With the debut of the first All-Elite wrestling licensed game today (review coming soon), Switch may have the first great licensed wrestling game outside of the Nintendo Switch Online app. However, there weren’t many other opportunities. There’s one 2K wrestling game on Switch, and it could be Dino Bravo for that platform. Wrestling Empire is impressive as a one-man project, but I threw it away like a hot potato. It’s like the complete elimination of action arcade wrestling and its ilk. Still, if Pro Wrestling for the NES wants to claim it’s one of the top five wrestling games on the platform, I stand by it.
But quitting cable, not being able to wake up at 4am to check New Japan’s cards, and not feeling like watching a Vince McMahon game have all come together for the last few years. It’s clear that I haven’t watched many matches. If I had the money, I would still be in business. And I’ve always appreciated the application of the art of professional wrestling to new media. You’ll be hooked on WrestleQuest, a wrestling turn-based RPG that releases in August. But as we enter the twilight of the Switch, the WrestleMania main event era, there are a few things I’d like to see in the business over the next few years.
Give me a Fire Pro, coward
Fire Pro Wrestling World launched on Steam and PlayStation 4 in 2017 and has been validated on Steam Deck, so it should be an easy candidate to move to Switch or a successor system if you want to keep the same form factor. The Spike-developed series (yes, that Spike by Spike Chunsoft) had several entries on the Game Boy Advance, but has not been released on North American Nintendo systems since. And its original product head (he sadly passed away in 2014) also has ties to Nintendo as the creator of his aforementioned NES Pro Wrestling.
Fire Pro has always aimed for realism. In GBA games, matches are awarded based on how well they did with a particular Japanese company’s style of play. He doesn’t powerbomb within 30 seconds like in many other wrestling games. . But the big attraction for me is the ability to change. This is by far the easiest game to download new characters to and I’ve seen all-new moves modded into Fire Pro games so far. Combine this with very good AI and you’ll be able to book some very wild pieces with decent character editing. Who are the candidates for the 8-man tag team of Prime Sting, Bruno Sammartino, Kazuchika Okada and La Parker on the same team?
Currently, most wrestling games fall into two groups. Sports sims (like those found in 2K games) or fighting games. Among these types, Fire Pro Wrestling remains the pinnacle as it leans towards the sports side, and there’s no doubt the Switch will benefit from that.
But we all know that half the fun of following business since the mid-’90s is the behind-the-scenes drama. What if you really want to stick to it?
Book if you think it’s easy
There aren’t many dedicated sports management simulators on Switch. The only (expensive) example is the yearly release of Football Manager, but it appears in some form in the Super Mega Baseball series, among others. And if you’re a wrestling fan of a certain age, you’ll definitely want to watch the main event of WrestleMania XXXIX, Invasion, winning his WWF title from Bret Hart in 1997, Starcade in 1989, and more. I’m sure you’ve tried to rebook…no shortage of Tuesdays. Some fans make morning appointments.
There is a famous wrestling management sim series on PC (“Extreme Warfare Revenge” series, later renamed “Total Extreme Warfare” after copyright infringement elements were removed), but as far as I know, It never appeared in the console version. Switch can definitely handle it. It’s entirely text-based, and can even be handheld-only if someone wants to be cocky about it. This is why the Switch series is called Football Manager (Year) Touch. (The main reason is that it’s a mobile port.)
In fact, EWR was my first exposure to a small form of generative AI. When I lay out the cards, the game genuine reviewers View the live match results. There is now no shortage of wrestling critics.There may also be a switchable option to use ex-NWR writers/2019 E3 survivors Brian Roseor my friend and former roommate Ryan McNeil (Given that his current beat is a 1995 roundup, perhaps no one specializes in claps.). I’m not going to do all the J&J Dream Factory here, but if it were to reveal that it uses an AI engine to generate wrestling match descriptions based on the style of the “combatants,” it would probably get a lot of money from investors. you will be able to get cash for
Will it be popular? Probably not. But I’d definitely spend 100 hours looking at even more. One of the first places I hung out on the Internet was a bulletin board run by “Diary”. EWRReservation. Some of the authors have worked in the media industry and become wrestlers themselves. So it could be a stream dream.
Kenny Omega will remember this
I don’t know if you know this, but inside the ring, and especially outside the ring, the wrestling industry is a mess. Most of the content was collected in a message board thread. “Despicable thread” It was started by…
check notes
… Tony Kahn, the current booker of All Elite Wrestling.
Anyway, wrestling is a potential business for almost any type of adventure game. Telltale style? Of course, if you’re trying to rip off The Walking Dead, you can also base it on the GLOW TV series or Heels. An LA Noir-style game based on Mob’s connection to professional wrestling (especially the Japanese Yakuza)? Absolutely. love game? I mean, there are plenty of real-life wrestling couples. I think the only reason Otomate doesn’t feature pro wrestling among the hundreds of games on Switch is that Japanese promotions only recently stopped putting women in other promotions. (For example, Switch game publisher Bushiroad owns New Japan Pro-Wrestling and Joshi Pro-Wrestling Stardom.)
But let’s be honest, the wrestling treatment I’d love to see in adventure form is a Phoenix Wright-esque courtroom drama about real-life events. Murder of Bruiser Brody. Maybe Miles Edgeworth is trying to put Invader I in his prison, or maybe Phoenix is trying to defend an innocent wrestler accused of a crime. Either way, Takumi Shu might do something amazing with this case.
When Rush and Iron Butterfly Met
The last possibility of wrestling seems silly on paper and is essentially nothing more than a quick time event, but I would love to see wrestling used in rhythm games. I’m here.
If Rock Band and Guitar Hero have taught us anything, it’s that recreating performances is a lot of fun. And wrestling, like rhythm games, is all about hitting the spot. A perfect or great “note” means it hits cleanly, a good sound means “he got it right enough”, and a miss completely blows the spot. Instead of exiting the game, you can say, “Go home,” and end the match. (If the umpire has to issue that order, God has sustained you.)
And just as rock bands embrace multiple musical styles, so does our proposed rhythm game. You can run technical matches, one-sided squash, video game-style spotfests/”party matches”, and even play around with different rules. trio match in mexico lucha libre style. Then it might switch to Japanese ‘strong-style’ bouts, then European-style bouts with rounds and the old ‘2-falls, 2-submissions or 1-knockout’ rule. Even general matches alone can be a great way to approach gameplay.
But imagine a historic match in that context.I’ve played Green Grass and High Tides, Inna Gadda da Vida, and even his 2112 in various hero games and band games… but what about trying to recreate the 93 minutes “When Hero Meets Punk” the 2003 game, or 45 minute draw Between Ric Flair and Sting in the first Clash of the Champions event?If you’re looking for something slower paced, you can start with Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant Follow it up from and after WrestleMania III Ricky Steamboat and Randy Savage from the same event.
the last bell
I doubt many of these ideas will come to fruition on Switch or in the early stages of the successor platform’s lifecycle. Wrestling is nowhere near as popular as it was in his 1980s and late 1990s, but at the time, companies improved their wrestling games year after year until the seminal No Mercy was born at the turn of the 2000s. I was able to do. But if someone wants to open the forbidden door and capture something different in the space, the effort can be well rewarded.
And hopefully, if there are licensed wrestlers in this organization, they’ll be well compensated for something other than permanent injuries. I love Bryan Danielson’s fights, but this guy has one more five-star classic before he’s out of business.
