Post by #HEEL Dark Lord on Oct 3, 2007 20:17:39 GMT -5
October 3, 2007 - Just a few months ago, THQ gathered the gaming press in the shadow of Wrestlemania and let the world know that the general manager and career modes from SmackDown! vs. Raw's past was dead.
Fans didn't take it well.
It wasn't so much the elimination by combination -- you can now play as a GM or a Superstar in one mode called 24/7 -- that raised their ire; it was the overall ambiguity of this new super-mode. Would it retain the story-driven single-player mode? Would it retain the cutthroat GM business of trying to keep your show on top while keeping your superstars healthy? How would the modes bleed into one another?
We've been able to spend an extended amount of time with 24/7 Mode -- an early build of the game that is subject to change -- and have come away with a number of impressions both good and bad.
Let's start where the changes are the most noticeable -- 24/7 Mode as a Superstar. When you select the option you'll be able to start a career as a Superstar or created character. If you choose your created brawler, you'll start with your minimum attributes and begin working your way up the ladder through skill training. Choose to be an established character, and you'll be able to start with the steam the wrestler already has or from scratch to build your own dynasty.
Now, readers, brace yourself; I have bad news … possibly terrible news. You can't take an ECW Superstar (CM Punk, Elijah Burke, etc.) through 24/7 mode. Worse? You can't take an ECW Superstar who swapped shows (i.e. Sandman, Bobby Lashley, etc.) through the new career mode either. Go ahead and let out a frustrated cry, ECW fans -- we did. There's a fair amount of voice acting and show-specific storylines for Raw and SmackDown, and it would appear that just couldn't be done for poor ol'ECW.
Once you get over the grief of not being able to play as any ECW dude -- with the exception of Johnny Nitro on Raw -- you can begin your dream of becoming a WWE Legend with one of 19 available wrestlers. The mode kicks off with your Superstar meeting Vince in the middle of an empty arena and him challenging you to become a legend and make it to the squared-circle for that awe-inspiring event known as Wrestlemania. From there, you adjourn to your new home away from home -- the WWE Locker Room.
Rather than last year's first-person/glide-around-the-locker room view, this year has you anchored in one spot staring at your shirt on a hanger, Diva posters on the wall and four interactive objects -- as well as a percentage meter in the corner of the screen that tracks your progress on becoming a legend. On a bench is the latest issue of WWE Magazine (where you can check out what the other Superstars are saying about your feud), your cell phone contains e-mails -- some packing voice work -- that keep you up-to-date on backstage opportunities as well as who hates you, the calendar is where you manage your daily schedule, and your laptop keeps track of the WWE Shop, the Power 25 and your health.
Yes -- your health. New to the single-player career this year are the health woes that made up the GM mode of SmackDown's past.
For our first jaunt through the life of a WWE Superstar in SVR '08, we chose Matt Hardy and set out to make our mark on SmackDown. Theodore Long prepped us with some lengthy voicemails about becoming the number one contender, Rey Mysterio kept sending us emails saying that we hadn't earned anyone's respect, and Booker T got pretty pissed when Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley started looking at us for a starring role in an upcoming WWE film.
To make this kind of impact, we needed to push Matt pretty hard.
See, there are four days of activities outside of your respective program -- if there isn't a PPV, you get the weekends off -- and from the calendar you can choose what you want to do on these non-wrestling days, but each choice will come with its own set of positive and negative elements.
Matt's on SmackDown, so his week is free and clear up until Friday. On Monday I might invade Raw and get a popularity boost with the fans but risk getting more fatigued. Tuesday, I can select a day of R&R to counteract the fatigue but lose the ground I gained with the fans. Wednesday, I can star in a movie to get over with the fans and grab some cash, but I'm going to be fatigued coming into Friday's show.
This give-and-take is spread out over training exercises -- nifty mini-matches where you're given a goal such as completing a set number of taunts or Ultimate Control Grapples to better your stats -- skill improvement training that costs money but will teach you mic moves and heat-gathering abilities that will lead to bonuses in your daily events, and the events -- autograph signings, trophy dates, etc. -- themselves.
Now, other than the training exercises, this is all strictly handled on the stat sheet. If you choose to put your wrestler through the $5,000 pain management session, which improves your recovery rate, you're only going to see the number you've added to your skill and the money you've lost. The same thing can be said for any press conference or photo shoot you hold.
So, you can see all the options we had for young Mr. Hardy. We wanted to crack the Top 25, so we started doing movies to get over. We wanted to make a name for ourselves, so we started invading other shows. We wanted the ladies, so we started going out on dates. Our fatigue went up -- you can monitor the stat on your computerized health report -- and as that happened, so did our injury probability.
A few weeks into his run to become the number one contender, Matt suffered a herniated disc in his back. The WWE medical staff suggested he take seven weeks off to rehab the injury.
