With the 2003 release of the fifth entry in the series, "Underground", the developers used storytelling and exploration to distance their product from the plotless, task-based format of previous "Tony Hawk's" games, which led Neversoft president Joel Jewett to describe "Underground" as an adventure game. It follows the player character and his treacherous friend, Eric Sparrow, on their quest to become professional skateboarders. The game was created with a theme of individuality: it stars an amateur skater in a true story mode, whereas each previous "Tony Hawk's" game had starred professional skaters and had lacked a plot. One reason for only allowing the player to use a custom character was that certain criminal acts completed in the plot would not reflect well on real-world skaters. Previous games in the series had included character-creation features as well, but Neversoft expanded customization in "Underground" by implementing face-scanning for the PlayStation 2 version. Regarding the customization options, especially the park editor, producer Stacey Drellishak stated that Neversoft was "trying to create the most customizable game ever". Levels in the console versions of "Underground" were significantly larger than those of earlier "Tony Hawk's" games. Neversoft expanded each level until it ceased to run correctly, then shrunk it slightly. Most of the levels were modeled closely after real-world locations; the designers traveled to locales representative of each city in the game and took photographs and videos as reference. Neversoft wanted the player to become familiar with the basic game mechanics quickly and to notice "Underground"s differences from previous "Tony Hawk's" games, who all stuck to roughly the same pattern, immediately. To accomplish this, they introduced the player to foot travel and the ability to climb along ledges in the first few missions of the game. While Neversoft wanted to keep "Underground" realistic and relatable for the most part, they added driving missions as an enjoyable diversion and to push the boundaries of freedom in skateboarding games. However, these missions were intended not to take away from the main experience of skateboarding. Because "Pro Skater 4" had received criticism for its difficulty, Neversoft added four difficulty settings to "Underground"s story mode.