madden of wwe

Reviewed by junky12345 on August 01, 2008  |  report this review

The WWE is one of the most successful franchises in entertainment history. Not only did it pioneer the art of live “sports entertainment,” but it is also a powerhouse on television and is on nearly every night. Recently, the WWE has been branching out into the wide world of video gaming. As a result, ever since the last generation the WWE series of games have been steadily improving. From the Legends of Wrestling to the Wrestlemania series, the market has literally been flooded with games based on the sports entertainment powerhouse
The Smackdown! vs. Raw franchise is like the Madden of WWE games, and it is the only one to get an annual update (we’re not counting the Wrestlemania titles). Last year was rather big for the franchise, as it was the official jump to the current generation of consoles. However, each version of the game had some serious issues, and many started to doubt whether the series would be able to survive on the newer consoles. However, it seems the folks at THQ have been listening to the fans and are making some serious changes to the multiplatform release of Smackdown! vs. Raw. One of the biggest flaws across the console versions last year were the below average character animations and the poor A.I. The wrestlers felt clunky in the ring, and opponents were either insanely difficult or entirely too easy to beat. However, THQ is promising this time the A.I. will be a truer reflection of a given wrestler’s actions in the ring. For example, Ric Flair will not move around in the same manner as John Cena (as was often the case in the previous iteration). Characters will also sport a larger amount of detail in the console versions and will look a lot more like real wrestlers instead of models with faces and muscle definition painted on.