Easy to pick up, solid, fun fighting game ruined by limited match selection and cheap AI.
But, in fact this deserves capital letters; BUT, after that point the lack of game modes started to annoy me. The greatest strength of WWE games has been the sheer number of matches you could throw your characters into. All Stars doesn't even have the Royal Rumble. The Royal Rumble has been in every game since Smackdown 2 and All Stars doesn't have it.
At this point I then realised my other main gripe about this game. In the earlier rush I had taken pleasure in the brawl and really relished the final moment when I stood triumphant over my opponent after a hard-won battle. With my excitement dropping I began to realise that the AI, to borrow a phrase from John Carpenter's'The Thing', was a "cheating b***h". In matches against my brother he couldn't touch me for the amount of reversals I was landing, against the AI my character (the Ultimate Warrior by choice) would suddenly become as inept and cack-handed as my brother's Triple H ever was. Every move I attempted was reversed and no matter how good my timing was I would only land 1 reversal in 5 on average.
This wouldn't have been such a problem were there a substantial story mode to work through in order to improve my skills. However the "Paths of Champions" mode is about as substantial as a ketchup on white bread sandwich. There are 3 paths, on each of which you are 9 matches away from a title shot against the Undertaker, Randy Orton or D-X during which you are subjected to 3 cutscenes where the respective superstar phones in their lines. Fortunately these are skippable otherwise I may have suffered a cerebral oedema from over-exposure to under-acting. (WWE superstars underacting? I thought such a thing was a felony) Though unlocking everything in the game will require you to play through each path with every superstar I just couldn't sit through the sheer monotony.
If you play the game for every achievement you're looking a maaaany many hours of gameplay, simply because of how much you'll be forced to repeat.
So, in summary, WWE All Stars is a game that had potential for great fun, but failed to live up to its predecessor's strengths and eventually persuaded me to trade it in because of its Cheap AI and artificially extended game life. After this game I'm looking at Dynasty Warriors much more kindly.