Is this better than Smackdown? (WWF Attitude (PS))

Member Name: saintsfanuk

Product:	WWF Attitude (PS)
Date:	22/09/01 (106 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Excellent career mode, plenty of wrestlers, blood!!

Disadvantages: Its old, moves hard to pull off

The World Wrestling Federation (WWF), when most people hear those words they automatically think, what a load of rubbish. Fair enough many people may have watched wrestling and don’t like it is their choice, but I for one do watch it and have been doing so for the past year. Naturally I would go out and buy a wrestling game for whatever games console I have. The question is why WWF Attitude? The simple answer is because it’s cheap and WWF Smackdown 2 doesn’t offer a good enough season mode.

I brought this game about 4 weeks ago for £8.00 from a shop in Southampton called CEX. It was so cheap because it is pre owned, but this doesn’t bother me as I have been trying to find it everywhere and hadn’t come across it until now.

If Smackdown 2 had actually included some of the stuff that is included attitude, it would have surely risen to a higher level. Although this game is old it is actually incredibly good.

GRAPHICS
=======

Ok the graphics of this game are not fantastic but this doesn’t really make a big difference on a game like this. First of all the wrestlers themselves, this wrestlers do look blocky and are not as smooth as Smackdown 2 but you can still recognise who is who and it doesn’t bother me at all. Then there is something which Smackdown 2 lack and that is the good-looking entrances of the wrestlers. In Attitude you see the wrestlers come out to there music with lights flashing and see them walk up into the ring and although there is no video sequence the entrance is much better than on Smackdown 2. The other thing, which concerns graphics, is the ability to turn blood on of off. This makes the game more realistic as when you are in a match you can cause you opponent to bleed, this also introduces first blood matches but more about them later.

SOUND
=====

One of the best things about this game is the commentary. There are 2 commentators, Jerry ‘th
e King’ Lawler and the great Shane McMahon. The commentary is rather good for a game this old, and a feature much needed in all the recent wrestling games. When the wrestlers are ready to start their matches the camera moves onto them and they start talking e.g. the Rock says ‘If ya smelllllllllll what the rock is cooking’, each wrestler says between 2 and 5 different things.

THE GAME
=======

As in any wrestling game there are plenty of matches (or at least there should be), there are also plenty of wrestlers. When you first start there are at least 40 wrestlers, with the ability to unlock and create others. To help you understand about this game a bit more and wrestling I will guide you through some of the matches available in this game.

LUMBERJACK MATCH – This is actually one of my favourite matches. The whole idea of a lumberjack match is that two people fight each other in the ring whilst on the outside are other wrestlers whose job it is to throw you or your opponent back in the ring if and when you are thrown out, they may also beat you up a bit as well. In this game however there are 2 people fighting in the ring with 2 computer wrestlers on the outside. You have to be careful here because if you are in grabbing distance of the computer it will pull you out of the ring and start beating you up. The computer also has an unlimited amount of health so whilst you are trying to get away it is constantly draining you of your health whilst anything you do has no real effect. It think that when playing a lumberjack match it is best to have it as a hardcore one as when you go outside the ring you can beat up the computer as much as you want.

GAUNTLET – This is a fun match, the idea of this match is that 2 people will start in the ring one opponent has a big advantage he can select a 4 man team. The other player has just one man which in order to win he must pin the other 4 wrestlers one by one. Onc
e one wrestlers is pinned the other one comes out, I found this match very useful to tuning up my wrestling skills as I was able to fight for a long time against different wrestlers and trying out different strategies.

TAG TEAM GAUNTLET – This is very similar to the gauntlet but this time it consists of 2 wrestlers against 8. The match starts in the ring with 2 on 2 with the usual tag team rules. Once an opponent on the team with 8 wrestlers is pinned then another wrestler comes in. Once a wrestler is pinned on the two-man tag team though he just walks backstage and it ends up with 1 man left to take on the remaining wrestlers.

ROYAL RUMBLE – Ah the royal rumble my 2nd most loved pay per view of the wrestling calendar (wrestle mania being the 1st). Although I have only seen one royal rumble I absolutely loved it. The 2001 royal rumble was rather different though as they started using weapons during it, which was brilliant and unfortunately on this game you can’t change it into a hardcore royal rumble. The idea of the rumble is to be the only wrestler left standing in the ring.

There are 30 wrestlers in total who enter the royal rumble. You choose the wrestler who you want to be (I usually choose one I hate because then I can save the best wrestlers till the end) and start the match. It starts with 4 people in the ring and every time one wrestler is eliminated another one comes in. You eliminate the wrestlers by throwing them out of the ring. To do this you need to do moves on them till they don’t get up straight away and then pick them up. When you are facing them you press X, X and left or right to pick them up and square to throw them out. Once your wrestler is eliminated though you then stat playing with the next one who comes in, which is why I use the rubbish wrestlers first.

