Review for Wrestlemania 2000 N64
Review Of WWF wrestlmania 2000 for the N64
THQ has been making WCW-licensed wrestling games for years. But a licensing shake-up has enabled the company to score the coveted WWF license that Acclaim held for years. THQ has a tremendous opportunity here to try something new with the license, and from the looks of the company's upcoming PlayStation title, WWF Smackdown, we may see something new yet. However, the company's first product, WWF Wrestlemania 2000 for the N64, is little more than a slightly upgraded version of WCW/NWO Revenge with a new set of wrestlers. So wrestling fans who are waiting for an all-new experience will have to keep on waiting. But WWF fans who skipped THQ's WCW games purely because of its license will be in for a game that plays well but captures only fleeting bits of the "attitude" that makes the WWF so popular.
Additions to the engine include a sitting position for fallen enemies. You can pick wrestlers up off the mat and place them in a sitting position, or you can pick them up and put them on their feet. An in-depth create-a-wrestler mode has been added. But unlike WWF Attitude, the depth isn't found in how many different colors of pants you can put on your wrestler or how many different types of mullets you can slap onto your wrestler's head; rather, the draw here is that you can customize every single move. Want up and the A button from a weak grapple to be a backhand slap? Go for it. Want your wrestler to finish other wrestlers with the "Insider's Edge," a rip-off of Scott Hall's Outsider's Edge? It's all you. A few other WCW finishers and taunts have made it into the game as well, so you can slap Scott Steiner's or DDP's taunt onto your wrestler if you so desire. Portions of the ring entrance walk are also customizable, as are things like ring entrance attire (hats, microphones, and water bottles are all available). You can set who your wrestler's rivals are, whom he walks to the ring with, how he reacts when and if he starts bleeding during a fight, and lots more.
Digitized music and stills from the superstars' video packages pepper the ring entrances, but both manage to detract from the experience rather than add to it. In theory, they make the introsmuch closer to reality than WCW/NWO Revenge's weak intros, but the quality of the entrance music is abysmal. Imagine a friend calling you up and playing entrance music over the phone - or perhaps a RealAudio file encoded at the lowest possible setting - and you'll be on the right track. The entrance "video" is similarly pathetic. It's a collage of still shots taken from the video intros, but the shots are taken at a very low resolution and blown up to fill the entire screen. It's a blocky, pixilated mess. You would think the developers would have splurged for a larger cart to make room for some higher-quality audio and video in the game. At least the wrestlers actually walking to the ring look better than those in Revenge did. Wrestlers come down the aisle with their managers, valets, or other companions. So, to answer the burning question, yes, Godfather comes to the ring with one of his hos.
By Evilocity
