchise. Rather, it has converted these levels into the classic style of play, where players have two minutes to accomplish various objectives all over the game’s levels.
For more details about Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4, check out our review.
