Many of you know me as a huge WWE fan, so you may be surprised to know that I haven’t bought a WWE 2K game in quite some time. In fact, you have to go back to 2019 to find my last installment. The reason being? Well, covid for starters, but also the declining quality of the games.
WWE 2K20 was an enormous flop. A buggy mess of a game that was virtually unplayable at launch, and didn’t get much better after patches. Then they took a 2 year hiatus that was helped along by the Covid pandemic. After the flop of 2K20, I was naturally skeptical of 2K22. I shouldn’t have been, because reports showed that game made the right adjustments. So I decided to give 2K23 a chance.
I’m glad I did.
It took me a minute to get used to the new control system. But the new controls make more sense and make the game play much smoother. The move list is more specific and extensive, so get ready to spend even more time than usual creating a character from scratch. (Which took about an hour before).
Animation looks much smoother than previous installments. It just feels good. The reversal system has also been revamped, and is much more elaborate, making for some cool back-and-forth action.
The thing I spent the most time on in my first night of this game was the career mode, better known as “My Rise”. I mean, isn’t the point of getting a wrestling game creating a character to live out childhood dreams of being a WWE superstar?
There are 2 different career modes, one geared to a male superstar, and one for a female. Each involves completely different backgrounds and storylines, which definitely adds replayability to the game. In each individual career, there are also different paths you can take each week that direct which way your experience goes.
My favorite part? We voiced characters again. The dialog isn’t super great, and it’s a bummer that you don’t get to modify your character’s voice. But it’s so much better than having to read the poorly written scripts of the past that involve the superstars saying things you could never imagine them actually saying in real life.
I still have more to play around with. But so far, this is my favorite of all the WWE 2K series.
If you’ve been away for a while like I have, this might be the one to bring you back. Or at least it should be.
Cover Photo Credit: Business Wire
