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WWE SmackDown vs Raw 2009 Review
Written by Chris Buffa on Monday, November 17, 2008
Impressive ring entrances complete with theme music, 29 wrestlers, seven match types, 17 different arenas.
Awful and near impossible to use control scheme, slow-paced combat.
WWE SmackDown vs Raw 2009 has impressive ring entrances and that's one of the few good things to say about it. THQ went with a horrible control scheme that makes the game near unplayable and incredibly annoying. Watching wrestlers walk to the ring is great, but flashy visuals mean little when the action smells worse than a pair of used tights.
Instead of tracing lines to body slam your opponents, like in last year's game, you maneuver your wrestler with the d-pad and perform moves by tapping the screen to punch, but since the game moves slower than a turtle, you'll often miss and watch as your opponent lands all of his strikes. In addition, grabbing someone is almost impossible because the computer cheats. Whenever we attempt a grapple by drawing a circle on the touch screen, the artificial intelligence usually backs away or scores a successful counter. This often results in our wrestler on his back and us frantically tapping the screen or rubbing back and forth to make him get up. Meanwhile, our adversary stomps our guy's head into the mat or bends his body like a pretzel with a submission.
In THQ's defense, the game has 29 wrestlers, all of whom have their signature finishing maneuvers, and seven different match types, such as Last Man Standing, Steel Cage, Hardcore and TLC (Tables, Ladders and Chairs). And as we mentioned, this is a pretty game, as wrestlers come down the aisle to their theme music and Titan Tron videos, stand on the ring apron and ham it up for the less than enthused crowd. So at the very least, this is an impressive looking DS game that lets you beat people up as John Cena, Triple H, Batista, Undertaker and a host of other familiar faces. There's even a limited Create-A-Superstar feature, a Season mode (where you attempt to win all of the WWE championships) and wireless Multi-Card play for two people unfortunate enough to purchase this game.
All the options in the world, however, cannot save an awful game. SmackDown vs. Raw's atrocious controls make it one of the worst wrestling efforts in recent memory and a textbook example of how not to utilize the DS' abilities. If you own a PSP, go with that version instead.
