WCW Mayhem

"Revenge Is Its Own Executioner....Mayhem simply hurts."

Okay, so the title for this review is pretty lame.....but hell. Mayhem really is not as good as it has been cracked up to be. Bad control, lack of moves, and terribly choppy animation kinda kills this one. Hey.....the models and sound look pretty good though. Hardly enough to save this cart's soul however.

Let us start with the good.

Yes, some of the graphics really are incredible. You have an option to pick all the usual pay-per-view and TV arenas (such as Nitro, Souled Out, etc.) and they really do look great. Yeah, the entrances (I mean the fireworks and, is that supposed to be smoke?) are pretty lame....but hey, the surroundings look good. The character models look really good as well. If you just take a look at the character select screen, you'll know what I mean. The detail is incredible. Goldberg's all cut as hell and all the wrestlers' faces look smoothly layered on. The sound in the game is a HUGE improvement over the past games, such as Revenge and World Tour, for it takes a page from Attitude. Most wrestlers have their own entrance music featured on TV.....and it sounds clear and brilliant. Tony Schiavone's announcing sounds really crisp as well.....and well timed. Good ol' Mean Gene is there too, just intros for the wrestlers, and he sounds clear and Okerlundy enough.....so no problem with the sound. Sound FX are okay too.....from the grimacing crunch when somebody gets choke slammed on the concrete to the crisp sound of the mat bouncing on its springs after a slam. Sound is definitely a strong point of this game........however......

The control and diversity of this game is really what kills it. I thought Attitude was pretty choppy, but wait till you get ahold of this one. The moves look okay once they're executed, for example, the animation of a wrestler recoiling after body slamming his opponent. BUT....until the moves actually execute, everything looks pretty bad. The grappling is most always off.....whipped opponents are often difficult to do moves to....and some of the animations are just plain awful. For example, if you just try to run at your opponent with Goldberg to do the spear, it just looks like he falls down and takes out his opponent with him. What I mean from diversity up above is the choice of moves, not wrestlers. There are plenty characters to choose from,but the same can't be said for actual moves. Basically every wrestler only has nine moves, and most of these moves are shared between many characters. For example, if I remember right, Goldberg and Booker T both share about half or more of their moves. And lemme tell ya, with how bad the control is and considering the lack of moves, the grappling gets REAL old fast. So what about striking moves? Off the turnbuckle moves? Well guess what....a lot of guys share those too. But hey......let's not be too picky. So really, once you've played through about four guys, you've seen it all....done it all, aside from finishers, which really aren't that spectacular anyways. Then there are the Cruisers....who all seem to have just a plethora of roll up pins and submissions, which get really annoying.

There is one REALLY good thing about this game though that I found quite commendable....and this is the option to "take it outside". I don't mean just outside the ring, I mean outside. If you get both of the players to head towards the entrance way, you can head out back to a couple of places...such as the medical room and the ticket booths. It switches to a security camera view for a while like you're watching an outside brawl on Nitro. This was really a great, original, creative addition to this game that scored it many points. But still........not enough man. I didn't want to make this review too long.....just enough to fill in the important points. This game is a rental. Period. Unless you are just a wrestling freak and must have every title that involves it (including M.U.S.C.L.E for the NES), pass this one over. I would HIGHLY recommend WCW/NWO Revenge instead....plays better and is much more fun. And if you just NEED a new wrestling game.....wait for Wrestlemania 2000. I'm serious now...just rent Mayhem and see, please don't spring for its $60 tag, play it for a couple of days, and then feel like a jackass for blowing all that hard earned burger flipping cash.

Here the good ol' rundown:

Graphics--8 The character models and arenas look incredible.....but the choppy animation and breakup of the characters when you're actually playing dock this grade.

Sound--9 The sound is good......wrestler's themes, Schiavone and Mean Gene sound good. The FX are okay too......crunches, shock sticks, and chair-against-head sound good enough for me.

Control--4 Yup, here's the hemlock. Grappling is very cumbersome and many moves, especially running ones, are sometimes difficult to pull off, and they usually look bad anyways. Running itself is awkward and you find yourself heading out of the ropes when you didn't mean to. The striking attacks respond okay though and the moves are simple enough to pull off.

Gameplay--5 Again, awkward grappling, lack of moves, and just plain repetitious wrestling (there's a tongue twister) just kill it. The moves look pretty smooth when they're pulled off.....but overall fluidity is pretty bad (characters walking, running, etc.).

Replay--4 This one gets real old, real fast. Yeah there are a lot of wrestlers to choose from, but I guarantee after playing about four or five of them you won't want to play any more of them. Multiplayer can be fun, but still....same drawbacks apply.

Final Thoughts--Again, just rent this one and you'll see what I mean. I myself had pretty high expectations for this one, but after playing for about thirty minutes, I found myself waiting for Wrestlemania 2000 once again.

OVERALL SCORE--5

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/99, Updated 11/01/99