Def Jam Vendetta

"One great title worth your money"

Gameplay: 7/10
I must say, while I don’t play a lot of wrestling games DJV has the best engine I’ve ever seen in a sports game. Apparently, it uses an engine I’ve never heard of called the AKI engine, and while I don’t know the specs I have to say that I am fairly impressed. The game plays out like a normal wrestling game; grapple, punch, run, toss, do whatever you can to destroy your opponent. There are no rules in it so a lot of the moves are over the top and gravity defying. Counters and throws are easy to perform and really use the Playstation 2’s pressure sensitive buttons well. There are a lot of characters (40 I think) and all of them have unique moves and fighting styles. The characters range from the story mode characters (complete with upgradeable stats), real life rap artists like DMX and N.O.R.E., and a bunch of made up characters and two un-lockable bouncers. Unlike other wrestling games, this one brings back a health bar and it works fairly well. A cool new addition is that every part of the body has a different bar. While this may make the game seem confusing and clutter the screen, it works perfectly and opponents who are hard to pin will be easily submitted once you damage their legs or arms a bit.

There are some minor problems within this game, though. For one it is rather shallow. While story mode is incredibly long (and has a cool feature where women fight over you and if you chose the right one, you will get a REAL LIFE MODEL of her as a pinup to be viewed at any time) the game does not feature the many modes most wrestling games have. Tag team mode is very unbalanced and while the AI does a good job whooping your butt, it becomes incredibly stupid during tag team matches. Also, many of the characters sometimes become unbalanced against others. Rap Artists like Method Man Redman have distinct advantages over other characters and there are a few characters that just seemed to be added in to have some diversity among players. Create a Character (or CAW) mode is not in here either, and while I don’t have much of a problem with that, it would have been nice to see it.

Graphics: 8/10
The graphics are nice and detailed and character models are some of the best I’ve seen. The Rap Artists look like their real life counterparts and the made-up characters have a unique visual flare in them. Moves are nicely animated and this is the first game (I think) to feature 3d modeled spectators instead of sorry sprites. The rings, while limited, are nicely made and placed in cool locations like an underground nightclub complete with dancers in cages. While the graphics are nice some of the moves look extremely wild and far-fetched but that’s just getting nit-picky.

Sound/Music: 7/10
The audio is a mixed bag. I personally show love to all kinds of music but not many will find the varied hip hop tunes pleasing. Each rap artist has a “featured” song that plays during the game and even if you don’t like rap music you will find it raising your adrenaline and adding a nice atmosphere to an already great piece. The sound effects are your standard groans, mat slams, and crowd cheers (although there is nothing wrong with that) but the sound effects could have been more diverse.

Overall: 7/10
This is a great game that is definitely worth your money. EA Big is a company known for excellent sports titles (like SSX Tricky) and if you like wrestling games (or even if you don’t) this title is really worth your hard earned cash.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 04/03/03, Updated 04/03/03