The game who made me a fan before I even watched the damn thing - in fact, I was one of the very smart, very lonely kids who wore the fact that he didn’t like it (it was fake!) on his sleeve. Cristian lent me his copy and, as we used to do, we’d keep each other’s games for months at a time basically doubling our libraries. Thank you Cristian, you were cool.
The end of the Golden Age that was the HTCP gameplay formula, which lives another day before getting its biggest overhaul yet in 2007. The two big ones this year were the new finisher meter and stamina. The former now had a hidden multiplier that would reward cycling moves or playing true to your Face/Heel alignment by filling faster or, conversely, slower, creating the lovely positive feedback loops that made AI never recover if you pummeled them first that would persist for half a decade. The latter simply forces you to stand still every once in a while to press Select and see a bar refill: unfortunately it will never progress much past this, which doesn’t matter much now but it does later when the series goes full simulationism (which I’m one of the apparently very few enjoyers) and it would REALLY appreciate a good fatigue system. They just don’t want to snatch that Fire Pro Wrestling demo man.
Season mode now is just a cinematic, canned story that takes place in a single show and lasts until Wrestlemania, where you’d win the big one. No more wrestler career sandbox unfortunately. I remember the RAW one started with an unlikely alliance with Triple H against a Smackdown invasion and would culminate in a Hell in a Cell against him, it’s for all intents and purposes my first wrestling storyline ever and made me fall in love with Shawn Michaels, whom I hadn’t even seen in TV yet. When I did I found out he did nothing that cool, he’d get roofied and kiss Vince’s ass, what a nerd. Smackdown!’s would start with Teddy Long getting hit and run’d and closed with either accepting or refusing RVD’s ECW revival slash invasion (heh, prescient), which made me find out other federations existed.
You’d get some rare dialogue choices that changed the end of a storyline, like calling Eugene a flat out r-word, but depending on character picked you’d get new stuff altogether? There was an Austin becoming GM one, sometimes YOU rammed Teddy Long with your car. Never was able to choose them at will.
Roster was mediocre, it was a transitional period where useful Attitude Era character fodder got canned, replaced by the never ending search for another Randy Orton. Losing people like the Dudleys and Rhino aren’t worth all those tall hairless fratboys, or Hassan that unlucky motherfucker. I always hated the Batista had his new theme but the old “Evolution henchman” motion, it’s around this time I started watching on TV and went ta-ta-ta with my arms every sunday afternoon
What the fuck is a Renee Dupree?
Oh just remembered this game is son of that godawful era where PSP would get enhanced ports with exclusive features, which is just a pain in the ass 20 years later when choosing which version to emulate. Quick, do you want THUG2 to run smooth or have twice as many levels? This one had some weird poker minigame too for some reason
The end of the Golden Age that was the HTCP gameplay formula, which lives another day before getting its biggest overhaul yet in 2007. The two big ones this year were the new finisher meter and stamina. The former now had a hidden multiplier that would reward cycling moves or playing true to your Face/Heel alignment by filling faster or, conversely, slower, creating the lovely positive feedback loops that made AI never recover if you pummeled them first that would persist for half a decade. The latter simply forces you to stand still every once in a while to press Select and see a bar refill: unfortunately it will never progress much past this, which doesn’t matter much now but it does later when the series goes full simulationism (which I’m one of the apparently very few enjoyers) and it would REALLY appreciate a good fatigue system. They just don’t want to snatch that Fire Pro Wrestling demo man.
Season mode now is just a cinematic, canned story that takes place in a single show and lasts until Wrestlemania, where you’d win the big one. No more wrestler career sandbox unfortunately. I remember the RAW one started with an unlikely alliance with Triple H against a Smackdown invasion and would culminate in a Hell in a Cell against him, it’s for all intents and purposes my first wrestling storyline ever and made me fall in love with Shawn Michaels, whom I hadn’t even seen in TV yet. When I did I found out he did nothing that cool, he’d get roofied and kiss Vince’s ass, what a nerd. Smackdown!’s would start with Teddy Long getting hit and run’d and closed with either accepting or refusing RVD’s ECW revival slash invasion (heh, prescient), which made me find out other federations existed.
You’d get some rare dialogue choices that changed the end of a storyline, like calling Eugene a flat out r-word, but depending on character picked you’d get new stuff altogether? There was an Austin becoming GM one, sometimes YOU rammed Teddy Long with your car. Never was able to choose them at will.
Roster was mediocre, it was a transitional period where useful Attitude Era character fodder got canned, replaced by the never ending search for another Randy Orton. Losing people like the Dudleys and Rhino aren’t worth all those tall hairless fratboys, or Hassan that unlucky motherfucker. I always hated the Batista had his new theme but the old “Evolution henchman” motion, it’s around this time I started watching on TV and went ta-ta-ta with my arms every sunday afternoon
What the fuck is a Renee Dupree?
Oh just remembered this game is son of that godawful era where PSP would get enhanced ports with exclusive features, which is just a pain in the ass 20 years later when choosing which version to emulate. Quick, do you want THUG2 to run smooth or have twice as many levels? This one had some weird poker minigame too for some reason