Once again, the game's story centered on the player character aspiring to become a professional skateboarder, this time by advancing through a rank system to become a part of Tony Hawk's new fictional skateboarding team, the namegiving "Project 8". Unlike in previous entries, the classic mode was embedded in the different areas of the open world. The game did not appear on Nintendo's then-new Wii console, which instead saw the release of the then-exclusive spin-off game "Downhill Jam", a downhill racing game featuring a mostly fictitious cast. The game was also released on PS2 half a year later. The next title in the main series, 2007's "Proving Ground" featured a largely similar concept to "Project 8", with an open world and the player able to choose three career paths as a skater. Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. were established as the three open world areas, with each containing three skateable areas, which also featured an integrated classic mode. The game was the first and only entry of the series to compete with rival skateboarding series "Skate", which also featured an open world but with more advanced controls and a less arcade-style approach. "Skate" outsold "Proving Ground" on a 2:1 ratio, resembling its lackluster reception. With the franchise suffering from product fatigue and appearing to be past its prime, Activision decided to dedicate most of Neversoft's laborforce to the "Guitar Hero" and "Call of Duty" franchises. This development would more and more marginalize Neversoft, which was defunct and completely merged with Infinity Ward by 2014. The control of the "Tony Hawk's" franchise had passed on to Chicago studio Robomodo by 2008. To combat product fatigue and be able to compete with rival EA's "Skate" series, Activision decided to reboot the series with the new developer Robomodo. Due to this, no new entry in the main series was released in 2008. However, the Nintendo DS exclusive spin-off "Motion" already hinted at the new franchise's new direction, as it featured tilt and motion controls. Furthermore, the game featured the option to snowboard for the first time in the series' history. In 2009, Robomodo released their first entry in the series, "", which relied on a peripheral-supported controller shaped like a skateboard. The game did not rely on a plot or an open world any longer and featured a completely different control system, with the player railing down a predetermined route, trying to use the skateboard controller to perform tricks on predetermined obstacles.