SURIVOR SERIES – I have no idea how this came about but I’m glad it did. Actually I lie there I think it might have
come from the pay per view Survivor series, but I obviously missed the one with this match in it. Anyway in this match there are two teams both with 4 wrestlers in each team. It is a tag team match and when one player gets eliminated a new one comes in until one team has lost all of its wrestlers.

STABLE MATCH – This has to be one of the best matches I have been privileged to wrestle in on a computer game. There are 4 teams each with 4 players on. When one player is pinned the next one from the team comes out until again there is one winner. Once the last wrestler from a team has been eliminated then he stays outside the ring ready to attack the other wrestlers in the ring if they go out. It is a great match because if you turn hardcore on or some of the other stipulations then there is so much you can do.

Now I could go on and tell you about all the game modes but they are the most interesting ones and anyway if I did how would I be able to tell you about the added things, which makes these matches truly fantastic.
MATCH OPTIONS
===========

HARDCORE MATCH – This changes your current match into a hardcore rules match where you can do whatever you want, you ca smash up your opponent with all the available weapons including a shovel and a guitar case. Not only this if you take the fight outside the ring then you can pin him anywhere you like.

CAGE MATCH – This match is one of the most exciting matches in the WWF. To win this match you must climb on the side of the cage and climb down the over side. It is not as easy as it sound, when you start climbing your opponents shakes the cage so you fall off. You have to completely batter your opponent before you even attempt to climb out. I usually find it best doing my finishing manoeuvre and then climbing out of the cage.

TOUGHMAN – This option is only available when fighting in 1 on 2 or 1 on 3 handicap matches and it makes the handicapped playe
r have to pin both of its opponents to win the match.

WIN MODIFIERS
===========

IRON MAN MATCH –turning on this option means that you and your opponent fight each other for a specific amount of time and the one who scores the most pin falls in that specified time wins the match.

FIRST BLOOD – The first person to make his opponent bleed wins the match. Now this can be done with weapons of moves so you do not have to have the hardcore option on the fight a first blood match.

There are many other win modifiers but I will let you find out what they are for yourselves as I chose the most suitable ones to tell you about and it is the same with the match options above.

CAREER
======

The career mode is partly why I brought this game because on Smackdown 2 the career mode doesn’t satisfy my needs. After playing in the career mode on this game however I found out that it does indeed satisfy my needs. To start with you can choose weather or not to do a tag team career or a singes career. Me being me have done both. In the tag team career mode you choose a partner and you try and work yourselves up to becoming the WWF tag team champions.

The single career however is rather different. You start out ranked 20th and only fighting on house shows. Your first quest is to win the European championship. Once you have worked your way up to win this glorious title you then have to successfully defend it 5 times until you can move onto the intercontinental championship. You then enter at 15th for the intercontinental belt. Once this has been won and defended its time for the big one the WORLD WRESTLING FEDERATION CHMAPIONSHIP. Now all you have to do is win that and prove that you are the greatest wrestler of all.

CREATE A WRESTLER
=================

The create a wrestler option is very good indeed. There are plenty of different cloths and faces to choose from but I must say the th
ing I like most about this mode is the available music, which you can give to your wrestlers. Instead of having to choose wrestlers music some has been put on this game so that you can hear it and decide weather you want it for your wrestler or not.

HEALTH
======

Ah the one thing Smackdown 2 lacks (apart from a good season mode) is the health meter. This meter is good because as you go down to different colours your wrestler becomes less able to get up straight away and can be pinned easier. This makes it more realistic as on Smackdown they get up the majority of the time when you have just done your finisher. To me this is why this game is so good because it has all the options I want.

MOVES
=====

The only trouble I had with this game was getting used to the moves, as you have to press things like left, right, left and then O to do a move. It is good though because it gives you the ability to add in more moves to the game, just don’t be shocked if you find it hard when you first get this game. A handy hint also when you first get this game if you actually pause it during your match and look at the move list it’ll tell you what moves you can do depending on what position you and your opponent are in e.g. if you are on top rope and he is laid out on the mat.

OVERALL
=======

Bringing my opinion to a close I would say tat this is an excellent game and for its age is very well thought out. In some ways this is far better than Smackdown 2 but I can’t take away some of the extra qualities Smackdown 2 adds into a wrestling game. I recommend any wrestling fan to buy this although I think they should try and play it first to see if they like it because know that people like all sorts of different things in a wrestling game. Don’t forget is has old wrestlers but you can get this game at a bargain price.

I really hope that this opinion has helped you. :O)



FINA
L WORD
=========

Here is an interesting fact (well to me anyway) this is the first opinion that I have written in over a month. But be sure to see plenty more flying your way soon.

‘OH ITS TRUE, ITS TRUE!!!’
(Kurt Angle)

Summary: