This review couldn’t come at a better time considering all the behind the scenes shenanigans going on with NDA’s and investigations against the Chairman Vince McMahon himself. The talent walkouts, plus I imagine other problems that have yet to surface. This however won’t stop me in reviewing this game, being a big wrestling fan myself watching Raw, Smackdown and NXT weekly plus all the PPVs that happen. So with missing a year due to the train crash that was 2K20 they needed to come out swinging and with the competitor in the AEW game coming out in the near future they needed too.
No matter where you stand on the tv product itself, as I will admit more often than not a lot of it isn’t the best and has helped give rise to the better product in AEW, that however is for another time and discussion. The game manages to remember that it is a wrestling game, as the shows tend to forget it’s a wrestling show. The fighting having been overhauled especially with the new combo system, plus the chain breaker if you are defending is a very welcome choice. The biggest improvement though over the last few entries is reversals, they are actually doable. Everything in the fighting itself seems far more concise, that doesn’t mean it’s without it’s bugs though. And it can become a right clusterfuck in multi man matches. Sometimes trying to get the pin in a ladder match or 4 way tag match is utter fucking nightmare. Even if you are having a good time sometimes you just wanna win and move on. The ref counts can be a bit gammy and sometimes your character will merge with various surroundings or if you are lucky enough your opponent. The grappling is more flowing and easier to transition into a suplex or submission, and setting up of characters charged finisher once your metre has filled up is promoted at you so it’s hard to miss.
The game has many different modes, the main story comes from the rise of Rey Mysterio with you re-enacting objective based offence to re-enact the exact moves he used in those famous matches. Theres nothing wrong with this mode, and having the man himself narrate around and during the matches is cool. It’s just not overly long or hard, or that interesting for some of the match choices. You have a MyGM mode, where you become a GM for one of the three brands, I do like this mode it’s just lacking usable titles and match types to make it a more complete mode. It is fun though booking week to week programming with the stars you want, and setting up heel turns, and feuds etc. You have universe mode where you just pick one of the superstars of your choice and just go through weekly matches and PPV, pretty standard stuff. Then you have MyRise where you attempt to rise through the ranks to WWE champion, again pretty standard stuff. The last optional mode outside of creating your own in the sandbox arcade mode, so a cage match, TLC, Tornado tag just a few amongst the plethora of choices to you is MyFaction. Now I really like this mode, but I can also see why you wouldn’t. It works as a trading card game sort of, but the card you pick is the superstar you fight as in the matches. Having different tiers of each wrestler means the higher the class and ranking the better they are. Where it falls flat is though it comfortable fits in the pay to win situation, where the game wants you to buy in game currency to buy more packs and get more cards. Now I find if you play enough and the different options within MyFaction with the rewards the give you it isn’t the worst just slowly collecting enough credits to but a new pack of cards. I do like the gold tier of certain cards where if you do a certain amount of specific actions you can upgrade the cards to a better tier and power ranking.
Graphically it’s a nice looking game, not the best going anywhere but the character models are the best they’ve ever been, hyper realistic to the people involved, the hair graphics look a tad wank though. The ring itself and the crowd surrounding it, seem crisper. I imagine they aren’t as high end as the could’ve been though as they are probably a bit behind still somewhat with missing the yearly cycle, as this shows with the superstar roster available to you. The entrances look sharper as well, and there is a whole depth of talent to choose from in game. It’s just a real shame how many of them are no longer with the company and haven’t been for some time even before the game dropped. I also feel the commentary is sounding and comes off far improved.
Overall I really enjoy playing this game in any of the modes available to you. If the 160ish wrestlers in the base game isn’t enough for you then you can expand it with one of the four dlc drops. This all muddled with the high variety of different matches and modes available to you it makes for a great pick up and play a bit or for a long session and doesn’t ask too much of you in return.
I’d certify this game a highly tasty 8/10.
Sony PS5 Released 8th March 2022.
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