C.S.

Any reason why? That seems really odd for a volunteer website. Actually, for a website in general. Such a policy makes sense for print media, obviously, but online? I realize 99% of the internet has no concept of brevity and just vomits out an overabundance of words, but it still seems like a strange restriction to me. If it were me, I would've written 1050 words - I highly doubt anyone would check - but I'm a bit of a rebel that way.

Very nice and fair review, @The Man in Blak. I was wondering why it took so long to publish. If you wrote it a month ago and the site held onto it all this time, that's...odd. (BTW, is the byline still scrambled, or are you Steve Gillham?) Anyway, the only thing I would've added is a paragraph on how limited the CAW mode is. You mentioned some things I didn't even know about - like being able to trigger chain wrestling. I just wish we knew how. I think you liked the minigames more than me. I love the idea of them, but the execution is lacking IMO. (The baseball one is genuinely fun though.) Once again, I love the transparency (how long you played, which system, how you acquired it, etc.) and accessibility information.

In the American Nightmare documentary, Cody mentioned leaving AEW because of a "personal issue." The Young Bucks are included in the doc. Kenny Omega isn't. Omega also reportedly has to be separated from CM Punk whenever they're in the same building, but we've heard no such news about Punk and the Bucks. In addition to that, Punk mentioned the Bucks in his return promo but not Omega. Is Omega the socially maladjusted egocentric weirdo he comes across as, or am I reading too much into nothing? Seems like there's smoke here though.

Dragunov looks like a Russian mobster. He should shave.

I hope Mami eventually beats Melo for the NXT Championship.

It wouldn't happen in AEW either though. (If Dark and Elevation were still around, that's where he'd be after a couple of months. But I guess Rampage and ROH are the new versions of that.) So, where would he be a star?

Time for the TRUE main event, featuring YOUR NXT North America Champion and the man who drew this house all by himself (okay, well, with Mami) - DOMINIK MYSTERIO! I hope he retains. Wes Lee isn't a star. I like Ali, but Dom is a STAR. You're not wrong. How is Damon Kemp so much better at this than his rapist brother?

I dunno... He exceeded my (granted, rock bottom) expectations. A star wasn't born tonight - and I'm not convinced he ever will be one - but if he gets a Wardlow push tossing lightweights around like he did after the match, it could work.

The Rapist looks like Jonathan Gresham next to Baron Corbin. He didn't embarrass himself, but he doesn't excite me either. Still, it's a win for him, because he was smooth and solid. Lame finish though. Nothing about this was ever a blood feud that would necessitate a double-DQ. He looked better after the match tossing Cruiserweight-sized dudes around. That's always a winning formula.

Main Event - WWE NXT Championship: Carmelo Hayes © vs. Ilja Dragunov TRUE Main Event - NXT North American Championship: Dominik Mysterio © vs. Mustafa Ali vs. Wes Lee NXT Women’s Championship: Tiffany Stratton © vs. Thea Hail NXT Tag Team Championship: Gallus (Mark Coffey and Wolfgang) © vs. Tony D’Angelo and Stacks NXT Debut: Gable Steveson vs. Baron Corbin Weapons Wild Match: Roxanne Perez vs. Blair Davenport Pre-Show Match: Nathan Frazer, Dragon Lee, Yulisa Leon, and Valentina Feroz vs. Noam Dar, Oro Mensah, Lash Legend, and Jakara Jackson

Rhythm and Blues too. Even if Greg did change his gimmick to match Honky's, it was still odd. I assume Ax is the talented one in your mind? While I don't think Crush was that bad - maybe limited, but he handled himself well enough - Bill Eadie has a major career as The Masked Superstar long before ever becoming Ax. Rock 'n Sock was rightly one of the first mentioned, but Stone Cold and Mankind is a great forgotten example of this.

Regal and "The Earl of Eaton" Robert (Bobby) Eaton is a classic example.

Even though this adversely affects the quality, Tony is wise enough to realize than ROH-only shows would not draw an audience and would only be a money pit.

Part of me wonders if MJF and Starks both bounce after their contracts are up.

Oh wow, I had no idea. What an awesome accolade for the greatest voice of our generation. I still have no idea why AEW hasn't scooped him up. Anyway, I've seen every "Rocky" - except, ironically, the one with Hulk Hogan in it - but I've yet to watch any of the "Creed" movies. Eventually, I'm going to binge them all - including the completely unexpected recent director's cut of "Rocky IV." LOL. Are you making a joke, or are you the dipshit from the other board? I called him "pal" too. If you're said dipshit, PM me.

I'm arguing with an idiot on another message board who claims WWE 2K20 (a broken, buggy, indefensible, irredeemable disaster of a game) is better than AEW Fight Forever. If someone wants to say they prefer 2K22 or 23, that's at least a reasonable take, but 2K20 was a catastrophe. His big response: the eyeroll emoji. Exchanges like this make me glad that PWO exists. Things can get heated here, but it's respectful and intelligent for the most part.

I'm still salty that "Das Wunderkind" Alex Wright never made the transition to WWE after WCW went out of business.

He's 18 years old. I didn't see the match, but he looked really smooth in clips. Of course it helps that Swerve was there as the veteran. What was wrong with the kid?

Brian Pillman Jr. is apparently gone. He looked like an absolute dork in his feud with MJF, but he also exposes AEW's complete inability to pivot when something doesn't go according to plan. Why not even try a heel turn to see what would happen? (Or did they do that on Dark/Elevation and I missed it?)

I can help with this, at least. Left and right on the d-pad (the arrows, not the sticks) will make scrolling much faster.

I'm almost at the end with Eddie Kingston in RTE, and I haven't gotten a chance at unlocking either Show or Brodie. Maybe I lost the wrong matches or picked the wrong options? Who knows. Also, if you don't beat Show in three minutes (not sure about Brodie), you're fucked because the game auto-saves after that, and you have to start all over again. That's pretty annoying. If I'm wrong, and I hope I am, please help a good brother out. The Owen grind feels quasi-disrespectful, even though it wasn't intended that way. Cody and Aubrey, thankfully, are easy to get - as you said (I already have both).

That's entirely subjective. I wanted a fun game with old school pick-up-and-play gameplay that wasn't the dire dogshit WWE 2K has been feeding us with a shovel for years, and I got that. Does that mean there's not room for improvement? Of course not. CAW is awful, even by the standards of 20 years ago. I'm not as hard on Road to Elite as most people are, but I never put much stock into thinking it would be anything special in the first place. It's a fun diversion. What I do hate is grinding to unlock a bunch of wrestlers - and whatever else - that should have been playable right out of the gate. Fight Forever isn't perfect, but at least it's not boring like almost every WWE game over the past decade has been. WWE 2K22 was briefly on PS+ Extra, and I loathed it with the intensity of a thousand suns. Broken, unintuitive, completely irritating in just about every way. I believe there's a trial for WWE 2K23 now, but I don't care enough to bother. @The Man in Blak's post covers the pros and cons of Fight Forever nicely.

Nowhere is charging $90 for it, are they? It's $60 for the base game (either physical or digital). I paid $70 and change for the Elite Edition (digital). Whether that's worth it is its own debate, but it's definitely not $90 that I can see - unless, maybe, you mean outside the U.S.? Then I don't know.

This deserved more replies. A big "what could have been" with his career. He was never a "super worker" or whatever, but he had great personality and charisma.

Lots of red and orange options, @Blehschmidt, but definitely a distinct lack of decent beards to use them on.