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Wrestle Mania 21 reveiw

Date Added: April 23, 2005
Story By: Rick Quinn

After the dismal failure of the online options for Smackdown vs. Raw, THQ was looking for a way to redeem itself. To do that, they went to Studio Giante, operated by the legendary John Tobias from the Mortal Kombat series. SG promised us a much more robust online mode, more options, and certainly more than just bra & panties matches. Fans waited with baited breath (and even now, some fans in the UK are still waiting) for the game to be released. They all scurried to their video game store and rushed home, ready to play online…

… but think again…

A glitch in the game prevented you from getting online with the game. Thousands of fans were upset by the glitch, but remained hopeful that online would be repaired soon. In the meantime, people took the opportunity to get to know the game, get a feel for the new controls. I too have spent many hours on Wrestle Mania 21, and here is what I have to say about it:

Graphics
The graphics in this game are nothing less than stunning. Everything is beautiful, with the exception of a few models here and there. Booker T, for example, looks like an alien, while others like Randy Orton, Stacy and Undertaker look dead on. The blood is excellent, though difficult to see when an opponent is first busted open. The arenas are VERY interactive, and there are more to choose from than I’ve ever seen before. In addition to having almost all the PPV and TV arenas, there are other lesser-known arenas in the game which give it an added appeal. The civic center, industrial basement and one them resembles a night club to name a few. Everything is so crisp, so clean, so fluent, you honestly are taken back by the details.

Gameplay
I’ll be the first to say it, the pro-reversal system sucks. It sucks bad. While there is a counter for every move, it requires three things from you: 1) You have to memorize every move in the game, 2) you have memorize the exact moment you can reverse, and 3) you have to press the button fast enough to get the counter. This was a fresh and innovative idea for the game in theory, but in practice, its not all its cracked up to me. That aside, the controls are fairly simple to learn, and all the moves look great. Another drawback is that there are very limited moves to pick from, and some of the moves you really want to use have to be unlocked. Some of you looking to create an Austin CAW immediately will have to wait until you complete all the tasks (more on that later), and then have more money than you care to spend on moves that should have already been in the game. Moves like the 619, stunner, F5 and gore are all locked away tightly. Other moves, like the spear, sweet chin music and RKO are in the game, but the positioning so bad for them it makes them hard to execute. I spend 20 minutes in a match trying to figure out the sweet chin music.

Moves down outside the ring or on top of the cell bother me the most. It seems that no matter what you set your moves to, you’re limited to body slams and spine busters on top of the cell, and even more limitations on the outside of the ring. Not to mention, you can’t do your finishing moves anything but in the ring, you can’t steal your opponent’s finishers, and it’s harder than it needs to be to reverse a finisher. NOTE: It all the time I’ve played this game, I have never nor have I ever had a finisher reversed.

Tasks
The tasks are fairly easy, and its fun because you can do them in exhibition. They don’t ask you to do anything too difficult, and it adds to the game. Once you have completely all tasks, you should have more than enough money to buy legends, arenas, attribute points and extra weapons.

Create a belt
By far it’s the best CAB feature ever created. Its easy and cheap to create a belt, and to build up your title, just win a few matches. There are hundreds of parts to pick from, allowing you to create almost any belt you want. The game keeps track of how many times you’ve defended the belt, and how much its worth.

Season
Season mode is beautifully presented, and has the best voice-overs I’ve ever seen. But theres a problem: as soon as you start season mode, you’re thrown into a match with Rene Dupri, a match that you must win. If you lose, you have to do the match again, and keep doing it until you get it right. This takes away from the open-ended feel we were hoping for. Its all so linear, and once you’ve completed season, you’re doomed to repeat history the second time around. Literally. The season mode never changes, giving no option but to suffer through the same storylines and the same betrayals yet again. Sigh.

Online
This was suppose to be the feature that saved that game, but sadly, it isn’t. In fact, it drags the game down. Even after disappointed fans downloaded the match required to use the online mode, there were still too many problems. The main problem is the lack of features. We were told that every match type would be playable online, and they are, but matches like cage, hell in a cell and ladder matches are restricted to one on one matches only. Matches like triple threat and fatal four ways are available, but heres the catch: unless you have a guest online with you, it’s restricted to 2 humans opponents and two wrestlers controlled by the AI. The same in triple threat matches. There are tag team matches, but again, you need a guest or you’re stuck with the computer as a partner. I have personally had matches online and there were two Batistas in the match. To make things worse, no matter what match type you pick, there is always a 10-minute time limit. Last man standing matches are doomed to end in a draw every time. From what I can tell, there are no scoreboards of any kind, no way to access other players records in the slightest. This led many to believe that other patch would be necessary for these features to work, but all of this should have been implemented from the moment the game was released. To be blunt, this online mode made me miss Smackdown vs. Raw. At last SvR was upfront with you, telling you from the beginning that match types would be limited online. WrestleMania 21 promised us the world, and delivered a failed attempt at online play.

Okay, so lets recap

Graphics: Solid 10 from me. This game is beautiful.

Gameplay: Its littered with problems, glitches, odd load times and collision problems. 5

Tasks: Fun to play, a nice addition to the game, but hardly innovative. 6

CAB: Almost perfect. 9

Season: This really drags the game down with no choices to be made and a linear storyline. 3

Online: It just plain sucks. Unless another patch is developed for it, this online mode is no better than SvR. 4

Official rating: 6.5 out of 10

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