The Next Big Thing
As Acclaim and EA Sports fell from the battle and other challengers such as Backyard Wrestling and The Simpsons Wrestling failed to light the wrestling game world on fire there only stood THQ and the WWE. Their reign of wrestling video games started by releasing different games on the different formats available. The first Smackdown game released on the PSone, and was the start of the hit series which eventually evolved into the Smackdown Vs Raw games before becoming the series that will continue this year with WWE 13. It had more realistic graphics then its N64 counterpart, but it was the N64 game WWF No Mercy which still stands as perhaps the highest regarded wrestling game of all time. It maybe perfected the game play which began in WCW vs the World, and had all the match types, entrances, and extra bells and whistles from its contemporaries. The next few years saw PS2 get the greatest WWE love with the Smackdown games, whilst the Gamecube tried its best to recreate the No Mercy magic to little avail. The Original Xbox got two Raw games and Wrestlemania 21, which whilst all great looking games were criticised with slower game play. The Xbox did allow you to use music from your hard drive as your wrestlers entrance theme which was a cool evolution of the create-a-wrestler feature. By the time Smackdown vs Raw 2008 the game was the same regardless of the system you owned. Rosters nowadays feature the complete roster youd expect to see on TV, and any match imaginable is guaranteed to be playable. Rosters can be updated with downloadable content, and we are so far removed from the three moves of yesteryear (Well everyone but John Cena) as each wrestler has dozens of moves and the physics are being forever updated with specific body part damage. WWE 13 is slated to be the most polished experience yet. Where will wrestling games go in the future?
Weve already had motion and gesture controlled wrestling games thanks to the Wii remote and Xbox Kinect
(Though maybe the less said about Hulk Hogans Main Event for Xbox Kinect the better), and maybe when we get Kinect 2 for Xbox 720 weve have fantastic lifelike gesture controls that truly conflicts with the message of Dont try this at home. Ideas such as voice control to allow you to call for the hot tag and be graded on your commentary could all soon become a reality. On the flip side people still do want the retro experience of WWF No Mercy as a download game with updated rosters, just as weve seen recently with the remake of Wrestlefest. Before we get too far into the future we'll just have to see where THQ take us with WWE 13.