I’ve been busy the last month pretending I’m going to write something and assembling ideas but never following through, and now Wrestlemania snuck up on me. I’ve sort of been doing a yearly thing of reviewing a wrestling game around this time and almost forgot this year. In my defense, I stopped watching WWE altogether almost a year ago because at one of their Pay-Per-View events they had a wrestler summon and control zombies who proceeded to eat two other wrestlers, who then appeared on TV the next night alive and well, neither devoured nor zombified, all just to promote some zombie movie with no significance to anyone’s storyline. It wasn’t even a Halloween event; this happened in May!
TL;DR- I’m an AEW guy now, who watches old WCW pay-per-views on VHS.
Oh, normally I don’t do this but since he’s in the game it seems rather gauche not to mention him but Scott Hall passed earlier this year. His is an intriguing, tragic, hopeful tale of peer pressure, arrogance, drug use, and redemption. I couldn’t play as him though because he needs to be unlocked first, and I didn’t have a memory card (called “Controller Pak” on the N64) handy to save progress with.
Anyway, on to this game. I didn’t know there was a PlayStation release, so I am approaching this assuming half the music and audio commentary is missing, as often happened when a disc game was put on cartridge. Nintendo opted for cartridges on its final system of the 90s because they felt disc loading times would interfere with gameplay, and boy were they right! Though I guess now they gave up on that, even their Switch games on those tiny little cartridges have loading times.
The Game
It’s a traditional wrestling game with some minor gimmicks. You are not in the wrestling ring wrestling wrestlers. You are having a brawl anywhere that’s not in the ring. It is encouraged that you pick up an object and wail on your opponent with it, or even toss your opponent into a random barrel with something burning inside, thus igniting your opponent. I am pretty sure that the fire marshal must’ve been bribed for that to exist. All matches are one-on-one though, no tag team stuff. Once you unlock arenas, you can kinda meander through them as you fight.
There are a bunch of moves to do, so many you need button combinations despite the N64 having 16 buttons plus the joystick. Unlike other wrestling titles I tried, somehow this one seemed easier. I was able to do more despite going in with the same knowledge of commands as any other wrestling game I reviewed.
I was very much wrong about the sounds. If any are missing it wasn’t noticeable; there’s plenty of commentary running during the match and it feels pretty natural to me.
There’s also a bit of customization that you can do, increasing the replay value. Aside from changing difficulty settings, match rules, and the attire of your wrestler, you also get to create your own wrestler, for all those who are anal-retentive and need to customize every last aspect of a match.
My Opinion
Wasn’t that bad, it was for me a little more tolerable than the other straight-up wrestling games I’ve played. Again, that’s entirely due to the control scheme I guess being easier for novices, and the available moves maybe all being similar in effect or something. I dunno, my point is that of the wrestling games I’ve done so far this one’s the easiest to start playing out of the blue with maybe a quick glance at the instructions. Conveniently, the game gives you a move list and commands when selecting the character, convenient because if you buy it used it will likely be $4 in the bargain bin and come without a manual.
Yes I know, it was received poorly and if you told most people it came out less than 5 months before the WCW wrestling promotion folded they’d say this game was to blame. But these folks also like the wrestling games that I dislike so there ya go.
C-Gaymer 