AEW Fight Forever (and other AEW video games)

[Mr Wrestling 2000]

On 6/17/2023 at 2:21 AM, C.S. said:

Did anyone preorder Fight Forever? I bit the bullet and took a risk by preordering the digital Elite Edition.

I don't usually go for digital, but I decided to in this case because the game is going to get incremental updates that wouldn't be on disc anyway.

Really hoping for the best here, as the WWE games have been unplayable dreck for a decade now.

I preordered because when it comes out i wont have time to hit the games store, i just got the base disk. I'm trying to temper my expectations for the game as Ive been burned on like dozen wrestling games at this point in my life. Saying that watching all the streamers playing it is getting me pretty pumped up to play some of the more ridiculous things. Shidas home run derby and the other mini games look like they will be very fun to play with friends on top of getting to throw bombs during hardcore matches.

[The Man in Blak]

I've actually been playing the game for review and, in general, I think people looking for something in the AKI N64 lineage will be pretty happy with Fight Forever.

[C.S.]

Thread renamed since AEW Fight Forever is clearly at the forefront and the rest of the AEW games are mobile experiments that have largely been forgotten.

 

5 hours ago, Mr Wrestling 2000 said:

I preordered because when it comes out i wont have time to hit the games store, i just got the base disk. I'm trying to temper my expectations for the game as Ive been burned on like dozen wrestling games at this point in my life. Saying that watching all the streamers playing it is getting me pretty pumped up to play some of the more ridiculous things. Shidas home run derby and the other mini games look like they will be very fun to play with friends on top of getting to throw bombs during hardcore matches.

I just hope single-player is fun too. I'm no longer a teenager/college student with a ready supply of local gamer friends.

 

2 hours ago, The Man in Blak said:

I've actually been playing the game for review and, in general, I think people looking for something in the AKI N64 lineage will be pretty happy with Fight Forever.

This is exactly what I was hoping for!

Where do you review games? I'd love to read your review when the embargo is up.

Can you reveal ahead of time what your rating might be?

[The Man in Blak]

Review is embargoed until the 28th, so I can't talk ratings or even too much review content until then - I'm not sure if I'll cross the finish line with my review by that embargo date but, once my writeup has been posted, I'll link it here.

[C.S.]

9 minutes ago, The Man in Blak said:

Review is embargoed until the 28th, so I can't talk ratings or even too much review content until then - I'm not sure if I'll cross the finish line with my review by that embargo date but, once my writeup has been posted, I'll link it here.

Awesome! Looking forward to it.

You're not the AMA guy on Reddit, are you?

(Those posts on r/AEWFightForever have since been deleted, but basically some guy got the game early and answered a bunch of questions about it.)

[The Man in Blak]

I am not the AMA guy on Reddit - I am just a freelance dude that occasionally writes reviews for gamecritics.com.

[SirEdger]

6 hours ago, Mr Wrestling 2000 said:

I preordered because when it comes out i wont have time to hit the games store, i just got the base disk. I'm trying to temper my expectations for the game as Ive been burned on like dozen wrestling games at this point in my life. Saying that watching all the streamers playing it is getting me pretty pumped up to play some of the more ridiculous things. Shidas home run derby and the other mini games look like they will be very fun to play with friends on top of getting to throw bombs during hardcore matches.

Is it me or the mini games included in the game have a bit of a Mario Party vibe to it? Given it's our go-to party video game among my group of friends, I think it's pretty cool that they seemingly have chosen that path for the mini games.

[Mr Wrestling 2000]

I would agree. I saw a stream of the New Legacy guys playing some and there was a no ropes ring where you have to push everyone else out, just like in mario party.

[C.S.]

Only a few more days until the first major non-WWE wrestling game in decades...

On 6/22/2023 at 2:31 PM, The Man in Blak said:

I am just a freelance dude that occasionally writes reviews for gamecritics.com.

I just took a look at the site, and I really like that these reviews dive into a game's accessibility or lack thereof and is honest about whether the game was completed or not.

No idea if this is you - I'm guessing not, since someone else reviewed WWE 2K23, and I assume that's you - but this seems like a fair review of Cannon Dancer: Osman.

https://gamecritics.com/jeff-ortloff/cannon-dancer-osman-review/

I ended up importing Cannon Dancer: Osman physically. It's not as great as I was hoping, but I don't regret getting it or anything.

The WWE 2K23 review is also great, but I can't say whether I agree or disagree because I haven't played it. I've been sick of WWE games for a while now. WWE 2K22 was briefly on PS+ Extra, and I hated it instantly. Everything about it just irritated me, for whatever reason. Here's hoping Fight Forever is more my vibe.

