AEW Fight Forever - A Much Needed Alternative to the Mainstream - gamescom 2022

ign.com:

As wrestling games got closer and closer to simulating the real action between the ropes, it has felt like some of the magic that made the genre such a smash hit in the N64 and early PlayStation eras was lost. AEW Fight Forever is looking to reignite that magic, and for both better and worse, it’s succeeding — Fight Forever plays almost exactly like WWF No Mercy, and while the core gameplay certainly hit me with waves of nostalgia, it also stung me with little rocks and pebbles of things that hold up less well to a modern standard.

Let’s start with the good. Fight Forever is exactly the kind of solid, pick-up-and-play friendly, arcadey wrestling game that the genre is very much in need of. A gap that WWE 2K Battlegrounds tried to fill, but fell short. There’s a button to punch, a button to kick, a button to grapple, and those buttons can be held down to execute slower, but stronger versions of each of those techniques. On the defensive end, there’s a button to block strikes, and a button to block grapples, and you’re rewarded with a reversal for timing a block just before the attack lands. This forms the bedrock of the combat system in Fight Forever, and just like in the days of the N64, the simplicity works well.

Other little nuances from No Mercy remain too. One of the biggest holdovers is the ability to hold the guard button while you’re getting up to crouch on the mat. While crouched, you are invulnerable to attacks, and are able to punish overly aggressive opponents with a quick strike to take back control of a match. Or if your opponent is wise to the tactic and backs off, you can just do a quick back roll and reset to a neutral position.

The momentum system also returns in exactly the same fashion, with a colored