Here's where it gets weird -- and keep in mind that this isn't the final build of the game -- there was no time-off option. The WWE was telling Matt to stop wrestling, but we couldn't make Matt stop wrestling. With the herniated disc tearing apart his life, Matt began entering matches with his torso already showing damage on the HUD.
Although not being able to take time off stunk, the fact that the game made us carry injuries into our matches was a cool feature, one made better by the AI's ability to pick up on our hurtin' back. When Matt faced off against his former tag team partner Mark Henry (don't ask), the World's Strongest Man repeatedly strong Irish whipped Hardy into the corners. Matt would slam into the turnbuckles and his back would get worse and worse. In a few exchanges, Mark had Matt down for the count.
A lot of fans on the IGN SmackDown message board have asked how the backstage environment works. No, you won't be able to roam the halls at your leisure, but there are a handful of cutscenes that have your superstar walking into the ladies locker room, cutting promos -- occasionally, you get to choose your response -- and dealing with your fellow Superstars.
Hopefully, THQ and Yuke's will shake things up in the final build. In our few months as Hardy, we walked in on the ladies changing more than once and saw the same walk down an opponent-filled hallway two or three times. Worse, the walk didn't make any sense. One moment we were getting a rambling, pissed-off message from Rey Mysterio, and the next we were shaking his hand in the hallway.
Whether you love or hate the changes to the individual side of 24/7, you should find GM Mode familiar and suped-up. The mode'll start and you'll have to choose if you want to be Theodore Long on SmackDown, the Coach on Raw or Tommy Dreamer on ECW -- yeah, even though you can't wrestle as any of the ECW guys in 24/7, you can book them and use them in the GM part. From there, you'll have a private meeting with Mr. McMahon on his jet, and he'll basically tell you to take your brand to the top or look for another job. Of course, Vince says all of this in that gravely growl of his so it sounds more intimidating.
You draft a roster (or pick the preset one) while managing your budget, set folks as clean or dirty, choose champions, get to hiring writers and set up feuds, which can be tracked in WWE Magazine along with trades and the health of your crew. Basically, it's a slick version of last year's model -- except that you can now put your boys through the paces on their off days.
Just like in the Superstar portion of 24/7, GM allows you to put your performers through training exercises, skill improvement and events. It's a good way to make your roster more durable, popular and better wrestlers while making you an extra buck or too.
Obviously, there's a lot to 24/7 mode. On the single-player side, you'll be able to track your skill progression, morale and progress to Legend status while being a GM will have you balancing the books and trying to push your faces and heels in the most appropriate way. Succeed, and you can take your earnings to the WWE Shop and unlock Legends, belts, move sets and more. Fail, and Vince will make sure you never work in this business again, chump
Fans didn't take it well.
It wasn't so much the elimination by combination -- you can now play as a GM or a Superstar in one mode called 24/7 -- that raised their ire; it was the overall ambiguity of this new super-mode. Would it retain the story-driven single-player mode? Would it retain the cutthroat GM business of trying to keep your show on top while keeping your superstars healthy? How would the modes bleed into one another?
We've been able to spend an extended amount of time with 24/7 Mode -- an early build of the game that is subject to change -- and have come away with a number of impressions both good and bad.
Let's start where the changes are the most noticeable -- 24/7 Mode as a Superstar. When you select the option you'll be able to start a career as a Superstar or created character. If you choose your created brawler, you'll start with your minimum attributes and begin working your way up the ladder through skill training. Choose to be an established character, and you'll be able to start with the steam the wrestler already has or from scratch to build your own dynasty.
Now, readers, brace yourself; I have bad news … possibly terrible news. You can't take an ECW Superstar (CM Punk, Elijah Burke, etc.) through 24/7 mode. Worse? You can't take an ECW Superstar who swapped shows (i.e. Sandman, Bobby Lashley, etc.) through the new career mode either. Go ahead and let out a frustrated cry, ECW fans -- we did. There's a fair amount of voice acting and show-specific storylines for Raw and SmackDown, and it would appear that just couldn't be done for poor ol'ECW.
Once you get over the grief of not being able to play as any ECW dude -- with the exception of Johnny Nitro on Raw -- you can begin your dream of becoming a WWE Legend with one of 19 available wrestlers. The mode kicks off with your Superstar meeting Vince in the middle of an empty arena and him challenging you to become a legend and make it to the squared-circle for that awe-inspiring event known as Wrestlemania. From there, you adjourn to your new home away from home -- the WWE Locker Room.
Rather than last year's first-person/glide-around-the-locker room view, this year has you anchored in one spot staring at your shirt on a hanger, Diva posters on the wall and four interactive objects -- as well as a percentage meter in the corner of the screen that tracks your progress on becoming a legend. On a bench is the latest issue of WWE Magazine (where you can check out what the other Superstars are saying about your feud), your cell phone contains e-mails -- some packing voice work -- that keep you up-to-date on backstage opportunities as well as who hates you, the calendar is where you manage your daily schedule, and your laptop keeps track of the WWE Shop, the Power 25 and your health.
