In the 1980s, 16-time world champion Ric Flair popularized the expression, “To be The Man, you gotta beat The Man.” In professional wrestling games, “The Man” has been the WWE 2K franchise, existing completely unchallenged for the better part of a decade. Newcomer AEW Fight Forever’s challenge does not change the balance of power, but its audacity to try by leaning into arcadey design ideas from yesteryear and embracing a pick-up-and-play philosophy should be praised. It’s the noticeable lack of genre-standard features, an underwhelming single-player campaign, and a smattering of mechanical bugaboos that take the legs out from under it. This fighter isn’t ready for the main event just yet.

In the style department, Fight Forever comes out swinging with cartoony character models and energetic animations. Most of the 52 available competitors have well-rendered caricatures, with Kenny Omega and Jon Moxley’s among my favorites. Even the ones that seem off, like an air fryer-shaped Chris Jericho, get the benefit of not needing to be “realistic” to get the appropriate vibe across.

Due to a tangled web of licensing agreements it’s not possible to release a wrestling game with a roster that fully matches the television show, and many games come out featuring wrestlers who either don’t look the same now as they did when their character models were designed, or are no longer in the company. That said, there’s some noticeable, almost inexcusable absences of characters and championships in the in-game roster that have been heavily featured in the real-life product for years, like Toni Storm and Daniel Garcia.

When they get busy in the ring, there’s an almost Def Jam Vendetta-like exaggerated explosiveness to every bump, kick, and punch that ramps up the over-the-top nature of the aerials and acrobatics of wrestling the way that comic books do for superhero violence. Outside of the lively animations, there’s a small number of occasions where some moves can actually affect the way you play in cool ways I haven’t seen before in a game like this. For example, grumpy Dutch goth kickboxer Malakai Black can spray black mist into opponents eyes when he gets desperate. If you’re on the receiving end, your controls will scramble for a brief few moments.

There’s an almost Def Jam Vendetta-like exaggerated explosiveness to every bump, kick, and punch.

I wish the style outside of the ring was as evocative. Most menus are clean but not at all interesting. The music, some of which is performed by AEW wrestlers like Swerve Strickland and Max Caster, has a lot of energy but is still pretty forgettable. The very few voiceovers in Fight Forever are hit and miss, with the introduction to the big single-player campaign, Road to Elite, being a hit and everything else being misses. Legendary wrestling announcer Jim Ross’s delivery is so especially bad that if I didn’t know better and you told me he was one of the most recognized and beloved voices in wrestling history, I’d assume you’d been hit in the head with a steel chair too many times.

If you’re like me and like tooling around with the creative tools in wrestling games, you might find the Create a Wrestler and Arena modes to be a bit barebones. There’s a jarring lack of facial diversity, and barring some gems like a silly bear costume fans of the webshow BTE may recognize, very slim pickings in the cosmetics department. Which feels ironic because there’s plenty of assets in the creative suite, from voiced entrance calls to poses and moves from wrestlers who didn’t make it in game, but with the tools available, you’d have a very hard time making them yourself without heavy modding (for those with a PC and bottomless motivation). Its also lacks in many of the quality-of-life features like being able to sort moves by type, which means sorting through the Fight Forever’s menu of techniques to find the perfect coup de grace for your combatant can feel like a chore.

Though it’s very similar to current popular wrestling games, it lacks their polish and responsiveness.

I’ve come to like Fight Forever’s in-ring action, but it’s far from my favorite wrestling game. Quick movement and smooth animations gives the action a uniquely frantic energy. The nuts and bolts of combat are simple in theory, and will resonate with anyone who’s played a wrestling game in the past. The punch, kick, and grapple buttons all do different moves when paired with directional tilts from the movement stick, and vary between weak and strong depending on if you tap or hold them, so there’s certainly no shortage of options.

Though it’s very similar to current popular wrestling games, it lacks their polish and responsiveness. Sometimes a strike combo or grapple sequence goes off without a hitch. Occasionally, though, attacks just kind of miss inexplicably, or worse yet will temporarily bug out to the point that I’ll press buttons and nothing will happen. Running, springboarding off of the ropes, dragging opponents around the ring, or whipping them into ropes are actions I particularly felt a constant disconnect with. Adding to that list of gripes is the frequently dimwitted AI which, at least on Normal difficulty, pretty regularly does baffling things like standing completely still or walking aimlessly into opponents or corners. All of these problems are exacerbated when playing online against friends, where you can add frequent clipping and rubberbanding at a rate that’s frankly unacceptable.

