WWE WrestleMania 21 - Review
Added July 2nd, 2005 by Dakota Grabowski
Introduction:
When wrestling was huge in the early 1990’s, I became one of its biggest followers. At that time, it wasn’t declared “fake” and all the legendary wrestlers were present to make the show fantastic. Bret Hart, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Razor Ramon, Lex Luger, Diesel and so many more were packed into one show that it was overwhelming. The WWF drew from the wrestlers’ personal gimmicks. Doink the Clown’s attention-grabber was of being a prankster and it was nice to routinely see for sights and gags. Wrestlers like El Gigante, The Mountie, IRS, Repo Man and several others had successful runs, in the fact that the fans actually believed their storylines and their portrayal of each character. That was then, and this is now.
The WWF has now become the WWE and the writers are digging at the bottom of the barrel trying to recreate the successful stint from the 90’s. The same could be said with their wrestling games. They peaked with WWF No Mercy and nothing to date has come close to greatness since then. Many wrestling games have appeared since WWF No Mercy such as WWE Raw 1 & 2; all the Smackdown games on the PS2; Royal Rumble on the Dreamcast; and GameCube’s Wrestlemania 18-19 and Day of Reckoning. But none have come anywhere near to capturing the gameplay right. Speaking of the Wrestlemania series, it has now transferred over to being an Xbox exclusive title. Has it suffered the same fate as the previous Raw games? With my experience in wrestling games dating back to the NES, Genesis and SNES, I have seen the best the genre could offer and Wrestlemania 21 does not even come close to the high requirements. Better yet, it doesn’t even match up to the previous installment that was on the GameCube.
Gameplay:
The game was handled by Studio Gigante. They originally worked on Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus when Microsoft published it. Tao Feng focused on breaking bones, ligaments, joints and all other limbs attached to the human body. Tao Feng wasn’t a huge commercial success but it did have enough gas in the tank to gain the wrestling fans’ attention. WrestleMania 21 shouldn’t be compared to Tao Feng at all. In overall gameplay, WrestleMania is a failure even when compared to their first Xbox project.
When wrestling was huge in the early 1990’s, I became one of its biggest followers. At that time, it wasn’t declared “fake” and all the legendary wrestlers were present to make the show fantastic. Bret Hart, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Razor Ramon, Lex Luger, Diesel and so many more were packed into one show that it was overwhelming. The WWF drew from the wrestlers’ personal gimmicks. Doink the Clown’s attention-grabber was of being a prankster and it was nice to routinely see for sights and gags. Wrestlers like El Gigante, The Mountie, IRS, Repo Man and several others had successful runs, in the fact that the fans actually believed their storylines and their portrayal of each character. That was then, and this is now.
The WWF has now become the WWE and the writers are digging at the bottom of the barrel trying to recreate the successful stint from the 90’s. The same could be said with their wrestling games. They peaked with WWF No Mercy and nothing to date has come close to greatness since then. Many wrestling games have appeared since WWF No Mercy such as WWE Raw 1 & 2; all the Smackdown games on the PS2; Royal Rumble on the Dreamcast; and GameCube’s Wrestlemania 18-19 and Day of Reckoning. But none have come anywhere near to capturing the gameplay right. Speaking of the Wrestlemania series, it has now transferred over to being an Xbox exclusive title. Has it suffered the same fate as the previous Raw games? With my experience in wrestling games dating back to the NES, Genesis and SNES, I have seen the best the genre could offer and Wrestlemania 21 does not even come close to the high requirements. Better yet, it doesn’t even match up to the previous installment that was on the GameCube.
Gameplay:
The game was handled by Studio Gigante. They originally worked on Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus when Microsoft published it. Tao Feng focused on breaking bones, ligaments, joints and all other limbs attached to the human body. Tao Feng wasn’t a huge commercial success but it did have enough gas in the tank to gain the wrestling fans’ attention. WrestleMania 21 shouldn’t be compared to Tao Feng at all. In overall gameplay, WrestleMania is a failure even when compared to their first Xbox project.
