Activision turns Tony Hawk 1+2 developer into a full-time Blizzard support studio

Tony Hawk
(Image credit: Activision)

In a statement to GamesIndustry.biz on Friday, Activision announced that it's moving game studio Vicarious Visions under the umbrella of Blizzard Entertainment, where its staff of some 200 developers will now be "fully dedicated to existing Blizzard games and initiatives." Vicarious Visions' latest project was Tony Hawk 1+2, which we called "everything you'd want from a remake of a 20 year old game." 

Vicarious Visions has been an Activision studio since 2005, and has history with the Tony Hawk series going back even further than that. Starting in 2002, Vicarious Visions developed the (surprisingly good) Game Boy Advance versions of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater. Over the last decade Vicarious Visions has made dozens of games on handheld platforms and worked on other successful remakes, like the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy. The studio was responsible for Destiny 2's excellent PC port.

Tony Hawk 1+2 seemed like a breakout success for the studio, and an ideal foundation for remakes of the beloved Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 and 4. But it seems unlikely that Vicarious Visions will be the developer behind those remakes, should they happen.

"After collaborating with Vicarious Visions for some time and developing a great relationship, Blizzard realized there was an opportunity for [Vicarious Visions] to provide long-term support," Activision told GamesIndustry.biz. It seems like the studio will now be focused on contributing to existing and upcoming Blizzard games like Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4.

Wes Fenlon
Senior Editor

Wes has been covering games and hardware for more than 10 years, first at tech sites like The Wirecutter and Tested before joining the PC Gamer team in 2014. Wes plays a little bit of everything, but he'll always jump at the chance to cover emulation and Japanese games.

When he's not obsessively optimizing and re-optimizing a tangle of conveyor belts in Satisfactory (it's really becoming a problem), he's probably playing a 20-year-old Final Fantasy or some opaque ASCII roguelike. With a focus on writing and editing features, he seeks out personal stories and in-depth histories from the corners of PC gaming and its niche communities. 50% pizza by volume (deep dish, to be specific).

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