Where Fight Forever deviates from contemporary wrestling games and borrows from past genre heavyweights like WWF No Mercy is in the momentum system, which rewards varied offense and solid defense by getting you closer and closer to using your finishing moves. Once your momentum meter is full, you’re free to let loose your character’s four signatures and special moves. These feel like true match-ending abilities, even when used pretty early, and if you’re properly exploiting each wrestler’s unique set of passive skills (which reward using their strengths to gain bonus momentum by doing things like diving off of turnbuckles or attacking first in a match) you can find yourself with your big guns ready very quickly.

It’s frustrating that there’s nothing telling you exactly where you stand at all times. 

Having low momentum, on the other hand, puts you in greater danger of losing matches through pin and submission, but this is separate from the opaque health and limb damage systems, which are also big factors in your chances of victory. Though it may seem intuitive that taking large amounts of damage over time will make you worse for wear, it’s frustrating that there’s nothing telling you exactly where you stand at all times.

This frustration carries over to submissions and general recovery systems. When being stretched by opponents, a prompt will show up telling you to mash buttons to break free, but there’s no indication of how much mashing you need to do to break free. When you’re knocked down, the inclination is to mash buttons or move the stick to speed up your recovery, but there’s really no telling if any of that actually works. Things like this don’t have to be a mystery in order to keep the accessibility bar low.

Another curious decision is that Fight Forever improves on the old Nintendo 64-era design of having two separate defense buttons, but maybe not enough to make a compelling argument for its further inclusion in the year of our Tribal Chief 2023. Either button, one for strikes and one for grapples, can be held down to block respective attacks, or tapped to reverse them and open the enemy up for counter attack. Being able to hold and block grapples without having to have pinpoint timing is a great change, and having two defensive buttons vs one is a solid way to add another layer of mastery in one on one encounters, but in multi-person bouts (which you do a lot of in Road to Elite) reading every different kind of attack and responding with the right button is all but impossible.

Road to Elite is an earnest, yet disappointing attempt at reviving the old-school season modes reminiscent of the PS2 era.

Of the limited match types offered, I primarily enjoyed the anything goes, hardcore-style Lights Out Match, largely because it showcases Fight Forever’s unique and hilarious arsenal of weapons. Joining genre staples like the humble steel chair and kendo stick are rideable skateboards, brooms wrapped in barbed wire, and literal explosives. There’s such a strong spirit of ridiculousness in the name of fun, especially in these matches, and that is something that’s been missing from WWE wrestling games for a while now.

As its big signature single-player mode, Road to Elite is an earnest, yet disappointing attempt at reviving the old-school season modes reminiscent of the PS2 era of WWE wrestling games. After selecting a character, either from the roster of AEW talent or one of your own creation, you speedrun a year in the life of an AEW wrestler. You’ll play through four months, each divided into weekly matches culminating in a big monthly PPV event. I actually liked its brevity; I could do an entire run in only a couple of hours, which is vital for a mode that stresses replayability.

The stories your character will find themselves in are largely silly and bad, but not completely outside of the bounds of pro wrestling. Your spontaneous tag team partner also being the person who’s been stealing your luggage for weeks isn’t more offensive to your IQ than something you’d see on a regular episode of Dynamite, but it’s not something I was champing at the bit to experience multiple times. And unlike the MyRise mode in the 2K games, which often feature short, gimmicky subplots in service of a larger overarching storyline, these are all just stop-and-start angles with no real meat on them. Stories can branch, allegedly depending on wins and losses, but it’s not clear if that means you have to win specific matches to get different results, or have a win-loss record above a certain rate. I’m on my third playthrough of Road to Elite, but I’ve only seen half of the 12 different stories available to find, with no real direction on how to see the others.

Also, Road to Elite has some light management-sim elements that are a bit undercooked. During each week you can do things like workout to gain skill points to boost your stats, go sightseeing to earn temporary motivation buffs for your next match, or sample some of the local cuisine to regain the energy it takes to do all of that. All of your skill points are completely useless if you choose a non-created character though, as their stats can’t be changed. Created wrestlers start with the bare minimum and without any practice, new players are likely to get bullied by some of the top-end, fully equipped opponents they’ll get paired with and against early on. There’s a bunch of potential in this mode, but it goes unrealized here.

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