AEW: Fight Forever (Nintendo Switch)

Product Information

Although other titles may have taken this to the extreme, none encapsulated this fun arcade style more than WWF No Mercy for the N64, which many STILL claim to be the best wrestling game ever, over 20 years after it came out.

Fixed an issue in Stadium Stampede where bullets penetrated walls when hitting a T-shirt bazooka closeto a wall. Other issues are less serious but will still disappoint fans. There’s no commentary during matches, and there are only a maximum of four wrestlers on-screen (which is probably for the best given the performance), which sort of makes the Casino Battle Royale mode a bit pointless. In real life, this 21-man variation on the Royal Rumble starts with five wrestlers in the ring and adds another five after a few minutes, continuing this until the final 21st wrestler who drew the ‘Joker’ turns up at the end. Naturally, this is impossible here, meaning it plays just like an N64-era Royal Rumble mode: it starts with four wrestlers, and when one is eliminated the next one comes in. Arenas look OK, and with 7 different locations to choose from almost all of AEW’s sets are represented (Forbidden Door being the most glaring omission.) a b Clarke, Justin (June 28, 2023). "AEW: Fight Forever Review: All About the Boom". Slant Magazine.It’s tough, though. As someone who’s been a fan of AEW since its inception four years ago, I really, really want to see them succeed. What’s more, it’s been years since I last really enjoyed a wrestling game, and given how much AEW: Fight Forever was clearly influenced by games like WWF No Mercy — a game I have fond memories of sinking hours upon hours into — I had pretty high hopes. Lambert, Jeremy (June 22, 2021). "Tony Khan Discusses Eight-Figure Video Game Investment, Believes It Will Pay Off In 2022 | Fightful News". Fightful . Retrieved August 14, 2023. Due to a tangled web of licensing agreements it’s not possible to release a wrestling game with a roster that fully matches the television show, and many games come out featuring wrestlers who either don’t look the same now as they did when their character models were designed, or are no longer in the company. That said, there's some noticeable, almost inexcusable absences of characters and championships in the in-game roster that have been heavily featured in the real-life product for years, like Toni Storm and Daniel Garcia. Plans of a game for the promotion were reported as early as October 2019 and officially announced in November 2020, with the game being the first wrestling game developed by Yuke's since 2018 with WWE 2K19, before the studio ended its working relationship with WWE. The game is heavily inspired by previous console generations of wrestling games, particularly WWF No Mercy for the Nintendo 64, with an arcade-style of gameplay with exaggerated wrestler appearances and presentation, as opposed to a more realistic simulation style of the developer's most recent previous wrestling games. a b c Stewart, Marcus (June 28, 2023). "AEW: Fight Forever Review". Game Informer . Retrieved June 29, 2023.

AEW Games recently announced details of a major patch that came to the game in advance of the next season of DLC. Learn more here.What it DID have, was a great control scheme, fun gameplay, a stellar roster of wrestlers and an engaging career mode. …But Does it Feel Right?

Generally speaking, various parts of Fight Forever feel a bit rushed. Most notably, the game features the first version of the AEW Women’s Championship, which has seen two new iterations since 2021. Not updating the assets seems like a result of tight deadlines, or, again, just overlooked opportunities to capitalize at launch. Loading screens pop up highlighting wrestlers with a quote, but the quote is usually a throwaway line from a years-old match. You also won’t find most of AEW’s licensed theme songs in the game. Taylor-Hill, Grant (May 17, 2023). "AEW Fight Forever: Entire Game At Risk of Being Leaked, It's Claimed". Insider Gaming . Retrieved May 19, 2023. Fixed an issue where the title freezes after pressing the “Options” button during a gameplay replay. AEW Fight Forever has a few different game modes, and even a handful of mini games. Mis(sing) MatchThere were also some intermittent performance issues. Any time I ran into the ropes, for example, they’d wobble like I was looking at sine waves, and would take a surprising amount of time to calm down. The crowd generally sounded tinny and far away, as if the chants were coming in over a can and a piece of string. There were even one or two moments where the game just froze, and I I had to restart it completely.