Just about every town in England has a public square or meeting place where you'll see groups of skateboarders gathering to show off their skills. But often, you won't see any actual skateboarding at all; instead, they'll all just take turns to stamp on the ends of their boards before falling off.

But don't mock them. They keep falling off because skateboarding is ankle-twistingly, ligament-wrenchingly tricky, with proper tricks reserved for a super-elite group. Yet these near-mythical heroes, capable of (gasp!) actual skateboarding, are still completely rubbish when placed alongside Tony Hawk. He's a brilliant skateboarder, and he features in brilliant skateboarding games.

Improving Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 was always going to be a tall order - that game represents the pinnacle of the extreme sports genre, with a brilliant trick system and tightly designed levels combining to make a truly enjoyable, great game.

It's therefore a brave move by the game's developers to introduce such sweeping changes for the fourth instalment. These changes are mainly structural - gone are the two-minute runs on smaller levels, replaced by sprawling areas of the kind found in Aggressive Inline. The time limit has also been dropped, so you can now skate about for as long as you like.

The objectives are still here, though. By approaching a person with a convenient large arrow above their head, you can try a variety of tasks similar to those found in previous Tony games (perform a specific trick, beat a score, collect S-K-A-T-E - you know the sort).

Happily, there's a whole bunch of new objectives, too. Some involve being dragged along by a car or other vehicle and keeping your balance using the standard manual balance meter for an allotted time, while others demand that you race from point to point within a tight time limit. There are also new C-O-M-B-O challenges, plus challenges that demand that you master the new Spine Transfer move.

Despite all the changes, though, for our money THPS4 doesn't quite match up to its predecessor for a number of reasons. One of these concerns the objectives themselves, which vary in quality. Some are top-notch, either with an excellent mini-game feel or just a solid, fair test of your skills. But others can be irritating - the task that asks the player to collect a series of twelve pink elephants is very fiddly for a challenge on the first level, for example, as is the objective where you must use the Spine Transfer between moving carnival floats.

There are a few tasks like these that require you to do the same thing over and over until you nail it - and, because they're rather fiddly, it can be more frustrating than fun. That said, the open structure of the game does mean you can saunter off to try something else for while. If you're new to the series, you might find THPS4's learning curve frustratingly steep. The game seems to assume a familiarity with the basic controls and throws you straight into tasks that require a fair knowledge of stringing combos together. This may seem a bit presumptuous if you've never played a Pro Skater game before, so be warned. For those of us who have spent hours perfecting our trickery in the past, however, it means we can get stuck straight in without having to perform insultingly simple challenges from the off. There's certainly lots of challenge for seasoned players.

The only other complaint is that the game's new structure has resulted in much larger levels. Admittedly, this is a matter of preference, but the smaller areas found in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 were, we think, better. They seemed tightly designed and rewarding to play, and cramming everything into a smaller space meant that you could know every layout like the back of your skateboard.

That's still theoretically the case with this version, but the larger levels feel a little flabbier. Some parts still demonstrate an admirable level of complexity - the more intricate areas of Alcatraz, for instance - but there are quite a lot of duller areas with nothing more than a few funboxes and kerbs dotted about, too. It's closer to the kind of area you might skate in real life, basically, and how you feel about that will probably dictate how you feel about the new sprawling areas. We prefer the all-out 'game-ness' of the levels in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, though, so ner.

But regardless of the debate over the new game structure, Pro Skater 4 cements the series' reputation as the finest extreme sports game available. The trick system is the best out there, by miles, and stringing together an almost offensive number of tricks is joyful. And, once mastered, the Spine Transfer allows you to negotiate the scenery even more effectively.

The third in the series is still our favourite, but it's a very close-run thing - and regardless, there are hours and hours of high-quality skating to be had here. So, our Tone's pulled it off again - but he's really got his work cut out for the next one.

1. Silky trick system
2. Absolutely tons to do, and then some
3. User-friendly structure

1. New format might upset purists
2. Levels not quite as interesting as Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3

Power
It's multiformat, so not amazing visually. But custom soundtracks exist for games like this.

Style
Looks-wise, it's not as impressive as Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 - bit of a bummer, that.

Immersion
Feels good to play, and the unparalleled trick system offers quick combo thrills...

Lifespan
...and an almost infinite scope for improving your skills. Loads of objectives, too.

Summary
A skatepark-load of new ideas and options make THPS4 the most playable, complete extreme sports experience available.