House of ZAN Forum

[Ravage]

Well, I got this in the mail yesterday. After reading the reviews, it was hard not to. For those few people who are familiar with the old ones, read this up. For those who were not, but like wrestling, read anyway, because SvR 2010 is a GAME CHANGER.
Bullet format ftw:

- Same basic Create-a-Wrestler system is back. The graphics are upgraded nicely, in that CaW's are now pretty much on par with the pre-rendered WWE peoples. There is a step back, as the patterns from days gone by are now gone, and the ability to customize clothing has been severely diminished. However, the clothing options that are there are still plenty to work with, and look GREAT now. A trench coat will seriously look and act like a trench coat. There are now limits to how much "stuff" you can add to a player model (for memory purposes, I imagine)

- Taking the place of the aforementioned patterns is "Create a Logo" which is basically a paint program in game that lets you customize pictures to add to clothing, TRON's, Highlight reels and the like. This is AWESOME in theory, though I have yet to play around with it.

- Story mode has been replaced with "Road to Wrestlemania", which has 5 different playable routes: Play as Edge, HBK, Mickie James, CaW, or HHH/Cena in a brand vs. brand storyline. Will probably start the CaW route tonight, and give more feedback. I'm not terribly impressed with this, but you can be sure these storylines will be more thorough than the slapped together ones of years gone by that were terribly generic and repetitive.

- Career mode returns and is dumbed down, in that there is no story at all. You basically follow a schedule of events, and challenge other wrestlers within the "bracket" you're competing in. For example, I'm in the US Title hunt, and am currently matching up against Miz, Santino, etc. Once I get enough points beating people in the division, I can challenge for the title. This is an amusing diversion, but no longer the driving force of the game it once was. The way it SEEMS, as you "unlock" match types in Career mode, you can start challenging people to certain types of matches instead of just 1 vs. 1 all the time.

- Create a Finisher is EXCELLENT. I made Schizm and, since the Stunner is most likely locked, had a problem finding an acceptable finisher. After figuring out how CaF works, I can say it is sweet as hell. I was able to craft a finisher that goes from Military Press/Toss into a modified driver of sorts...hard to explain, but sweet. They also have Create a Diving Finisher, which I will try when I make Caramel Mendoza. Caramba!

- Create an Entrance is HUGELY in depth, and honestly overwhelming. There is so much you can do with it that it gets confusing. However, once you have a song selected, you can pick the changing of camera angles, pyros, and certain effects and animations to match the music...this brings me to...

- Create a Soundtrack. Yes, they finally did it. My MP3's are now my entrance themes. Schizm walks out to "Heavy" by Collective Soul, and pyros hit to the beat, as the cameras change based on the music levels. It is sweeeeeet.

- Create a Story. I haven't touched it yet, but basically there exists a tool for creating entire storylines, right down to promos and match results. With a USB keyboard (preferably), I can even enter the text for dialogue, and tailor the scenes I set up. These can be shared online and downloaded....basically never ending content!

- Edit WWE stars: You can now edit the outfit colors for existing WWE folks. This is kinda lame, but nice nonetheless. I haven't found a way to actually give them different gear, but I'm still looking. Color coordinating can have its benefits.

- The HUD has been taken out of the match. All you see are the wrestlers, with dim halos around their feet, which give the momentum. It's not incredibly easy to follow yet, as I still don't really know how close I am to pulling off a signature or finisher move, but it sure looks pretty.

- Levelling up is accomplished by playing your character in matches. Any matches. I can sit down and play an exhibition 1 on 1 tables match with Umaga if I like, and I will earn points towards Schizm's advancement. Get this - the areas that you are able to assign points are the areas you utilized during the match, so if I want to level up hardcore, I'd better be grabbing a chair while in that match! Road to Wrestlemania, Career mode, and story modes all contribute. So all my CaW's can be levelled at any time!

- Soundtrack. Instead of the uber-gay Bumpy Knuckles songs x5, we are now treated to actual WWE themes while in the menus and creation programs. Also, I found the button to skip songs, so it's basically a jukebox of all the themes in WWE at the time of the game's creation.

- Match types - They're all there, with the addition of the Championship Scramble. Should be fun! They've also revamped the Royal Rumble to make it not suck (apparently). We'll see how that goes.

- Highlight Reel - OMGSOFANTASTIC. At the end of every match, you can pick some pre-selected "high points" in the match (usually revolving around a signature/finisher move) to save to HD. You can then go into the Highlight Reel tool and take these videos, edit them, add effects, and save to "DVD"s, which you then create a DVD case for. You can then take these videos and either upload them directly to Youtube, or create an entrance video! My current entrance video is a 4-way split screen of Schizm performing the "Dark Edge of Insanity" finisher to Santino, with the caption "DAMN" popping up as the impact happens. It replays constantly.

The Neg's (have to mention them):

- Divas are not available in many match types, and never in competition with male characters. I've always been a bit irritated by this, as it stifles creativity (and Divas are much better practice for a newb character). Perhaps one of the cheat codes will enable this.

- The controls from the last couple games return. They aren't bad, just different. I thought the original scheme that's been around since HCTP was fine, and there was no need to reinvent the wheel.

- In Create a story, you can only use a CaW 7 times per story. That's TOTAL APPEARANCES IN ANYTHING, from matches to promos. If you have 2 CaW's in the story, the 7 must be divided between them. So basically, you can't do heavy CaW storylines, unless you get very creative. This is probably my BIGGEST bleh from the whole thing.



So in short, Adam, if you want to come over and check it out sometime, just lemme know when you're free. If you plan on actually making Scorpion, might I suggest a whole afternoon - that process just keeps getting LONGER EVERY YEAR. I'm not sure if the Wii version will be as good, as they will surely have to trim some stuff.

[Grand Master Sef]

i plan to buy this game for the PS3 if I can get my hands on 1 this christmas season.

Scorpion shall be made but at least I can do any exhibition matches to gain points for your characters!
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