new RAW 2 info and screens *inside*

[Guest Eagan469]

WWE Raw 2 Interview

Exclusive info and screens on THQ's sloberknockin' franchise.

 

July 03, 2003 - Every day, the question is asked: "What's going on with WWE Raw 2?" E-mails, phone calls, faxes, instant messages, board posts, chats…and that's just at IGN. So you could imagine the chaos over at THQ as they've continued to keep the majority of information about this eagerly anticipated game a secret for months.

That's why IGN decided to go straight to the source, and after a few headlocks, a figure-four, and a Pedigree, Raw's Product Manager Chris Sturr finally decided to talk. Lucky for him, I didn't have to bust out the steel chair.

 

IGN: What's the main feature that differentiates WWE Raw 2 from the other WWE games also being released this year?

 

Chris Sturr: The main thing is the four-player season mode. No other WWE game this year has that mode and we really think it's going to be a hit with the fans. So not only can you play a season by yourself against computer opponents, but you can also get together with three of your other buddies, and transform into a WWE superstar and literally live out their lives both inside and outside the ring. Whether it's backstage and you're sabotaging another superstar or attacking him from behind, or you're in the ring calling a buddy out and challenging him to a fight. You know how all of that smack talking goes, and this game is really dynamic and enables you to experience the different things that happen to wrestlers during the course of the year. The game isn't linear, so you're actually deciding the course for your character. I just think it's going to be a lot of fun and add a lot of replay value to Raw.

 

IGN: How many wrestlers can you control during one season?

 

Chris Sturr: Just one. We want you to become that character.

 

IGN: Can you create wrestlers to control as well?

 

Chris Sturr: Yes you can. You can play as either a WWE superstar or a created wrestler, it's up to you. We worked hard on the create-a-wrestler this year, making sure we have a large variety of parts, textures, and clothes so each wrestler can have his or her own look, as well as adding a lot of move sets into the game so not only do you have the wrestler the way you want him to look, but he'll fight the way you want him to fight as well.

 

 

IGN: Will the storyline in career mode pickup from current WWE storylines or are they completely original?

 

Chris Sturr: Nothing's established. It's completely original and completely up to you and what you want to experience. So if you want to create a rivalry between The Rock and Stone Cold, you can. If you want to set up a rivalry between The Big Show and Kane, you can. You don't have any set storylines, so if you want to team Rock and Stone Cold and go for the tag team championship, it's entirely up to you.

 

Career mode is really set up to play through one season, but if you want to keep trading belts or continue playing through the various weeks and pay-per-views, you can keep doing that indefinitely if you want. One season is going to take you plenty of time to play through, though, so we think you're going to finish up a season with one character and then start over with someone else, but the experience will be completely different because the story is up to you.

 

IGN: What are some of the other big features planned for Raw 2?

Chris Sturr: The next big thing is the variety of match types. For the first game, we really only had Raw, Exhibition, Tag, and some variations of that. This time around we have Hell in a Cell, which is a crowd favorite. The cell behaves and is modeled after what you see in real life, so there are doors that you have to bust through and the top of the cage will break open. We've also added a Royal Rumble mode, along with TLC matches where you have every table, ladder, and chair scattered around the ring to use as a weapon, as well as separate table, ladder, and chair matches. Each one of those is a game onto itself, as table matches you need to slam your opponent through a table to win, ladder matches, you need to be the first to climb to the top and grab the belt, and chairs, well, it's always fun to smack someone with a chair. Above and beyond all of that, we have eleven new and fully scaled arenas, and those include Raw, the new Smackdown, and most of the pay-per-view arenas with the exception of some of the International pay-per-views. Those are all modeled in 3D, so the crowd is completely 3D. It's probably the closest recreation of a Raw broadcast that I've ever seen.

 

IGN: How current are the rosters going to be? When's your cutoff date, or did you already hit it?

 

Chris Sturr: We've already set the roster, and it includes 64 playable characters and an additional set of non-playable characters who you'll see backstage or are involved in single-player storylines like Jonathan Coachman, Michael Cole, J.R., Jerry Lawler, and Eric Bischoff. Some of the new wrestlers you can play as include Batista, Goldberg, Randy Orton, John Cena, and Scott Steiner. This roster compares to the roster we had with No Mercy, and is quite easily one of the biggest we've ever had.

 

IGN: I heard the new Smackdown game has old-school wrestlers like The Million Dollar Man and the Road Warriors. Are any of these legends going to be in Raw as well?

 

Chris Sturr: Unfortunately, no.

 

 

IGN: One of the biggest concerns gamers had with the original Raw was wrestler control. How have you guys addressed this issue for the sequel?

