WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2010

Every year, those good old boys at THQ promise us a wrestling revelation. Whether its better graphics, new moves, new modes or an enhanced roster of characters, it’s always going to be the greatest thing ever – in their eyes. And every year, we all sit down to play, and realise that whilst those new additions are nice to have, the game plays well enough but still has the same massive holes in its gameplay and a slow and cumbersome front-end.

This year is no different.

The frontend has had a slight bit of brushing up – with the instantly-available “Training Arena” being a nice touch akin to FIFA 10’s “Arena” – but you’re still dealing with something that has to stop to load for ten seconds after every other button-press, and that still uses that ridiculously large font, as it has since the days of the PSOne. Installing to the HDD does improve the loading times this year though, which is…well…expected, really.

In terms of game modes, there’s plenty to look at. Aspiring Vince McMahons can step into the “Story Designer” to plan, write and play through up to TEN YEARS of WWE programming and this mode alone is going to be worth the asking price for some players. You can script each show’s intro, make matches with predefined settings (so if your storyline involves say Chris Jericho attacking Triple H in a cutscene pre-match, Triple H can start a match with half his health or a damaged leg) and create cutscenes. The beauty of this is that whilst I – and a good percentage of the fanbase – will have absolutely no interest in this mode at all, those who do have an interest can create a storyline or two and then upload them for everyone to grab and play through. This means that there’s something in it for everyone. The best user-generated content will extend the life of the game, although whether that good stuff will sink under the weight of the absolute tosh that most people will come up with remains to be seen.

Elsewhere, the Road to Wrestlemania returns and whilst it is generally strong, there are some bizarre oddities and you really can’t help feeling that the ability for the story to deviate from the pre-set path would have been a nice one. Take Shawn Michaels’ route as an example. In your second proper match with HBK, you’re fighting against JBL in a singles bout. Randy Orton is the guest commentator, and he breaks off to help your opponent win by handing him a chair and distracting the ref. Should you avoid JBL’s chair shot (which is very, very easy to do, as he seems to have no idea that he’s supposed to smack you with it), Orton joins in and can pull off move after move – even hitting you with the chair – without JBL being disqualified. When you pick up the chair and hit JBL with it though, the bell rings and you’ve lost. Not only that, but your only choice is to either quit, or play through the match again – repeating it until you win. In this case, surely JBL should be disqualified the second Orton lays a finger on me and, should I somehow manage to lose (which is very, very likely) against the two opponents, surely my path to Wrestlemania 25 should alter somehow, so I can gain vengeance in a later match? Nope. What happens is that you fall into a repeating loop of lose, rematch, lose, rematch until you give up or somehow get very, very lucky. The same happens with the second match of the story for your created wrestler. The only difference there is that you have to actually knock out one of the two opponents, rather than simply pin them. You’ll be playing on the ‘Hard’ difficulty setting at least – since the AI for the default setting is practically non-existent – and this creates a bizarre roadblock, since against one fighter, ‘Hard’ is actually fun and challenging. Against two, it’s practically impossible to beat. You get up and knock one guy down; his partner kicks you in the back. You reverse a grapple whilst you’re on the deck, only to get up and…get kicked in the back. You pick up a weapon and…get kicked in the back. This also exposes another of the flaws in the fighting engine since – unless you’ve pulled off a finisher – your opponent very rarely stays down for any significant amount of time. If you pull off a chair shot when fighting two guys, you’ll barely have time to grapple the second fellow before the first has gotten up and performed a one-handed bulldog on you. This wouldn’t be as much of an issue, if the game didn’t require that you win every single match in Road to Wrestlemania mode – which is easily the game’s highlight. Hell, even the N64 WWE titles supported limited story branching, so I’m sure it wouldn’t be too hard to do it now. With that said, the storylines presented are generally interesting and fun to play – it’s just that the slightly stranger and more infuriating moments do take the polish off, somewhat.

