Yuke’s introduces AEW Fight Forever, that’ll satisfy old-school professional wrestling fans.
Founded in 2019 by Tony and Shahid Khan, and in just a short period of time, AEW has managed to establish itself as the second most successful professional wrestling franchise in the world – only behind their rival and global phenomenon, WWE. And with that being said, it’s about time the fine company gives the fans a standout video game. No, we’re not talking about two of their previous games: AEW Casino: Double or Nothing and AEW Elite General Manager. We’re talking about a game that truly represents what AEW is all about and then some.
This is where AEW Fight Forever comes in, being the company’s third video game, but it’s the debuting title to make it to PC and consoles. The game becomes its developer, Yuke’s’ first AEW game, and you should know by now of their exceptional pedigree of making wrestling games. In case you didn’t know, you can thank them for giving us some of the greatest WWE games of all time. Including, Smackdown: Here Comes the Pain and Smackdown Vs Raw 2007. Although it’s been approximately five years since their last wrestling game (WWE 2K19), they’ve, without a doubt delivered a great slobber-knocker in their latest project.
AEW Fight Forever has a sizeable roster containing a mixture of male and female professional wrestlers (including managers) – each having their own set of authentic moves and unique characteristics. Having to finally play with the likes of AEW Fight Forever’s poster boy Kenny Omega, iconic superstars such as Chris Jericho and Sting, as well as the gorgeous glamazon Jade Cargill – instead of only watching them on the TV screen is a thing of beauty.
If you’re expecting real-life movement in AEW Fight Forever like you have in per se recent WWE 2K games; especially the latest instalment WWE 2K23, you’ll be sorely disappointed, and you obviously didn’t get the memo. Yuke’s were clearly going for an arcade-style gameplay featuring old-school beat ’em up mechanics that’ll surely please the older generation players and allow them to get in touch with their nostalgia. One of the clearest examples of this is the developer reverting back to the old ways of breaking out of pinfalls or submissions – which is by simply button mashing.
Strikes, grapples, submissions, finishers and more – AEW Fight Forever provides the whole shebang for you to inflict indescribable levels of pain onto your opponents. And while you’re at it, why not taunt your opponents and show who’s boss? Great news, many of you were wishing for this, but it was granted. AEW Fight Forever brings chain wrestling. For those that aren’t too sure what it is, it’s a technique where a wrestler transitions from one move to the next. This is what you’ll be getting in your matches.
Including the momentum meter, which is located at the bottom of your HUD. This feature is pivotal to not only control the tempo of your matches but also towards victory. The bar will fill up every time you execute an attack or a counter. Once the meter is filled, you can seal the deal by performing your playable character’s signatures and finishers, usually followed by exciting instant replays.
Ranging from singles matches to tag team matches to ladder matches, AEW Fight Forever has enough match types for you to cause mayhem, whether you’re in Exhibition or online. To spice things up, you have the cornerstone of professional wrestling, that being the weapons, which are at your disposal whenever you need them, and it’s solely down to you to send your opponents on the path of destruction.
But nothing speaks mayhem quite like AEW Fight Forever’s most dangerous match it has to offer, with the exploding barbed wire Deathmatch that’ll feed your intense thirst for blood. The ropes as well as a couple of tables in the ring, are covered in horrifying barbed wires and you try everything you have to not come into contact with them, but making sure your opponent does. The crazy thing is, these are the least of your worries. You’ll both endure a massive explosion that surrounds the ring.
The rules are simple. You can win by pinfall or submission. During your match, the ring will explode after the 120 second mark and the wrestler who’s closest to the ropes during this phase who concede the most damage. There’s just one more thing for you to remember, every time you or your opponent come into contact with the ropes, they explode – causing further damage to the body. They don’t call this the most dangerous match in AEW for nothing.
I have to tell you, seeing all that blood dripping down my opponent’s bodies, including myself, as well as the bloody mess in the ring, followed by the audience shouting profanities as an expression took me back to the prime ECW (Extreme Championship Wrestling) days, and loved every minute of it.
If you feel you haven’t caused enough harm to your opponent, certain match types include the post-match beatdown option and you’ll have fifteen seconds to really send the message. Meanwhile, the ring bell will be spamming to signal that the match is done, but it doesn’t matter when it comes to AEW Fight Forever.
For more incentive, you’re rewarded with the likes of ratings, grades, money and score rankings based on your performances and challenges completed. And you can use the money you’ve earned to purchase great items from AEW Fight Forever’s shop. Another thing, your wins and losses go towards your chosen character’s record.
One thing about a wrestling game that many players mostly go for is the story. And in AEW Fight Forever, you’ll be getting that in Road to Elite, which is the story-based mode where you can select any male or female superstar, including your custom character, train them and go through one year (2019-2020) in AEW that spans through four blocks, with each block consisting of a major AEW pay per view. You can also pick what diet they follow. It will only affect the foods that appear during the story mode, and it does nothing to influence game stats.
You’ll earn skill points for performing at workouts and matches. You can use the points you’ve accumulated to improve your superstar. But you have to be very cautious of the intensity of your workouts and matches, as they’ll consume energy. Plus, if you’re training with low energy, you’ll run the risk of injures. That’s why it’s crucial to make sure your superstar eats regularly to restore energy.
You’ll also earn money after each match appearance and you can use the money to either buy items or, if God forbid, you end up in the hospital and you need money to aid recovery. You won’t be able to work out when you’re injured, but you can still appear in matches. I don’t have to tell you what happens if you show up to matches when you’re not 100% fit, do I?
Road to Elite is incredibly enjoyable and perhaps AEW Fight Forever’s most pleasing feature, as it strongly resembled the story modes of the classical WWE Smackdown games that were released over two decades ago. Mainly because of the cutscenes with no voice-overs for most of the time, and the only way you know what was said was with subtitles. This is no surprise, seeing as AEW Fight Forever’s Yuke’s were behind the iconic wrestling games.
Despite AEW Fight Forever’s praiseworthy gameplay, there are some issues that you simply couldn’t ignore, and it certainly removes a few cool points. For one, the game is quite buggy. Many times there are poor hit detections, which lead to the AI obtaining the upper hand sometimes. On top of that, after my opponent is up, I can’t grapple them until I execute a strike attack first. This is incredibly frustrating, especially when I wanted to perform a special.
The Mini-Games mode isn’t so great either. Although there are 19 Mini-Games to choose from, none of them gave me replayability vibes. After playing them once, I had no inclination to go back. This is pretty bizarre to say about a mode with a large list.
The creation suite is pretty inconsistent. Features like create-an-entrance are decent – with an abundance of cool entrances, pyros, titantrons and more. The only problem is that the entrances are under ten seconds long. Meanwhile, others like create-a-wrestler are the complete opposite, and the lack of depth in customisation in this department doesn’t make it seem like it’s worth creating one at all and would rather stick with playing with the default superstars.
Finally, AEW Fight Forever shouldn’t have bothered having commentary if players are getting a few lifeless sentences spoken during entrances and after matches. This is especially for iconic colour commentator good ol’ Jim Ross (J.R.) deserves much more respect with play-by-play commentary.
Despite some of the glaring issues, AEW Fight Forever is a well-grounded entry into the franchise and has done its job to deliver a retro-like wrestling game to adhere to wrestling fans of previous generations and even new-age wrestling fans can fully appreciate.
