Skateboarding seems like yesterday's pastime but video games involving boards, baggy clothes and boys with attitude just keep coming. Hayden Meikle looks at the latest two offerings.
There are still gamers in denial out there.
Hundreds of them, all refusing to accept the era of Tony Hawk's dominance has been well and truly crushed.
The skateboarding gaming landscape - yes, of course there is such a thing - changed momentously two years ago when powerful Electronic Arts decided to dip its very large toe into the market.
Hawk, or at least the name of the great pioneer, had had a monopoly on skateboarding games for close to 10 years.
Everybody had played a Tony Hawk game, knew the controls inside out and assumed the series would quietly go on every year.
But every champion needs a challenger, and it's such fun when that challenger turns out to be not only completely different but quite a bit better.
Skate caused a lot of jaws to drop when it arrived.
The graphics were excellent and there was a range of real skater dudes to control, but the real shock was the gameplay.
Instead of simply pushing the control stick forward to basically do everything, there was a three-tiered approach.
One stick controlled your body, another handled the board, and buttons needed to be pushed to create momentum.
Skate was revolutionary, fun (until it got really difficult) and basically let the Hawk series know a new king was in town.
Here's the first sequel - you just know there are going to be a lot more - to see if there is still an appetite for the new way of doing things.
Like a lot of first sequels, Skate 2 doesn't get too radical - it just builds quietly on the first game.
The setting is again the fictional city of San Vanalona but it's become very skater-unfriendly, with security guards posted everywhere and all sorts of spikes and caps inserted on rails, benches and steps that make for fertile skating.
There are challenges around every corner, plenty of other skaters to interact with and thousands of items to skate on/off/through/over/around.
New to the series is the ability to interact much more with the landscape.
Early examples include the ability to pull ramps into a new spot to fulfill challenges, and rotating dumpsters to fly over.
Otherwise, it seems the tweaks are subtle.
The style of skating is exactly the same, which means those who did it well in the first game be delighted and those who struggled will again be left wondering what they're doing wrong.
One thing I liked about the Tony Hawk series was the sensation of speed.
I was never the most technically adept boarder but I could really fly, and get some serious air over ramps.
Skate 2 is more deliberate, and more cerebral.
You really have to think about the best way to attack an obstacle or pull off a move, and your top speed never gets too unwieldy.
There is no doubt Skate 2 is aimed at the higher end of the market, at the more elite skating gamers who know all about ollies and shuv-its and backside 540s.
For the rest of us, it offers a reasonable amount of fun before the frustration sets in.
Skate It
As its popularity rises, the Nintendo DS is really starting to push its boundaries.
The little two-screen console has completely dominated the handheld market since its release, even managing to trump the PlayStation Portable, which has far more features and would seem a better fit for this tech-savvy generation.
The appeal of the DS is its simplicity, but developers are also trying to get more out of it where they can.
Skateboarding really doesn't seem like it should be a good fit on such a small and relatively weak (in technology terms) console, but that hasn't stopped EA trying to deliver a port of its Skate series.
Also appearing on the Wii, Skate It aims to deliver a twist on a typical skateboarding game to allow the small-screeners to join in the fun.
By necessity, EA has pruned back a lot of elements.
The graphics are predictably well off the pace set by the bigger consoles and at times they're actually distractingly poor.
The top screen displays the skate park and skater, and the touch screen shows your board.
The use of stylus is clever, with a few jabs at the screen triggering all sorts of tricks.
Like Skate 2, Skate It is high on the difficulty scale.
You'll get seriously frustrated trying to meet the various challenges - just don't throw your DS away in anger.
While it's finicky at times and too tough at others, Skate It is a heck of an effort to transport an awkward sport into your hands.
