This blog will probably reveal more about me than I'd like and i'll be leading with a confession, I know a lot about wrestling, far more than I should. This is part of the reason why I gave TNA Wrestling on the PS2 a brief rental. I can't say I've really been following its progress through development by like looking at previews or screenshots or anything, so I was coming to the game completely fresh.I had been rather excited that this game was coming out however, as its something been needed in the fighting/wrestling game genre - competition. Without competition franchises especially stagnate, they don't have a reason to improve various areas that might need attention as it is either go with their product or you go without. Rumour has it this has also been happening with EA's Madden NFL series now they have a license monopoly , however I can't comment much on this as its not a game I play, well, not since Madden '93. So the fact a new wrestling game - one with some name stars attached has hit the scene.
Unfortunately while it is competition, much like the actual situation in the wrestling world, neither are much competition just yet. While neither of the wrestling games on offer currently are all that great, this one comes in a clear second (I'm leaving out Fire Pro as for one I'm not sure if its even available in the PAL regions, and also I haven't played any entries in the much acclaimed series). What I always go for in these games is the story/career type modes, they're the reason why I still play wrestling games, why I play Football Manager every incarnation, why I occasionally still play F1 2005 (as I can't justify another game in the series just yet) - always for the chance to play through some kind of story, however badly written, and to work my way to the top. Strange really as I've never really had any ambition to a real career other than the do a little more than scrape by.
I had quite high hopes for this however, as TNA has made some innovations with the Ultimate X match, and well when I've watched the product has had more of a focus on the actual wrestling rather than everything else that goes on around "sports entertainment" as its sometimes referred to - which is an advantage in terms of a game. However what strikes me with this game is exactly how limited it is, and I think a part of me expected this when I learned Midway were responsible for the game. That kind of comment might be a bit cruel and is definately an extremely broad generalisation considering the volume of their output, but I honestly can't remember the last game they did that I enjoyed. To make a big success of a license you need a big name or a good game and unfortunately with TNA Wrestling they have neither. The promotion are making progress within the states as far as exposure and everything goes, but I couldn't even tell you where to start looking for it on TV in the UK, I'm sure it'll be there somewhere given the multitude of digital channels now available given some of the trash shows there. But anyway I suppose I should get onto the actual game itself.
Theres only really 2 modes in which to play this game, theres the story mode - which is where I spent my entire time, and the exhibition mode used for multiplayer and quickplay of the various matchtypes. My first disappointment was to find that there is no create-a-wrestler mode, and considering the storyline of the game I thought this was the whole point of it. You also have to play through the story mode to unlock wrestlers to use within the exhibition mode. The graphics are not bad, I'm not sure how it'll rank up against competition on the xbox360/ps3 but they weren't bad for a ps2 game as you'd expect from a game this late in a consoles life. However Midway have gone a bad route with some of the cut scenes. There are two types of cutscenes which in short are one in which characters are moving and interacting and the other where for some reason everyones frozen and the camera moves through them very bizarrely while the main character does some summing up narration. The closest analogy I can think of to what its like is something I remember seeing in the old american series Police Squad, the prequel tv series to The Naked Gun film series. Often during the end credits the actors would 'freeze' and the cameras kept rolling, now imagine this happening and the camera panning about/moving through them and to me it just didn't work well.
The storyline itself as I previously mentioned is perfect for a create-a-wrestler scenario, you are a superstar who gets beat up beyond recognition and are dumped in a no name town in mexico. You wake up to find you have amnesia and plastic surgeons are about to rebuild your face. You decide to take out your frustations in the ring, and eventually find yourself back in TNA and eventually progress to the world title match. Predictable for the most part? Yes. Short? Yes. Limited? Yes. Theres no wiggle room, you have to win every match, if you lose, you just repeat the match. The matches all feel too similar and the story did very little for me to actually care about.
I also came across a number of glitches during my short time with the game. I would inexplicably fall through the ring and appear on the outside, I'd lock up with someone near the ropes and suddenly appear on the floor or I'd pull off moves, well a punch or a kick that wouldn't connect despite clearly doing so in a real situation so the collision detection is off as well. As far as the controls go there isn't really any issues I have with them other than the fact that they could've mapped so much more to them. For grapples they only had moves assigned the button, 'away' and the button and 'towards' and the button. This may be stating the obvious but there are 4 directions on a d-pad/analogue controller meaning there were 2 free obvious controls that could've been assigned to moves which would have definately improved my enjoyment of the game, it may have been partly my fault for not reading instruction manuals and so forth but it really felt like the infamous '6 moves of doom' often talked about among fans (typically towards the end of a match, especially in the wwe you'll notice finishes typically go in the same manner, the same sequence of moves) and it often felt like you only really had a couple of moves to progress through the matches with making the game very repetitive.
So after finding so many faults you're probably wondering why I played the game through to completion, well for one I wanted a quick game to complete so I could try my hand at a review (Force Unleashed on the backburner currently as I want to really enjoy that one), for two I don't really get to complete that many games, theres always another one that grabs my attention or I get bored, and for three I suck at a lot of games so I'm not good enough to get to the end. I suppose I was also kinda curious to see if there were any swerves in the story and where it was really going to end and to some extent it wasn't completely as bad as I've made out but the thing to keep in mind is that there are a lot of issues with the game.
Overall, and this is the part I've been looking forward to, I don't actually want to give it a score because I agree with a lot of reviewers, its never the score its the body of the review that is the important bit. There have been many a badly reviewed game that I've enjoyed and even more well reviewed game that I couldn't stand (Super Mario 64, the majority of Zelda games come to mind) so considering theres no motivation otherwise to try and attract readers. But overall I'd say that this game is worth a rent if you;re a wrestling fan despite the faults as if nothing else it'll tide you over till the next release. As far as buying it, while it is great to finally see AJ Styles and the fallen angel Christopher Daniels and all in a game I'd say its only worth it if you're a big TNA fan and you're getting it for the PS2 as its only around £15 compared to the much more expensive 360 version.
Dang that summary was all over there...I'll work on that, anyhoo thats it from me today apart from this
Strange compliment #1
"you'd make a good granddad" - i'm not really sure what to do with that, especially since i'm only 22.