Tony Hawk Ride comes with padding for your hardwood floor

Activision will ship Tony Hawk Ride's skateboard peripheral with some extra padding in the box for those without carpets to place it on. A company representative told Joystiq at GamesCom today that the board will ship with "two strips, stickers," but couldn't precisely describe the thickness or provide an example. He implied the strips would run along the long flat bottom on both sides, which still makes us nervous for folks with hardwood floors if they -- or a rambunctious group of children -- attempt an ollie with the peripheral. For the record, the rep told us the "recommended surface [to play on] is carpet."

We asked the rep if the company plans to introduce a prophylactic that could cover the bottom of the board, but were told, "[We] haven't decided on that." Assurances were made that the board has gone through lots of durability testing -- even though it's not the board we're worried about. It uses 4 AA batteries and can apparently last 30-40 hours, with a "sleep mode" kicking in after about 30 minutes to an hour.