Yes -- your health. New to the single-player career this year are the health woes that made up the GM mode of SmackDown's past.
For our first jaunt through the life of a WWE Superstar in SVR '08, we chose Matt Hardy and set out to make our mark on SmackDown. Theodore Long prepped us with some lengthy voicemails about becoming the number one contender, Rey Mysterio kept sending us emails saying that we hadn't earned anyone's respect, and Booker T got pretty pissed when Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley started looking at us for a starring role in an upcoming WWE film.
To make this kind of impact, we needed to push Matt pretty hard.
See, there are four days of activities outside of your respective program -- if there isn't a PPV, you get the weekends off -- and from the calendar you can choose what you want to do on these non-wrestling days, but each choice will come with its own set of positive and negative elements.
Matt's on SmackDown, so his week is free and clear up until Friday. On Monday I might invade Raw and get a popularity boost with the fans but risk getting more fatigued. Tuesday, I can select a day of R&R to counteract the fatigue but lose the ground I gained with the fans. Wednesday, I can star in a movie to get over with the fans and grab some cash, but I'm going to be fatigued coming into Friday's show.
This give-and-take is spread out over training exercises -- nifty mini-matches where you're given a goal such as completing a set number of taunts or Ultimate Control Grapples to better your stats -- skill improvement training that costs money but will teach you mic moves and heat-gathering abilities that will lead to bonuses in your daily events, and the events -- autograph signings, trophy dates, etc. -- themselves.
Now, other than the training exercises, this is all strictly handled on the stat sheet. If you choose to put your wrestler through the $5,000 pain management session, which improves your recovery rate, you're only going to see the number you've added to your skill and the money you've lost. The same thing can be said for any press conference or photo shoot you hold.
So, you can see all the options we had for young Mr. Hardy. We wanted to crack the Top 25, so we started doing movies to get over. We wanted to make a name for ourselves, so we started invading other shows. We wanted the ladies, so we started going out on dates. Our fatigue went up -- you can monitor the stat on your computerized health report -- and as that happened, so did our injury probability.
A few weeks into his run to become the number one contender, Matt suffered a herniated disc in his back. The WWE medical staff suggested he take seven weeks off to rehab the injury.
Here's where it gets weird -- and keep in mind that this isn't the final build of the game -- there was no time-off option. The WWE was telling Matt to stop wrestling, but we couldn't make Matt stop wrestling. With the herniated disc tearing apart his life, Matt began entering matches with his torso already showing damage on the HUD.
Although not being able to take time off stunk, the fact that the game made us carry injuries into our matches was a cool feature, one made better by the AI's ability to pick up on our hurtin' back. When Matt faced off against his former tag team partner Mark Henry (don't ask), the World's Strongest Man repeatedly strong Irish whipped Hardy into the corners. Matt would slam into the turnbuckles and his back would get worse and worse. In a few exchanges, Mark had Matt down for the count.
A lot of fans on the IGN SmackDown message board have asked how the backstage environment works. No, you won't be able to roam the halls at your leisure, but there are a handful of cutscenes that have your superstar walking into the ladies locker room, cutting promos -- occasionally, you get to choose your response -- and dealing with your fellow Superstars.
Hopefully, THQ and Yuke's will shake things up in the final build. In our few months as Hardy, we walked in on the ladies changing more than once and saw the same walk down an opponent-filled hallway two or three times. Worse, the walk didn't make any sense. One moment we were getting a rambling, pissed-off message from Rey Mysterio, and the next we were shaking his hand in the hallway.
Whether you love or hate the changes to the individual side of 24/7, you should find GM Mode familiar and suped-up. The mode'll start and you'll have to choose if you want to be Theodore Long on SmackDown, the Coach on Raw or Tommy Dreamer on ECW -- yeah, even though you can't wrestle as any of the ECW guys in 24/7, you can book them and use them in the GM part. From there, you'll have a private meeting with Mr. McMahon on his jet, and he'll basically tell you to take your brand to the top or look for another job. Of course, Vince says all of this in that gravely growl of his so it sounds more intimidating.
You draft a roster (or pick the preset one) while managing your budget, set folks as clean or dirty, choose champions, get to hiring writers and set up feuds, which can be tracked in WWE Magazine along with trades and the health of your crew. Basically, it's a slick version of last year's model -- except that you can now put your boys through the paces on their off days.
Just like in the Superstar portion of 24/7, GM allows you to put your performers through training exercises, skill improvement and events. It's a good way to make your roster more durable, popular and better wrestlers while making you an extra buck or too.
Obviously, there's a lot to 24/7 mode. On the single-player side, you'll be able to track your skill progression, morale and progress to Legend status while being a GM will have you balancing the books and trying to push your faces and heels in the most appropriate way. Succeed, and you can take your earnings to the WWE Shop and unlock Legends, belts, move sets and more. Fail, and Vince will make sure you never work in this business again, chump
