Even the big effects, such as the night-and-day cycles on each stage, are replicated. Cut-scenes roll on in-game cinematics, with convincing hi-res models of the stars and players.

Every song from the console game's soundtrack has been crammed in for over 50 rad tunes to roll on. Framerate is Body Butter smooth, and the draw distance went as far out as we could get a view on the stages we saw. Side-by-side, you could probably find nits to pick, but on its own and on that small 16x9 screen, the PSP game looks the part. Some textures have also been held to a lower res (street signage was scaled back some), but others look to have been sharpened in the conversion due to the PSP's helpful compression systems and texturing abilities. And even if it isn't, that's hardly a criminal case against the PSP project. At least, they weren't as good in the version we had to try - heck, for all we know, that could just be preview build deference. How close to the console game is Tony Hawk's Underground 2 Remix? Well, the shadows aren't as good. It's only a little bit later, once you've played for a little bit and already blown the last trick of your first million-point combo, that it comes back to smack you in the face: when the heck is it normal that you've got the real deal of T.H.U.G., skating in perfect harmony to every of your breaths and button presses, running on a system that you can stash in your backpack or your girl's purse? Sure, there have been nice 2.5D versions on GBA, and there was the 3D N-Gage port a bit back that did about as much justice to the skating series as a cell phone can, but seriously - this is a PS2/Xbox/GameCube game, and you're playing it on a game system that has probably been farted on in your back pocket.

First reaction when booting up Tony Hawk's Underground 2 Remx for PlayStation Portable: OK, everything's intact, we're good to go.

Thug 2 pc flippy