Some of the scripted Universe events are fairly decent.The submission game has been refined slightly with an option to have button-bashing replacing the stick swirling method of last year, which itself has been changed so attacking and defending are now consistent colours.
You can also focus on the referee or managers and oddly, your tag team partner (unclear why you may want to do this). In WWE 2K17 this problem is resolved by having the name flash only for a second as you switch focus, and you’re able to do it at almost any point in time – making the match much more dynamic. Also in bigger matches, you would not know who you were fighting unless you had your ‘target’ name above your head all the time. But you could only do this when standing perfectly still which meant that you often were open to attack. Previously, if you were in a match with more than one person, you could push the stick to switch your ‘focus’ and attack someone else. This sounds really trivial but makes a huge difference. By default for example, you can now manually switch who you are targeting.
The in-ring action is as good as ever with some fairly small changes to last year but they can have a large impact on the gameplay. When you do select a character, the announcer bellows their name – this is a really nice touch.Once you’re in the ring all that is behind you and it is down to business. This would be fine if the models were good, but there’s a serious quality mix between them all. Gone are high definition photos of each character but instead you get an in-game model depicting them. Character selection is also a text list, with images appearing of each one you pass by. Look at this bunch of misfits.The compromise begins immediately. Some spice is added by smoke effects and a randomised animated entrance of a character across the background but feels a bit lame. Giving the benefit of the doubt, you could be fooled into thinking that this was to try and rekindle the flavour of WWF No Mercy, the AKI classic which was released on Nintendo 64 many years ago and had a similar set of titles. It’s baffling really – the underwhelming entrance to your WWE experience is low-key, understated and feels like a placeholder screen for when the final menus are completed. WWE 2K17 changes things here to instead have your central hub for all things WWE to be a text list. WWE 2K16 had fantastic high definition images littering the screens when you first started the game, the menus were tiled to fill the screen with these larger-than-life characters. The glitz and glamour of WWE has always been a trademark and one you should expect bigger and more realistic in every video game.
WWE 2K17 has a balancing job to do here then, and it is probably a release more filled with compromise on its vision than anything else. The videogame version of this year’s WWE installment then has to try and capture this new mentality – steps which were taken in the previous outing, but in an ever-increasing era of podcasting, YouTube and social media, how do you capture all of the drama of being a wrestler? Your intro to the world of WWE is fairly lame. Performing for thousands of people live and millions on television around the world will do something to someone, but once they are back out of sight they return to normality. The mystery of ‘the business’ has dissipated and everyone is well aware now that not only is it pre-determined (the use of the word ‘fake’ still isn’t quite right, as the physicality is very real) but now the characters are very openly played by on the whole, very nice people.These police, mild mannered individuals transform into monsters, beasts, maniacs, show-offs and borderline psychopaths once they walk through the curtain. World Wrestling Entertainment has had a big spotlight on it in recent years. The biggest ever roster and unparalleled customisation options mean this is the deepest WWE game to date.