WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2007

Players will also want to consider stamina and momentum. Like their real world counterparts, the fighters are all generally big and beefy, and it's with perhaps a little bit of tongue-in-cheek that their stamina levels wear down rather rapidly and thus must be allowed to recharge fairly regularly. Performing too many strenuous actions such as continually running, or an ultimate control move (which are new for 2007) will cause you to run out of stamina and thus stagger around until you recover. This neatly mimics real-world wrestling bouts, with fighters being caught unawares whilst there are regaining their strength. Standing still will recover your stamina and pressing the circle button will recover your stamina at a faster rate, although both methods will leave you open to attack.

Momentum builds as you would expect it to, with whichever fighter is in the ascendency gaining more momentum whilst the other loses theirs. Once the momentum bar is filled you can perform a finishing move or store it for later. The finishing move is different for each fighter and can only be performed in certain situations, however the reward is that this will usually win the match. Using the d-pad to taunt your opponent will build your momentum quicker but yet again this will leave you open to attack and thus a delicate balance between attacking to build momentum and retreating in order to regain stamina.

Despite this being a highly competent wrestling game, there are some downsides. The amount of loading has already been mentioned and the sometimes suspect collision detection also needs to be taken note of. In addition the grapples performed between fighters sometimes doesn't match up, with one fighter seemingly holding thin air instead of the opponent's head. This is perhaps understandable though, given the wide variety and sizes of character models.

All in all, WWE SmackDown vs Raw 2007 is a feature-rich and enjoyable title, with not much missing. Now, if only Big Daddy and Giant Haystack could make it into the next version we'd finally be able to relive some of wrestling's oldest rivalries.

Page: 1  2 

NEXT PAGE >>