First things first, WWE Wrestlemania 21 is already an outdated wrestling game. It was outdated when it released in April, due to the fact that the developers couldn’t even get a complete roster presented for the game. There are 45 wrestlers in total and one would think that is a good sized roster right? I think not. You have to include five legendary wrestlers and the six women wrestlers/divas. 45 minus those eleven and that leaves you only have 34 wrestlers on the roster, of which a few have already been released from the WWE. For those looking for a complete roster, these wrestlers are absent from Wrestlemania 21: Billy Kidman, Paul London, La Resistance’, William Regal, Chris Masters, Dawn Marie, Orlando Jordan, Kenzo Suzuki, the Basham Brothers, Carlito and so many others. It’s ridiculous to have such a small roster with a console such as the Xbox. The Xbox has a lot of raw power compared to other consoles on the market and I find it humiliating to see a limited roster.
Most wrestling fans don’t play wrestling games to use their favorite star wrestlers, but instead to create their own. The create-a-wrestler option is the only saving factor to come out of this entire experience. You are able to edit the nickname, hometown, weight class, skin tone, wrestling style, and other biographical information. After that, you are allowed to add on accessories to help create a flashier wrestler. Who knows, maybe the tattoos, wrestling pads, jewelry (John Cena’s blingin’ necklaces), and several other accessories might be the ultimate addition to put you over the top in style. There are eleven categories to tweak around in, each with their own subcategory. The level of detail you can put into your character is quite high. With the praise above, do you think it might be enough to save the game from oblivion? Well, there are several flaws within the create-a-wrestler feature. The menu and presentation is down right disgraceful. You’ll be forced to view each item separately. This becomes tedious and frustrating as it will continue to drag you away from the wrestling, and keep you plowing through the same menus over and over again.
Before I move on from the create-a-wrestler feature, there’s a little more to be added regarding the selections for your character. You will be able to create your own entrance. Custom Soundtracks are included on Wrestlemania 21, so that’s a huge plus for those who strive to buy every game that uses that function. Also included (as with several other wrestling games) are pyrotechnics, videos for the TitanTron, and crowd signs to be held by fans during the customized ring entrances. The game doesn’t hit it out of the ballpark with the create-a-wrestler, but it did round a few bases.
Now moving on, many wrestling fans mainly look to spend their time in the career/season modes. Essentially almost every wrestling game requires a career mode for it to have the complete package. Similar to franchise modes located in every football game, the career mode is for those hardcore junkies who live and breathe wrestling. Sadly I must report that Wrestlemania’s career mode contains the big three “D’s” that nobody wants to hear about a game. It’s dismal, disappointing and depressing. Let’s start with the dismal part. You only have one choice during the game’s course of the matches you compete in. Well, make that two since the second choice is failure and you’ll have to quit from the career mode. If you lose a match in the game, you must either retry or exit the career mode entirely. I hate to lose but sometimes I like for luck to factor into my matches and for the results to vary. If I lose, I would like to move on to another match with a different wrestler rather than rinse, dry and repeat the same match over again.
The second “D” is disappointing. The storyline in the game is disappointing from start to finish. You have one straight path through the career mode and it never branches off. Even after countless times of playing the career mode, it still remains the same rather than differentiating a little bit. There are a few double crossings and twists, but nothing that will make you use your brain to figure out why a wrestler turned on you. The third and last “D” is depressing. Depressing for the fact that I can’t ever use an already created superstar in the game but rather I have to create my own. After 52 matches, you should find yourself hating your character and wanting to use Randy Orton or even Triple H, but to no avail, there’s no option to do that. Dismal; Disappointing; Depressing; Wrestlemania 21’s career mode is one big let down.
Graphics:
Studio Gigante is known for tapping the raw power of the Xbox, as seen with Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus, and Wrestlemania comes close to providing the same level of graphics. Each wrestler is detailed with more than 10,000 polygons. If you want something to compare that to, Xbox’s original WWE series, WWE Raw, had only 5,000 polygons per model. On the GameCube, Wrestlemania X8 had only 3,500 polygons, Playstation 2’s Smackdown vs. Raw had a 40% increase in graphics from their previous installment but that still is less than half of what Wrestlemania 21 has. Polygons aside, Wrestlemania’s character models look tremendously impressive but not enough to prevent the graphics department from failing.