The game’s career mode – formerly a highlight in years gone by – is poor once again too. You fight, with each match being rated out of 5 stars. Obtaining enough stars unlocks the “Number 1 Contender” match. When you win this, you fight for the belt. Storylines are non-existent, and you’re simply playing match after match after match until you’ve done enough for the game to call you the champion. During the Intercontinental Belt Path (the first you’ll face as a male fighter), my third match against CM Punk was interrupted by Kofi Kingston. Kingston wandered to ringside – the announcers didn’t say a word – and just…stood there. Punk threw me out of the ring, and Kingston tried to Irish Whip me into the barricade, which I reversed. I got back into the ring, and no more was said about it. Kofi did grab the ref’s attention when I went for the pin, but all I had to do was simply attempt it again to get the win. On completion of that match, I unlocked the Number 1 Contender bout, and was thrown into a steel cage with John Morrison. No build up. No storyline. No reasoning, other than that Number 1 Contender matches always have a gimmick.

In the ring, not a massive amount has changed. Gone is the HUD of last year’s version, replaced with a simple circle around your wrestler’s feet, representing his or her momentum. Building up momentum by taunting, pulling off strings of moves and generally laying the smacketh down will cause a little “S” to appear at your feet, indicating that you can pull off one of your character’s “Signature” moves. Do this successfully, or keep boosting that momentum in other ways, and your finisher will become available. This works really well and the lack of the HUD is a bigger deal than you’d think.

What isn’t such a great step forward however, is what happens when your character steps out of the ring. You run to the rope, press your A button to slide out of the ring and – BAM! – now you’re looking at things from a completely different angle as the game decides to cut away to a camera that is practically unusable. The amount of times that you’ll go to slide out of the ring to chase someone down, only to find that you start running in the wrong direction thanks to the ridiculous change in perspective (down becomes left, left becomes up, etc.) is crazy. You get used to it, but initially the switch in camera is incredibly galling and somewhat unnecessary.

As far as the actual fighting engine goes, you’d be hard pressed to notice any significant changes to the way that the characters interact with each other. A lot of reversals look (and are) completely unnatural – as has been the case for years – thanks to the speed that the defending character has to move at in order to successfully turn the tide. On the upside, the way in which the fighters’ body parts go a colour that I’m going to call “Sore Nipples Red” when they’ve been chest-chopped or axe-handled across the back is pretty cool, as is the way in which blood is depicted. Once you bust someone open, the claret spills everywhere, including on your own combatant’s hands as he tries to inflict more damage. On the whole, the game puts in a solid general performance, despite some nasty clipping in places.

Despite the downsides, WWE Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 is still a fun game to play. Yes, the “Create-A-Superstar” options are now completely devoid of sense due to a “points” system being put into play that allows me to put a hoodie and t-shirt on my character, whilst leaving me unable to “afford” a pair of jeans. Yes, the fighting engine still has the same problems as it did six years ago. Yes, you’ll still be waiting for the game to load more than you’d like. But, the fact of the matter is that whilst other fighting games set you the task of going into battle and defeating your opponent by any means possible without any care about how the match is panning out, SvR2010 brings you the feel of “Sports Entertainment” by really utilising its momentum system well. If you turn the “Stamina System” on – which is bizarrely off by default – then you get an even more believable game. There’s nothing quite like the feeling of getting kicked and thrown all over the ring in a Tag Team match as your under-powered CAW, before getting in a few shots and being prompted to press a pair of buttons in order to instigate a “Hot” tag. You press, and the game instantly skips to a cutscene of your created wrestler crawling towards his more experienced partner. SLAP! The tag is made! Here comes the Undertaker! BANG! Down goes one…BANG! And the other! You’re back in the match as momentum has swung your way – and the crowd and commentators (who are used more sparingly and cleverly this year, thankfully) love it. If you’re lucky, that momentum might be enough to allow Taker to pull off a signature move and give you a real chance for the win. Even if that isn’t the case, you’ve still had your adrenaline rush.

The fighting engine is flawed – and probably will be flawed in the same way next year, too – and the menu system is tired when compared to pretty much any EA or Codemasters title – again, as it will be next year – but there’s something truly amazing about the way that the game makes you feel at times, just as watching the WWE in real life does. We all know that the matches are scripted but if we like a character, we’ll still be cheering his name and imploring him to kick out when his shoulders are down for the 1-2-3. Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 is a million miles away from perfect, but generally does a good enough job of drawing you in that you’ll be able to get past most of the game’s bigger issues. If it doesn’t hook you within your first few matches though, it’s unlikely that it ever will.