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Column: Beyond The Roster Update
Posted by Matt on 8/23/07
Let's step back and take a look at the future of wrestling games and what they can still offer a gamer. For us to look to the future however, we must remember where these games came from.
Let us travel back a moment to the not to distant past of 1998 with the release of WWF Warzone for the Sony Play Station and Nintendo 64 game consoles. This game was developed by Acclaim, the important fact here is it was the first 3D WWF title to be released period. Everyone knew during that first match wrestling games had changed forever.
Warzone offered wrestling gamers many things we had never seen before. But after a few months in reference to the lasting appeal of the game Jim Ross put it best “my draughts nursery rimes are more exciting than this” a quote some of you may recall. Following this WWF Attitude was released which wasn’t much more than an updated roster and few new match types. Then everything changed WWF Smackdown for Play Station was released…
WrestlingGamers.com WWF War Zone Review
WrestlingGamers.com WWF Attitude Review
Fast-forward to present day we are STILL with the Smackdown franchise. Innovated, updated, added, remade, reworked and everything in-between the Smackdown franchise is now the shining star of wrestling games. The game plays well looks good and feels good. Great! Now what?
That is the problem isn’t it? Are we as wrestling gamers becoming football gamers? What do I mean by this? Let’s look at the Madden series a moment. Alright aside from the fact the Smackdown series is now labeled by years like the Madden series what am I getting at? I am getting at the point that the Madden series is little more each year than fresh graphics, updated rosters and maybe new stadiums. When I made this correlation a shiver went down my back.
But wait! Wrestling isn’t football! Football has teams all competing for one thing: The Super bowl. Wrestling has diverse personalities trying to screw each other, plot against, ruin lives, cause physical damage and occasionally capture a championship. Wrestling has potential!
Bring on the updated rosters, freshen my graphics, tweak my controls. But there are two things that will always change in wrestling games.
The number one thing is the gaming environment. Wrestling is not confined to a field. We can go anywhere and do anything our little hearts desire to inflect damage upon our foes! Exploit the hell out of the backstage and ring area. The possibilities of items under the ring are nearly endless. How about a popup list when I lift up the apron that lets me choose my bat, table or chair?
The second thing to keep wrestling games alive is the season or career mode. I am going to go out on a limb here and say we need both. Yes, both.
The season would consist of your wrestler of choice from the roster in the game going through a year’s season. What year’s season? How about the year prior to release! That’s right. I want THQ to actively follow a year of WWE and recreate the wrestler’s experience, feuds and championships in a game. Far fetched? Maybe for the next title but a few down the road I don’t think I am that far off. This is something that could happen. Think about it if there are 30 wrestlers there are 30 different seasons to play through! Even if only the big name wrestler lines were done, this would be interesting to see. The lasting appeal would be amazing. This is something that would keep everyone buying the game year after year.
Now I am going to step outside the realm of the near future into what I consider the far or further future with my proposed career mode. My ideal career mode forces the player to use a created wrestler. This maybe a bit of a stretch but I want to use it to convey my point… I want a Grand Theft Auto type career, free roaming. Now I don’t want to steal cars or shoot people. I want to start backstage roaming around in my dressing room. I want the actions I do backstage to affect my career. I want to be able to peak my face out and see a match going on down front and have the option to run out and help either of the opponents. This could unit a month long feud. I want to be attacked. I want to attack. I want the environment we talked about earlier to be fully integrated into this mode. I want to rant on the microphone; I want to be in the real WWE. There are several ways to accomplish this goal but the number one thing is to keep it free. The user decides what happens.
Maybe I am living in the clouds and hoping for things that just can’t be done. But the problem still remains: People need a reason the buy the newest games beyond a roster update.
This brings me to our message boards; I have designated a thread found here. This thread deals with what YOU think can be the biggest innovations to entice you to buy the next generation of WWE games, beyond the roster updates. We plan to forward this thread to THQ in a one week time. They read this stuff guys. Get heard!
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Released: September 9, 2008
Dvlpr: Midway Games
Publisher: Midway Games
System(s):
Nintendo Wii, Playstation 2, Playstation 3, X-Box 360
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