Activision still pushing Shred, believes Tony Hawk (the man) has staying power

Tony Hawk Shred's bad start at retail still has Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision Publishing, doing damage control. In a recent interview with IndustryGamers, the executive stated that Tony Hawk, as a figure, has "relevance and tremendous appeal for people." Hirshberg described him as a "lasting icon," and explained that the company needs to make "smart moves in terms of innovation to see if [it] can recapture people's imaginations" with the game franchise.

While Hirshberg feels it's too early to say that Shred fell crotch first onto the metal handrail it was trying to grind, Activision will "keep the pedal to the metal" through the holiday season, hoping to score a hit with kids and potential gift-givers.

Clearly that Vans boost across the asphalt (proper metaphor!) does not include any focus on making sure the game gets reviewed and placed on Metacritic. Developed by hard-hit Robomodo, it has only one professional review listed across three platforms. NPD results will be out this Thursday, so we'll see then if Tony Hawk Shred picked up from the 3,000 sales it had in October.
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