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"RAW 2 first impressions..."

Slow, unresponsive and boring. It feels like a chore to play and it makes me glad that I have a PS2 with Smackdown 4 and the possibility of Smackdown 5. It actually feels slower than the first despite what reviews say. Graphically its gorgeous, one of the most stunning games to date, fantastic character models and a real life like feel to them.

*Struggles to compliment the game outside of the visuals*

I am completely with Sav on this one, its utter guff to be honest and I am glad its just a rental as I would be kicking myself having paid £30 for this! A few problems I have encountered so far:

1. Turned Xbox on to receive damaged disc error despite it being completely free of anything. Did it two more times and it finally worked.

2. Setting up Table to put opponent through is streesful and completely disatisfying. Tried and tried to put opponent through using Rock Bottom and when I lined it up and did it the table didn't break. The only let down with the tables in Smackdown is that you can only put them through it with 4 moves and the opponent has to be on the table, I was under the impression that in RAW 2 you could do any move and so far I have managed to put them through using a boring fishermans suplex.

*YAWN*

3. Trying to get tables etc from under the ring is a nightmare, you press the white button and nothing happens. Keep trying and within 5 minutes you might have some luck.

4. Trying to get weapons, tables etc into the ring from the outside. Once again an absolute nightmare. Pressing black makes him drop it and even though the guides say you need to be in the middle of the ring it still doesn't work.

5. Shockingly slow game engine, very unresponsive and very annoying.

6. Poor layout of controls, whoever laid the control shceme out should be shot.

There are more problems with the game than I have noted down but I will list them as they arrive. So far absolutley gutted.

Avoid!

Well considering I've played No Mercy for more than a few hours I know where RAW 2's coming from.

Alistair doesn't he's more fussed about his beat'em up Smackdown series.

Generally I have no time for beat'em up's. They lack variation. Admittedly smackdown has variation but it's too arcadey for those who want a realistic simulation.

Bugs included RAW 2 is a good game.

I found a problem with the Smackdown engine. It went like this:

1. I started playing Smackdown.

2. I realised I was playing Smackdown.

3. I felt a sudden urge to turn the game off.

:D

Yeah IGN I remember reading the Backyard Wrestling preview, they said it was simple with location specific moves.

I didn't think it would be anything special but the varied locations look fun.

I expect it's good in 4 player.

Hedfix wrote:

> Backyard Wrestling could be good as could AKI's Muscle Men wrestling
> game.
>
> So there's 3 independent wrestling games going up against THQ's big
> three.
>
> Should be interesting.

I think Backyard Wrestling is already out of the equation. It got 6.5 on IGN.

I doubt you will find many places rating it higher than Smackdown 5. Its purely down to preference which one you prefer however I think you know by now which one I will be going for... ;)

The only review of it that I've got is Gamesmasters. They seemed to like it and rated it better than the Cubes latest installment of Wrestlemania but not as good as Smackdown 5.

Read in CVG that it was the most returned game for so many weeks in America which was funny to know. They didn't know whether this was down to the loading glitch or if people didn't like it.

Anyone know what Edge and GamesTM gave for this?

Unfortunatly this game has recieved enough good feedback to ensure that we're unlikely to see a decent WWE game on the XBox for many a year. God knows how.

What Tilta said earlier. As a sport to watch I can't bare to these days. However make a decent game out of it and they can be fantastic fun.

Ar.....wrestling games.

Good and bad wrestling games? Thats like saying there are good and bad bits to drinking poisonous liver snakes of doom.