Tony Hawk's Proving Ground

Activision is remaining tight-lipped regarding rumors today that Neversoft has been taken off the Tony Hawk's franchise.The rumors suggest that the Neversoft-created series is now in the hands of new developer Robomodo, who has already disclosed that it's working on an as-yet unnamed game for Activision.

But Activision on the matter that it "does not comment on rumors and speculation."

Activision and video game advertising network Massive, a subsidiary of Microsoft, have announced that Activision titles Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock and Tony Hawk's Proving Ground have been added to the Massive Network, allowing in-game advertising to be updated in real-time. According to the companies, Massive ads served into Guitar Hero III will be contextually relevant to the rock venues in which players perform. As for Tony Hawk's Proving Ground, the ads will be tailored to real-world skating environments, offering marketers visibility in each title's specific demographics.

Ahead of Activision's financial results next week, Janco Partners analyst Mike Hickey has commended short-term revenue prospects, but commented that emerging competition for some of [Activision's] core franchises, including Guitar Hero and Tony Hawk, may prove damaging for the company's long-term growth. Hickey stated for the short-term company prospects, We expect key fiscal Q208 and 2H08 game sales will come from Spiderman 3, Shrek 3, Transformers, Guitar Hero, Tony Hawk, Call of Duty 4 and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars. The Company's fiscal '08 game pipeline is exceedingly strong, and will likely generate record fiscal '08 operating performance.

Tony Hawk's Proving Ground proved it could take on rival skateboatding rival SKATE, which also boasts an impressive soundtrack. While SKATE has 45 known songs from artists like David Bowie, N.W.A. and The Ramones, Tony Hawk's Proving Ground comes through with over 50 songs including The Pretender, the first single from the Foo Fighters' forthcoming album. Both games fulfill our Nirvana need. The full soundtrack list of Tony Hawk's Proving Ground is at Gaming Target.

TeamXbox just got word from Activision that a playable demo of Tony Hawk's Proving Ground will hit Xbox Live Marketplace in the next coming weeks. The publisher also provided them with the final box art for the game.

The title may shout Tony Hawk, but the games have always been about you. Immersive controls... deep customization... and, occasionally, even face mapping technology. Not many franchises work this hard to inject their players - through both look and feel - into the experience. Proving Ground, the next installment in the Tony Hawk empire, plans to take these character building ideals to a new extreme. Creating your virtual persona won't happen so much in the startup screens as it does in the

Activision communicated that Tony Hawk's Proving Ground, the sequel to Tony Hawk's Project 8, is going to be released in october 2007 for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii, PlayStation 2 and Nintendo DS.