AEW: Fight Forever Review

thesixthaxis.com:

Having grown tired of the overly-slick and Vince-booked inconsistencies of WWE, I’ve been a big fan of the refreshingly wrestling-focused production of All Elite Wrestling. Sure, in the years since its foundation, it’s had its share of ups and downs, but for my money, Dynamite has remained the most consistently entertaining wrestling show in the history of the biz. With that in mind then, it gives me absolutely no pleasure to state that AEW: Fight Forever – AEW Games’ first ‘proper’ video game release – is pretty rubbish.

Created by pro-wrestling video game-developing royalty Yuke’s, it’s safe to say the expectations were initially sky-high for AEW: Fight Forever. This is, after all, the studio responsible for bringing into the world some of the greatest wrestling video games ever released. It’s a real shame then, that AEW: Fight Forever is not among those games – it’s not even close.

What AEW: Fight Forever gets right is its accessibility. Controls are a doddle, making the game easy to pick up and play. With a far more arcade feel than its 2K contemporaries, and with mercifully short wrestler entrances, the action comes thick and fast, ensuring that even newbies will be orange punching and coffin dropping with the best of them. There are no silly mini-games to escape submission holds or pin falls here, just pure button mashing, and special moves are activated with the flick of a thumbstick. What’s not to like?

Visually, AEW: Fight Forever is arcadey too. Character models are chunky and only vaguely fussed about bearing any similarity to the actual wrestlers. Chris Jericho has the right head, but it’s attached to what can best be described as an extremely ripped dumper truck of a body. Visually the rest of the roster is a