In Right, Down + Circle, author Cole Nowicki unearths the circumstances and happenstance that ultimately led to the creation of what Electronic Playground dubbed “..maybe the perfect video game” in 1999 – Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater.

Born and raised in Athabasca, Alberta, Cole found his way into skateboarding at a young age through both his older brother’s fascination with it as well as an obsession with the 1999 video game, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. How exactly did THPS succeed when so many skateboarding games failed miserably? Is there a direct correlation with the success of THPS and the adoption of skateboarding as an olympic sport at the 2020 Tokyo games? Did THPS pave the way for Goldfingers song “Superman” to become a seminal anthem for a generation? I guess in so many words, did THPS save skateboarding?

Just a few years before THPS launched, the skateboarding “industry” itself was on the ropes. With ESPN launching The Extreme Games (now dubbed The X Games), skateboarding finally had somewhat of a national platform yet still could not find its way into the cultural zeitgeist of the 90s after the dizzying highs it enjoyed in the 70s and 80s. So how did Activision (game publisher) do it exactly? Well, it took the notoriety of Tony Hawk and combined it with a fun, arcade-style game complete with licensed music. While it was difficult to truly master, it was easy and accessible enough for anyone to just pick up a controller and play.

While many games that followed would grab their own audience (Olli Olli, EA’s Skate franchise, Thrasher: Skate and Destroy to name a few), no one could quite match the cultural impact of THPS. There is certainly something to be said for someone who does it first and does it right because even though there were games that preceded THPS, none did it quite so flawlessly; even if the sequels that followed eventually produced diminishing results.

While it’s a short read at about one hundred and twenty pages or so, it’s just about the perfect length for the story Nowicki wishes to tell. Nowicki blends his own story of those formative years spent practicing heel flips in his parents’ driveway alongside skateboarding’s cultural reemergence all thanks to Neversoft and Activision’s “perfect video game”.