Most wrestling fans don’t play wrestling games to use their favorite star wrestlers, but instead to create their own. The create-a-wrestler option is the only saving factor to come out of this entire experience. You are able to edit the nickname, hometown, weight class, skin tone, wrestling style, and other biographical information. After that, you are allowed to add on accessories to help create a flashier wrestler. Who knows, maybe the tattoos, wrestling pads, jewelry (John Cena’s blingin’ necklaces), and several other accessories might be the ultimate addition to put you over the top in style. There are eleven categories to tweak around in, each with their own subcategory. The level of detail you can put into your character is quite high. With the praise above, do you think it might be enough to save the game from oblivion? Well, there are several flaws within the create-a-wrestler feature. The menu and presentation is down right disgraceful. You’ll be forced to view each item separately. This becomes tedious and frustrating as it will continue to drag you away from the wrestling, and keep you plowing through the same menus over and over again.
Before I move on from the create-a-wrestler feature, there’s a little more to be added regarding the selections for your character. You will be able to create your own entrance. Custom Soundtracks are included on Wrestlemania 21, so that’s a huge plus for those who strive to buy every game that uses that function. Also included (as with several other wrestling games) are pyrotechnics, videos for the TitanTron, and crowd signs to be held by fans during the customized ring entrances. The game doesn’t hit it out of the ballpark with the create-a-wrestler, but it did round a few bases.
Now moving on, many wrestling fans mainly look to spend their time in the career/season modes. Essentially almost every wrestling game requires a career mode for it to have the complete package. Similar to franchise modes located in every football game, the career mode is for those hardcore junkies who live and breathe wrestling. Sadly I must report that Wrestlemania’s career mode contains the big three “D’s” that nobody wants to hear about a game. It’s dismal, disappointing and depressing. Let’s start with the dismal part. You only have one choice during the game’s course of the matches you compete in. Well, make that two since the second choice is failure and you’ll have to quit from the career mode. If you lose a match in the game, you must either retry or exit the career mode entirely. I hate to lose but sometimes I like for luck to factor into my matches and for the results to vary. If I lose, I would like to move on to another match with a different wrestler rather than rinse, dry and repeat the same match over again.
The second “D” is disappointing. The storyline in the game is disappointing from start to finish. You have one straight path through the career mode and it never branches off. Even after countless times of playing the career mode, it still remains the same rather than differentiating a little bit. There are a few double crossings and twists, but nothing that will make you use your brain to figure out why a wrestler turned on you. The third and last “D” is depressing. Depressing for the fact that I can’t ever use an already created superstar in the game but rather I have to create my own. After 52 matches, you should find yourself hating your character and wanting to use Randy Orton or even Triple H, but to no avail, there’s no option to do that. Dismal; Disappointing; Depressing; Wrestlemania 21’s career mode is one big let down.
Graphics:
Studio Gigante is known for tapping the raw power of the Xbox, as seen with Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus, and Wrestlemania comes close to providing the same level of graphics. Each wrestler is detailed with more than 10,000 polygons. If you want something to compare that to, Xbox’s original WWE series, WWE Raw, had only 5,000 polygons per model. On the GameCube, Wrestlemania X8 had only 3,500 polygons, Playstation 2’s Smackdown vs. Raw had a 40% increase in graphics from their previous installment but that still is less than half of what Wrestlemania 21 has. Polygons aside, Wrestlemania’s character models look tremendously impressive but not enough to prevent the graphics department from failing.
The models have a plastic look to them and shine as if they were Jakks’ Pacific toys. That could have been toned down a bit and Studio Gigante could have put more effort on realism. The largest problem I can see is that the animations look great but not when you actually have to fight. The clipping problems when wrestlers interact are painful to watch. Not only has it made me realize that wrestling games no longer have the luster anymore, but I can’t stand to play the game due to the numerous animation glitches.