 

Chris Sturr: The first big change you'll see is that we got rid of the original momentum meter. One of the big complaints was that you needed to build up this momentum to do your finishing move, but it was tough to do and wasn't very consistent. Now each individual superstar has his own momentum meter and it looks very much like an EKG so when your health and momentum are fine, you have a normal heartbeat. But when you start to get jazzed, when you start to build up your momentum, it's a faster EKG and at that point you can pull off your finishing move and it's not contingent on the crowd or their reaction to you, it's contingent on the way you play. So if you continuously mash the same button or try to pull off the same grappling moves, it's not going to reward you. You have to diversify your move set and your playing strategy so that you're rewarded with better momentum. And that not only deals with the moves you're performing, but the counters you're performing against your opponent as well. That change right there is probably the biggest you'll see, because what it causes you to do during gameplay is pull of more strategic counters, you'll see a more diverse set of moves and animations, and we've worked on the grappling range because we found that a lot of gamers just weren't able to perform grapples unless they were in right on top of their opponent. We've increased the grappling distance to a little more that what you'd need in real life, but it's greatly enhanced the gameplay, as well as the overall speed of the game. The countering system will be a two-button system, strikes and grapples, very similar to Def Jam.

 

 

IGN: Any special plans for the ring entrances?

 

Chris Sturr: We've taken what we learned last year with the cinematic look and that TV broadcast appearance, and we're adding more pyro, more special effects into the mix. We've definitely worked on the walk animations for the superstars so that they don't have that stiff look to them anymore, it's more fluid. And we've really worked on capturing the camera angles that you see on TV into our game. If Kane's camera angle starts from a great distance then zooms in, so will our game. We've also tried to more what the WWE likes to call the ID shot. It's where the camera comes in close on a superstars face and you see the emotion, you see the expressions, you see them jawing to the crowd. It's that type of intensity we're trying to capture for your Xbox.

 

IGN: Are you going to be able to rip your own songs and use them for the ring entrances?

 

Chris Sturr: You will be able to use Custom Soundtracks and incorporate your own songs for your created wrestlers, but I don't think that will be the case for the WWE superstars. But for your created wrestler, yes, you can use whatever song you want for their ring entrance.

 

IGN: What song will your created wrestler use as his theme music?

 

Chris Sturr: I think my guy will come out to Master of Puppets.

 

IGN: When I first heard about the game, I heard there was blood. Then I heard it was taken out. I just wanted to set the record straight, is there blood in the game?

Chris Sturr: No there is not.

 

IGN: Did the WWE or Microsoft force you take it out?

 

Chris Sturr: Neither, actually. It was an internal decision. We wanted to do it right, and we didn't feel the technology was there, so we decided not to do it for this product. The blood effects you'll see on both Wrestlemania and Smackdown are both textual effects on the wrestlers faces, Anchor applies more of a splattering effect like the type seen in games like Pride. That was not the blood effect that was approved for us to use and we weren't able to develop a technology to do a texturing effect for blood in time. Raw features some of the best graphics you'll see on a system, and with the crowd being 3D, we wanted it to look right, otherwise we weren't going to include it at all.

 

IGN: I was curious how much influence the wrestlers have over the game. Do any of them approach you and complain that a move didn't look right or that you didn't give them big enough muscles?

 

Chris Sturr: Every opportunity we get to go backstage and interact with the wrestlers, we take full advantage of, but it's not very often. These guys are traveling and putting on shows 24/7, traveling 52 weeks a year, but like I said, when we do get the chance to bring the game backstage and show them their moves, show them how they look in the game, we're definitely taking notes on what they say. Booker T. one time saw a move in our game that he hadn't done in years. He was like, "Man, I haven't tried that one in a long time, I think I'm going to incorporate that into my regular repertoire." We were showing Hogan his character last year and he said, "No brother, that's not the way it's done," and he Hulked out right there in front of us and busted out what he calls his Fred Sanford punches, which are the three punches he throws before his leg drop, and now that's exactly how he does it in the game. Every chance we get to talk to the superstars we take. Stevie Richards has been great. He's a huge gamer and gives us input on the controls and the way the characters move and grapple.

 

 

Actually, Hurricane was talking to us about a move he was developing in practice. He was giving us visibility into things he was going to build into his wrestling style that no one has ever seen before so that we could try to have his new move in the game around the same time he was getting ready to debut it on air in real life. The only problem is, it's one thing to tell the developer about a move, and it's something else to actually see him do it. But I think that's the next step we're going to take, working with superstars so that we know their new moves 6-10 months out.

 

IGN: Will Raw have any Xbox Live functionality like downloadable costumes, wrestlers, or arenas?

 

Chris Sturr: No Xbox Live components. It's definitely the plan for Raw 3, though.

 

IGN: How long before there's a Royal Rumble on Live? Is that something you see happening in Raw 3, or is that something for Xbox 2?

 

Chris Sturr: We hope to get it done for this hardware life cycle. The easy stuff is downloading new content, maybe downloading a new arena or costumes, or like you said, downloading a new superstar. We set our roster sometimes 6-8 months before the game ships, but what if a new superstar signs or someone who wasn't in the game emerges as a major player on the roster? It would be great to be able to buy the game, then a month later, download that superstar. The next step after that would be single and tag team matches, then from there it would be something like the Royal Rumble. Above and beyond that, the ultimate goal is to have a community with some type of season online.

