Backlog Quest II: Day 5 – WWE All Stars (3DS) – Decades of Spandex

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Dear Journal,

Today I wrestled Andre the Giant as The Rock.

WWE All Stars combined comically over muscled versions of some of the WWE’s biggest stars (or WWF as it was called when many of them rose to fame), all together in one game. It’s sort of like Field of Dreams, only with a lot more spandex. Facing off against wrestles over the decades through various “story modes” in order to make the pay-per view headliner and of course win the title.

There was a time when some of the most entertaining (and electrifying) video games actually had WWF on the cover; especially during the N64 era. Hours were spent playing WWF Warzone and WWF Attitude in my house. These games sometimes featured special unlockable characters from other time periods, but no game had an entire roster comprised of some of the biggest legends in the history of the WWE.

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What was possibly the most interesting though about throwing WWE All Stars into my 3DS is how little has changed. Sure, the characters are now comically oversized, but other than that the game plays very much like the N64 games of old. Light punches, heavy punches, light grapples, heavy grapples. It is all there and not all that surprisingly, the format carries over to the mobile 3DS format pretty well. Playing through the pseudo-story mode in the game was always a little “meh” and never the highlight of the game. But playing a match while waiting on the bus, in the breakroom before work, etc., well that works.

It is also somewhat surprisingly that WWE All Stars, which screams cheap port to the 3DS, actually features some great graphics and probably the most audio I’ve heard in any 3DS game I’ve played thus far.  There is a fair amount of announcer talk, over the top animated cut scenes and of course plenty of wrestler entrance music and animations.

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Basically the game is a pretty simple arcade brawler. Nothing overly complicated is added to the mix, and the game doesn’t suffer for that. The flip side of course is that it doesn’t offer a whole lot to entice either. The game is fun, but playing matches over and over gets kind of boring and the controls are not entirely intuitive making some of the matches a tad more difficult than they should be. The exaggerated arcade style of appearance and gameplay mostly works though.

Those who have enjoyed the WWE passively over the years may not find the cast of wrestlers as awesome as those who have been active fans either. The WWE is starting to have been around long enough that there are several generations of fans as well as wrestlers, but the fans tend to not stick around quite as long as the wrestlers. I’m familiar with major icons like The Warrior, Hulk Hogan, Macho Man, The Rock, etc., but wrestlers such as Randy Orton and John Morrison mean little to me. The loyal fans over the years will get far more out of this than a teenager just getting into the WWE today.

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Overall, if you are looking for a 3DS game that looks and sounds great, but is mostly fun in short burst and easy to set down and walk away from WWE All Stars may be the perfect match for you. The impressively large cast of characters makes it likely that you’ll know at least a few of the wrestlers, and the over the top action keeps it entertaining enough to out last the somewhat monotonous nature of the game. For a now-bargain title, you could do a lot worse.
Tomorrow I explain how Looney Tunes characters with guns can actually be under-whelming with Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal.

Final Rating: 7/10

CBR Break Down:
Console Played On
: 3DS
Time to completion: ~ 1 hours (each story mode)
Gamer Score Earned: N/A
Price Bought at: $10
Current Price: $11.65 (Amazon)
Recommend Purchase Price: $10 is a good price, especially if you are not a huge WWE fan.
Why you should buy it: Fun in short burst.
Why you shouldn’t buy it: It wouldn’t keep you entertained on a long flight.

Check out all the Backlog Quest II journal entries!

Check out all the Backlog Quest II journal entries!

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