One of the best wrestling games ever!
The game features 37 wrestlers, as well as 6 unlockables. Altogether, there are 14 WCW Stars and 9 nWo wrestlers. The rest are "fictional" characters based on real wrestlers. For example, The Black Ninja is really The Great Sasuke and Black Belt is Taka Michinoku. These "fictional" characters fight under two, also fictional promotions, "Independent Union" and "Dead or Alive".
The are 5 modes in the game, League Challenge, Exhibition, WCW vs nWo, League and Tornament.
The League Challenge is the main part of the game. Here you can pick a wrestler from any of the 4 promotions and take on numerous opponents. You can pick which promotion to fight for and which league to fight in, e.g. Heavyweight, Cruiserweight, or Tag Team.
Completing the different leagues and promotions will unlock hidden wrestlers like WCW's DDP and nWo's Randy Savage.
In Exhibition mode you wrestle in a single contest. There are 4 match types available, Single, Tag, Handicap and a 4 man battle royal. In the WCW vs nWo mode you pick which side you want to fight for and choose up to 5 wrestlers for each team. Then a series of one on one matches between you an the computer (or a 2nd player) will determine the winning team. The winner of each match will continue in to the next match and every other match unless he's beaten. If and When he's beaten, another wrestler from his team will carry on.
The Tournament mode is a 3 round, single elimination tournament. You can set it up with a maximum of 8 wrestlers or Tag Teams. If a wrestler is beaten, he is eliminated from the tournament. When a wrestler wins, he advances to the next round.
The League mode is similar to the Tournament, though nobody gets eliminated and there aren't any specific round. Up to 8 wrestlers can participate and the way to win is to get as many points as possible. The tournament ends when all wrestlers have faced each other.
World Tour uses the famous "AKI engine". This engine is well known for it's slower pace and how it focuses more on simulation than on arcade type action.
The style and control set up is simple and easy to get in to but also provides a lot of depth that most wrestling games really lack. Strikes are performed by pressing the B button and the holds and slams are done by pressing the A button. Instead of just pressing the buttons though you can tap the buttons for weak strikes and slams, or you can hold the buttons down for more powerful attacks.
This tap/hold system works for the majority of attack situations, like standing, running, and corner moves.
The analog stick is used for taunts and finishing moves. To perform your finishing move, you must build up your stamina, lock up with your opponent and then move the analog stick in any direction. Other finishing moves can be done by climbing the turnbuckles or doing a ground hold with full stamina.
Other actions, like blocking, running, tagging, and climbing are mapped to the C buttons and shoulder buttons.
One of the great things about The AKI engine is the ability to use ring psycology. meaning you can go in to a match with a strategy, and use your own tactics to take out your opponent. You could choose to go full force and hit him with move after move, you could play the match as a heel and use dirty moves and tactics, you could use a hit and run style. Pretty much any way you want to fight can be done.
Add to this, a great selection of wrestlers, from heavyweights and cruiserweights to technical wrestlers and brawlers and a great balance in styles, moves and difficulty, and you have a brilliant wrestling system.
The graphics in World Tour are comprised of simple flat textures and grainy, blurry sprites. This sounds awful but it's not that bad. The sprites I described are the crowd, and actually, they do look terrible. The rest of the game looks pretty good though. The wrestlers are quite simple looking and even though they don't look excactly like the people they're meant to, you can still tell who's who and all of their features are captured well. The rings and arenas are pretty detailed but are also quite simple. Though this is due to the arenas being based on Japanese promotions where things are set out a lot more basic, unlike a typical WCW Nitro or PPV set up. Because of this, the WCW Atmosphere isn't captured and instead, feels like WCW
changed their image and became a Japanese based company.
The animations are really well done and add a lot to the game. Some moves look a little weak when they should have a decent impact but apart from that everything looks great and runs smoothly.
The sound effects are also great. The slams and throws sound perfect and there's a lot of variety in the effects with different sounds for where the impact happens or from the type of move. The crowd could have been better as there is no neutral sound coming from them. It'll be dead quiet and then suddenly there'll be a huge burst of sound when you pull off a move or taunt the crowd or your opponent. The punches, kicks and holds sound ok for the most part but could've had a bit more variety.
There are only two songs that play during matches, which is a little dissapointing but luckily they don't get annoying or repetitive. The sogns are just generic rock instrumentals but go quite well with the rest of the game.
Overall, WCW vs nWo is one of the best wrestling games ever released. it's definately lacking in match types, visuals and extra features, compared to newer wrestling games, but that is no excuse to pass on this game. If you like other AKI wrestling games and are in to the more technical side of wrestling, you will definately like this. Though if you prefer games like Smackdown vs Raw that are filled with hundreds of features and use a faster, more arcade like engine, you probably won't like this game very much. But still, give this a try!