Audio:
Wrestlemania 21 has the same licensed tracks from Smackdown! vs. Raw. That being said, you already know this portion of the game is a failure. For a game to have the same licensed tracks, it feels as if they had no time left and grabbed the music from Smackdown and inserted it in Wrestlemania 21. Studio Gigante is lucky for the Xbox’s hardware supporting custom soundtracks as it does help make up for the lack of a worthy set of tracks. Another good factor is the career mode having their own voice-overs rather than seeing the scenes containing just written dialogue. It’s nice to see that they could insert the voices of the wrestlers to go along with the career mode. With the career mode being such a mess, it’s still not enough to change my opinion of how a game with such great potential could fail on all levels. The announcers don’t have enough dialogue to last more than a few sessions before you begin to hear repeated lines, which will make gamers irritated playing through a match.
Control:
Wrestlemania 21 isn’t difficult to pick up and play. The problem lays within the actual collisions, body slams, elbow drops and every other single animation in the game that should be perfectly incorporated in wrestling games. The A button allows you to quick grapple. Strikes are mapped to the X button that also works along with the direction pressed on the D-Pad or Analog stick. So if you press X and up, expect a straight up punch and the list goes on with every other direction you press on the D-Pad or Analog stick. Everything is simply laid out, similar to WWE Raw 1 & 2.
The clipping problems make it impossible to play through one match. There are invisible barriers that you’ll run into. Colliding with an object out of the blue wouldn’t be so bad if you could actually see it and learn from your mistake. Since you aren’t able to see the obstacle standing in your way, it takes away from the game’s precious moments. There are moments that could have been enjoyed like when you want to do a running drop kick at your opponent, but they grapple with another wrestler and you aren’t able to execute the move anymore. Another biggie is when you jump off the turnbuckle for a move, and either your opponent gets up too fast and you miss, or you can actually execute the move but still miss. Missing isn’t attributed to your bad aim; the game just doesn’t recognize that the rival is under you.
If there is one thing that makes up for the lack of control in the game is that Wrestlemania 21 contains a weight class system. For those who love using faster wrestlers that are small in stature (IE. Rey Mysterio), they will not be able to pick up wrestlers like the Big Show and Kane for body slams. If you are going to try and lift up a heavier wrestler, be prepared to strain yourself and leave yourself open for any and all counter-attacks.
Replay:
Replay factor is miniscule and minute. There is Xbox Live, but who would want to take this game online and hear all the other users’ rants? If you want to jump online and talk to other people who hate the game, be my guest. All the bugs, glitches, and defects are there so what’s the use when the game doesn’t even feel complete. The online is smooth but don’t expect to never get lag. There will be a smidgen of lag here and there but that’s to be expected. To be ranked online, you’ll be defending your titles to validate your worthiness. The more times you successfully defend your title, the better for your ranking. If you want some Royal Rumble action online, sorry but look elsewhere as Wrestlemania 21 doesn’t support it on Xbox Live.
There are several match types available in the game. The usual single and tag matches are in the game but each have their own variations to spice things up. There’s cage matches, hell in a cell, table matches, TLC matches, and ladder matches for variations for single matches. For tag matches, there’s another match included called Tornado Tag matches but it shows up in every wrestling game. For special matches there are “Bra & Panty” matches, which ask women to rip each other’s clothes off. There’s also handicap, triple threats, four way brawls, last man standing, battle royales and royal rumbles to participate in. If the match types don’t make you happy, I guess the option to create your own belt should be intriguing as you can defend it online.
Audio:
Wrestlemania 21 has the same licensed tracks from Smackdown! vs. Raw. That being said, you already know this portion of the game is a failure. For a game to have the same licensed tracks, it feels as if they had no time left and grabbed the music from Smackdown and inserted it in Wrestlemania 21. Studio Gigante is lucky for the Xbox’s hardware supporting custom soundtracks as it does help make up for the lack of a worthy set of tracks. Another good factor is the career mode having their own voice-overs rather than seeing the scenes containing just written dialogue. It’s nice to see that they could insert the voices of the wrestlers to go along with the career mode. With the career mode being such a mess, it’s still not enough to change my opinion of how a game with such great potential could fail on all levels. The announcers don’t have enough dialogue to last more than a few sessions before you begin to hear repeated lines, which will make gamers irritated playing through a match.