[The Man in Blak]

It’s actually been a couple of years since I did a review at GC - I requested the AEW Fight Forever opportunity back when it was announced (which feels like ten years ago now). But yeah, GC has had this approach to disclosures and accessibility for a long time and that’s one of the main reasons that I’ve been happy to contribute there.

[C.S.]

Preloads for the PS4 and PS5 version are now up!

PS4 took about an hour for my friend to download.

PS5 took me mere minutes.

I have access to both versions (digitally).

20 hours ago, The Man in Blak said:

It’s actually been a couple of years since I did a review at GC - I requested the AEW Fight Forever opportunity back when it was announced (which feels like ten years ago now). But yeah, GC has had this approach to disclosures and accessibility for a long time and that’s one of the main reasons that I’ve been happy to contribute there.

Looking forward to reading your review on the 28th!

[The Man in Blak]

Not sure at this point if we'll be able to make the 28th for the review, but I'm working on it. ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯

[sek69]

I have the game pre ordered via Amazon, should have it within a day or two of release I would expect. 

[Coffey]

I'm going to wait for reviews & watch some streams before I decide to get it or not. I've fallen for the preorder shit one too many times. Also for the "spiritually successor to WWF No Mercy!" on more than one occasion, too. 

[C.S.]

1 hour ago, The Man in Blak said:

Not sure at this point if we'll be able to make the 28th for the review, but I'm working on it. ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯

No worries. But definitely post it here when it's up.

In the meantime, I'll play it tomorrow and post my initial impressions. 

[C.S.]

My early impressions of AEW Fight Forever:

Everything looks smooth and solid, very easy to pick up and play, fun.

I played Eddie Kingston vs. Orange Cassidy and me vs. PAC.

CAW is very limited (so no Kamala for me), but it's good enough for me to create a reasonable facsimile of myself. Not exactly realistic to my body type, etc., but it's wrestling, so I guess I'm on steroids now.

Haven't tried Road to Elite yet, or whatever it's called. Cody needs to be unlocked. Probably a few others.

Cool feature: When you create a CAW, you get the "...is ALL ELITE" banner, but it goes by quickly, so I hope there's a way to see it again so I can screenshot it.

[sek69]

The interesting thing to me is how the plan is for them to just release updates and DLC instead of selling a new game every year.  

[Blehschmidt]

5 hours ago, C.S. said:

CAW is very limited (so no Kamala for me), but it's good enough for me to create a reasonable facsimile of myself. Not exactly realistic to my body type, etc., but it's wrestling, so I guess I'm on steroids now.

If you are screwing around and have a moment, could you check and let me know if red hair/beards are an option in the CAW

[C.S.]

4 minutes ago, Blehschmidt said:

If you are screwing around and have a moment, could you check and let me know if red hair/beards are an option in the CAW

I will check the red part and get back to you, but I can tell you now that beard styles in general are disappointingly limited.

[KawadaSmile]

 

[C.S.]

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

 

[Blehschmidt]

8 minutes ago, C.S. said:

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

 

Much appreciated.

Hopefully they'll patch some stuff into the CAW since they apparently plan to keep updating the game.

[The Man in Blak]

I filed my review the night before embargo, so we're going through the editing phase of it - at this point, I doubt it will get published alongside the launch of the game.

Ultimately, my take was that AEW Fight Forever was a great first step. It's thin on content (especially when it comes to appearance options for CAW), but the core of the game is a surprisingly faithful recreation of the classic No Mercy engine and I think that alone makes it worth checking out. Other than the fatal four-way matches -- which are absolute disasters, thanks to the AI -- I generally dug what I played out of Road to Elite as well.

They do need to clean up how CAW progression builds up over multiple Road to Elite playthroughs, though, because it seemed to "half-reset" whenever I would take a second playthrough with a character. All the stats and traits would be reset, but I would keep the unlocked signature/finisher moves that I would have assigned to the app, even though I would no longer have the additional signature/finisher slot stats.

[sek69]

Got the game today and messed around a little bit, if you loved the N64 Aki WCW and WWE games you're going to love this. It was super easy to unlock Cody, and man does it feel weird playing him in an AEW game now.  

I did have  few minor glitches, but other than that 's been a blast . 

[sek69]

So it looks like besides Cody and Aubrey (who are easy to unlock); Paul Wight, Brodie Lee, and Owen Hart are unlockable in story mode.