2K and WWE? What does it mean? - Wiggy's Blog

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Wiggy's Blog

2K and WWE? What does it mean? Stuck

Posted on January 24, 2013 at 04:00 PM.

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With 2K seemingly having procured the rights to make WWE games from here on out, it's safe to wonder what this will mean for the philosophy and feature set of these new products. It seemed until recently that EA was commonly thought of as the de facto choice for the vacant WWE license, but you have to wonder if they didn't push that hard given that they already have two fighting games under their purview (Fight Night and UFC).

It would've created an interesting conundrum for EA to have all three licenses, as they'd have to cobble together three different teams to handle three uniquely distinct fighting products, and they'd have to schedule them in such a way to not cannibalize their own products. I'd say 2K getting the license is probably a good thing for the industry as a whole, as we all know how monopolies in certain sports franchises can frustrate gamers and stifle creativity.

What does 2K do with the WWE license? Well, hopefully the put their best foot forward and focus on the changes that THQ was starting to make in the series, getting away from the concept of wrestling as some sort of weird "fighting" game, because honestly, that's not what it is. You can't predict the swerves, pageantry and general insanity of professional wrestling by staging virtual fights in such a controlled way, with life bars and heavily structured rules. The concept of momentum and "the show" needs to be emphasized, and the "Attitude Era" mode in WWE '13 was a great prelude into what a future wrestling game could be.

People care about the stories and the characters as well as their flashy moves and overall style. Sure, people get into gimmick matches and try to compete against others, but this isn't some complex sim of feints, jabs, stamina management and counter-striking like you get in UFC games or Fight Night.

The most obvious idea comes from NBA 2K13's MyCareer mode, as the ability to "role play" as your favorite WWE star -- inside the ring, outside the ring, backstage, away from the arena -- could be incredibly compelling, and the heel/face personas of wrestling would lend perfectly to a procedurally generated story that would have much more focus than what the universe mode currently offers.

I'd be interested to see how 2K's servers would stack up as compared to THQ for online play and content downloading/uploading, as both companies have had their fair share of problems when it comes to this space.

You can see why 2K would go for this license, as it's a brand that is selling quite well right now, and they'd have a couple of solid sports brands -- with NBA -- to try and build their own stable around. I'm really interested to see what their first game ends up bringing to the ring.

How about you, OS community? What would you want to see from a 2K WWE product?

Comments

# 1 Gramps91 @ Jan 23

I really hope it's on Wii U as I plan on buying one soon with the announcements of the new Zelda titles today, as well as Smash Bros. With that bought I won't have enough to buy a PS4 or Xbox 720 for a while. However, I hope to see a Career mode of some kind, like NBA 2k's my career, as well as an in depth GM mode.

# 2 HighCmpPct @ Jan 24

Hopefully it'll mean that the WWE games finally understand the importance of 2 COUNT FALLS!!!

# 3 SHAKYR @ Jan 24

I see this as a great thing because it can open a door for competition for another combat game.... Boxing! The 2K and WWE coming together can be a incredible thing especially if they put their Visual Concepts team on it. Visual Concepts are know for their attention to details of a sport.

# 4 lynkraid @ Jan 24

I dunno, nothing says Visual Concepts is be working on it. But Visual Concepts have never made a wrestling game before, who says they would want to or if they did that it would be any fun at all?

Even then if Visual Concepts did take over, we wouldn't see a WWE game released until fall 2014 at least, as most new games take 2 years to be made from scratch.

I mean hey.. Look at the TNA game, it was totally crap, so nothing says if someone new is making the game that its going to be a sure fire hit.

# 5 Aardawg @ Jan 25

This means that 2k is wasting time, money, and resources on a wwe game instead of making a new college hoops game. What a joke.

# 6 HighCmpPct @ Jan 26

Oh man don't bring up the TNA game, really really bad JU-JU.

# 7 DarkOutFront @ Jan 28

Hopefully they have a my player like game mode

# 8 RandallB21 @ Jan 29

@Aardawg I'm with you man! BRING BACK COLLEGE HOOPS 2K!!!

# 9 bxphenom7 @ Jan 29

I was hoping the "monopolies in certain sports franchises" link was going to take me to an article about NFL 2k vs Madden. Anyways, I think 2k will use the WWE license better than THQ