WWE ’12

The WWE has fundamentally changed several times in its lifespan. From classic WWF, to the “Attitude Era” of The Rock and Stone Cold, to a more family friendly approach of late. Similarly, the games associated with the federation have changed equally. Starting with the WWF games on N64, to Smackdown! on Playstation, Smackdown Vs Raw more recently, they’ve had their fair share of changes. Starting again with WWE ’12, THQ have reinvigorated the series and given it a nice new polish.

What will strike people first off the bat is the multitude of playing options available. You can just jump into exhibition matches of all different gimmicks which are well realised and fun. You can start a scripted and voice-acted (by the actual wrestlers portrayed) story in the “Road to Wrestlemania” mode. Or, you can take ultimate control in Universe mode. Universe mode is an excellent addition that has been sampled in previous iterations of WWE games, but it feels that this is the best it’s been done. It allows players to plan out the matches that will take place on Raw, Smackdown, Superstars and all of the WWE’s Pay-Per-Views, create teams, feuds, plan interference, crown new champions and ruin careers. It’s pretty great, and allows fantasy bookers the ability to let their favourite, lesser known wrestlers rise to prominence, even if it is just digitally. The cut-scenes and random things that can happen in Universe mode can become repetitive quickly, but when the real fun is trying to create an exciting and varied match card this is easily overlooked.

THQ has always given the player plenty of creation tools. There are some incredible create options. Create a character: a classic feature of the series. Create a story: where you can script cutscenes an events leading up to a match. Create an icon: a fairly rich, MS Paint-esque editor tool that allows you (with great patience) to create any kind of logo you want. Create an Arena: which is surprisingly satisfying. I created an arena based on the Marvel superhero Deadpool and it looked great, and was fun to have matches in. The create suite is honestly the game’s strongest selling point. There’s a great satisfaction in creating a wrestler, giving them a bunch of cool moves, writing a storyline where he feuds with the WWE Champion, having him walk down the ramp to a custom soundtrack and entrance movie of him kicking ass, into an arena that you designed yourself. It’s this level of customisation that could keep you playing for a long, long time.

Controls are fairly simple, but the game does a bad job of explaining them to you. There is one button for striking, another for grappling. The grappling works on a chain system. You hit the grapple button, enter into either a headlock, side armlock, or backlock, and then chose the move you want to do from there by pressing a direction and then the grapple button again. The game also introduces a new limb targeting system, which plays heavily into the strategy of fights. Working heavily on your opponent’s arms will make submission moves on the arm more likely to cause a tapout, however doing it repeatedly makes it easier to counter. The game is definitely more complex in gameplay than the recent WWE All Stars, which featured cartoon-style graphics and arcade style brawling. But it’s a nice change, and isn’t so technical that you can’t button mash your way to a championship.

Graphically, the game is a mixed bag. A smart camera has been added that mimics the camera angles you’d likely see if you were to watch WWE’s programming. Other than that, some of the quality of graphics can range between decent current generation, to high quality last generation. Also, if you’ve never seen some of the wrestlers in real life, you still wouldn’t recognise them after seeing them in game. The face renders are abysmal in some instances, and pixel perfect in others. It’s a bizarre situation where the top face of the company looks unrecognisable save for his clothing, but some of the lesser known talent look spot on.