Control:
Wrestlemania 21 isn’t difficult to pick up and play. The problem lays within the actual collisions, body slams, elbow drops and every other single animation in the game that should be perfectly incorporated in wrestling games. The A button allows you to quick grapple. Strikes are mapped to the X button that also works along with the direction pressed on the D-Pad or Analog stick. So if you press X and up, expect a straight up punch and the list goes on with every other direction you press on the D-Pad or Analog stick. Everything is simply laid out, similar to WWE Raw 1 & 2.
The clipping problems make it impossible to play through one match. There are invisible barriers that you’ll run into. Colliding with an object out of the blue wouldn’t be so bad if you could actually see it and learn from your mistake. Since you aren’t able to see the obstacle standing in your way, it takes away from the game’s precious moments. There are moments that could have been enjoyed like when you want to do a running drop kick at your opponent, but they grapple with another wrestler and you aren’t able to execute the move anymore. Another biggie is when you jump off the turnbuckle for a move, and either your opponent gets up too fast and you miss, or you can actually execute the move but still miss. Missing isn’t attributed to your bad aim; the game just doesn’t recognize that the rival is under you.
If there is one thing that makes up for the lack of control in the game is that Wrestlemania 21 contains a weight class system. For those who love using faster wrestlers that are small in stature (IE. Rey Mysterio), they will not be able to pick up wrestlers like the Big Show and Kane for body slams. If you are going to try and lift up a heavier wrestler, be prepared to strain yourself and leave yourself open for any and all counter-attacks.
Replay:
Replay factor is miniscule and minute. There is Xbox Live, but who would want to take this game online and hear all the other users’ rants? If you want to jump online and talk to other people who hate the game, be my guest. All the bugs, glitches, and defects are there so what’s the use when the game doesn’t even feel complete. The online is smooth but don’t expect to never get lag. There will be a smidgen of lag here and there but that’s to be expected. To be ranked online, you’ll be defending your titles to validate your worthiness. The more times you successfully defend your title, the better for your ranking. If you want some Royal Rumble action online, sorry but look elsewhere as Wrestlemania 21 doesn’t support it on Xbox Live.
There are several match types available in the game. The usual single and tag matches are in the game but each have their own variations to spice things up. There’s cage matches, hell in a cell, table matches, TLC matches, and ladder matches for variations for single matches. For tag matches, there’s another match included called Tornado Tag matches but it shows up in every wrestling game. For special matches there are “Bra & Panty” matches, which ask women to rip each other’s clothes off. There’s also handicap, triple threats, four way brawls, last man standing, battle royales and royal rumbles to participate in. If the match types don’t make you happy, I guess the option to create your own belt should be intriguing as you can defend it online.
Summary:
Wrestlemania 21 tried to integrate a lot in one game, but fails on all levels. I am disappointed to say that the online play is at the top of the list for much needed rework. The online should have been one of the best areas in the game, but instead turned out to be sloppy. The audio is technically better than the graphics in the game as they did add voice-overs for the career mode, which wasn’t seen in past wrestling games. The graphics on the other hand are still hanging onto the great character models. The work needed to eliminate the bugs in the animations should not be overlooked. The last thing they need to focus on is to actually have a complete and full roster rather than this cut down showing they provided. The Xbox has a lot of power and I am sure that it could support more than 45 wrestlers. Maybe they’ll learn from their mistakes but most likely we won’t see another wrestling game this generation for the Xbox.
Wrestlemania 21 tried to integrate a lot in one game, but fails on all levels. I am disappointed to say that the online play is at the top of the list for much needed rework. The online should have been one of the best areas in the game, but instead turned out to be sloppy. The audio is technically better than the graphics in the game as they did add voice-overs for the career mode, which wasn’t seen in past wrestling games. The graphics on the other hand are still hanging onto the great character models. The work needed to eliminate the bugs in the animations should not be overlooked. The last thing they need to focus on is to actually have a complete and full roster rather than this cut down showing they provided. The Xbox has a lot of power and I am sure that it could support more than 45 wrestlers. Maybe they’ll learn from their mistakes but most likely we won’t see another wrestling game this generation for the Xbox.