 

 

IGN: Now that you've made a WWE game, any plans of stepping in the ring for real?

 

Chris Sturr: I actually took my first bump. They had me squat down and cross my hands across my chest and basically fall back. One of the directors at the WWE showed us how to do this, but they kept telling us that the key was to keep your chin tucked into your chest, which is something I wasn't able to do, and man, did I pay the price. You're supposed to land flat on your back and smack your arms against the mat to disperse the energy. It's amazing to see these guys jump off ladders and cages when I felt what it was like to basically just fall over. It makes you realize what these guys do in the ring is real. What these guys do is not fake, you can get hurt, and they're professionals. Taking the bump was fun, but it kind of hurts. All of our necks and chests were sore because it snaps your neck back when you land. I have new respect for these guys, and we want you to feel that pain in the videogame. We want everyone to know what it's like to take a bump.

[Guest Flyboy]

Eh, it's worth at least a rental. Why?

 

You will be able to use Custom Soundtracks and incorporate your own songs for your created wrestlers, but I don't think that will be the case for the WWE superstars. But for your created wrestler, yes, you can use whatever song you want for their ring entrance.

 

I know that doesn't make the game at all, but the thought of being able to do that is nearly orgasmic.

[Guest SP-1]

I'm . . . interested.

 

Slightly.

 

Question: is that Flair getting suplexed in that last pic? If it is, they need to lighten his skin up a little. Naitch is tan and all, but not *that* dark.

[Guest Flyboy]

Question: is that Flair getting suplexed in that last pic? If it is, they need to lighten his skin up a little. Naitch is tan and all, but not *that* dark.

Yes.

[Guest Eagan469]

Eh, it's worth at least a rental.  Why?

 

You will be able to use Custom Soundtracks and incorporate your own songs for your created wrestlers, but I don't think that will be the case for the WWE superstars. But for your created wrestler, yes, you can use whatever song you want for their ring entrance.

 

I know that doesn't make the game at all, but the thought of being able to do that is nearly orgasmic.

I'm hoping that in RAW 3 you can issue open challenges across X-Box live with your CAW's.

 

Imagine you're playing as a tag-team with your buddy, and all of a sudden "DA DA DA, DA DA DA, DA DA DA DA DA, We're not the mounties!" starts playing and the Quebecers come out to challenge you!

 

I *would* mark out.

[Guest redbaron51]

if they fix the controls, then its a must buy

[Guest MrRant]

Eh, it's worth at least a rental. Why?

 

You will be able to use Custom Soundtracks and incorporate your own songs for your created wrestlers, but I don't think that will be the case for the WWE superstars. But for your created wrestler, yes, you can use whatever song you want for their ring entrance.

 

I know that doesn't make the game at all, but the thought of being able to do that is nearly orgasmic.

Why do I think I know who you are going to use?

[Guest Lightning Flik]

Shit, that looks impressive on what they are saying. But that's saying and no seeing yet. Still gives me hope.

[Guest Flyboy]

Eh, it's worth at least a rental.  Why?

 

You will be able to use Custom Soundtracks and incorporate your own songs for your created wrestlers, but I don't think that will be the case for the WWE superstars. But for your created wrestler, yes, you can use whatever song you want for their ring entrance.

 

I know that doesn't make the game at all, but the thought of being able to do that is nearly orgasmic.

Why do I think I know who you are going to use?

Because I post most of my musical taste at your forums. But, tickle me. Who am I going to use?

[Guest MrRant]

Blaze of Glory to a black wrestler. With cornrows. And tattoos... lots of tattoos.

[rising up out of the back seat-nuh 0]

Wow, that is one out of date roster. It looks like it was done around WM time.

[Guest Flyboy]

No. No. No. Entirely wrong.

 

I always create "The Flyboy" which is a white wrestler that I used in an e-fed. There's a huge background that I could give you and such, but I'll spare you the read.

[Guest MarvinisaLunatic]

Im trying to figure out what Hurricanes new move is and what move Booker T hadn't done in years..

[Guest fazzle]

what move Booker T hadn't done in years..

Harlem Hangover, probably.

[Guest Lethargic]

Im trying to figure out what Hurricanes new move is and what move Booker T hadn't done in years..

Been involved in a good match.

[Guest Karnage]

All the colours still look awkward in this game.

[Guest WukenBloodstar]

I could say the same for SD 5, the colors look more clear in Raw 2 than SD 5 IMO.

[Guest Jobber of the Week]

What, no Spanky!?!? :mad:

[Guest MrRant]

What? No Spanky?

[Guest What?]

No Spanky?!

 

 

NO! BAD X-BOX! BAD!

 

 

I don't have an X-Box anyway, but rest assured that if I did, I would create Spanky, and his music would be "Genie in a Bottle"

 

 

Oh yeah...You know it.

[Guest WukenBloodstar]

I'll buy Raw 2, I liked, that's right...I liked the first Raw.