1. It Plays Like The SNES RAW Game And WWF No Mercy Had A Hardcore Baby
So, how does this game youve spent 2000 words reading about actually play? Pretty good. From the old WWF Raw games on SNES it borrows a flat 2D perspective, weapons littering either side of the ring, and an actual ref you can interact with trying to maintain order. From WWE No Mercy it borrows a methodical grappling system that uses momentum and randomness to determine when counters occur and how often, though hammering the punch button seems to help out in some sticky situations. Speaking of buttons, Booking Revolution does touch control right, giving you big buttons and a big virtual joy-pad that's second nature by the time you play your third match. The buttons make a lot of sense, too - P picks up items, A attacks, G grapples, R runs, and T Taunts (and performs a finish from within a grapple). If you're absolutely opposed to using your touch screen on your iPhone or Android device, the game is available on PC, Mac, and Ouya - and supports controllers on Android as well. The real secret to enjoying Booking Revolution the best way is realizing you can control anyone on the screen at any given moment. Yes, thats right - at any point during a given match you can switch between the ref, any of the wrestlers, or the managers outside the ring simply by touching your health bar in the top left hand corner - truly allowing you to choreograph a match the way you want it. Sometimes this means taking control of a downed character and keeping them that way to the CPU controlled opponent can go up top. Other times it means turning on your manager with a DDT on the announce table, and sometimes it means taking control of the ref to slow that 3 count way down to ensure that dramatic last-second kick out at the main event of your PPV. But regardless of the amount of control you think you have, like any wrestling show - unexpected problems arise. You may end up wrestling in the dark, or severely injuring your promotions biggest up-and-comer two minutes into the main event he was supposed to win. How you adapt is what makes Booking Revolution so addicting - it almost feels like the Oregon Trail. Beyond that, Booking Revolution feels cohesive, and not like a gussied up Smackdown game with new features piled onto a bunch of nearly decade old game code. There are actual sound effects and crowd noises (oddly enough something WWE 2K14 struggles with), no super-frequent, samey looking counters, and there are backstage consequences to in-ring actions - all things you'd expect from a wrestling game, but until this point haven't seen. So what makes Booking Revolution the GOAT when it comes to wrestling games? Authenticity. It
feels like being a stressed-out booker when your World Champ shows up drunk to the arena and you have to send him out there anyway because he's your biggest draw. It
feels like getting punched in the gut when a recently signed, high-priced wrestler exclaims midway through his first match "I hurt my head!" and then is ultimately paralyzed for weeks. It
feels like you're the king of kings after putting your opponent through three tables with a pedigree to end a brutal hardcore bout and no one got hurt. It
feels like a game made for people who truly love wrestling, and want a taste of what its like to really be in the ring and have a good match, because it
is. Booking Revolution gives you, literally, the best wrestling game of all time - in your pocket, to play for infinity - a nice touch being that even if you get fired, the universe you created soldiers on - so when you try again everything is more-or-less how you left it, but with a couple of changes hinting at the fact somehow this world is alive even when you're not in it - not that you'd ever want to leave. Mdickies Booking Revolution is Available on iOS, Android, PC, Mac, and Ouya! (Yes! Ouya!)