AEW Fight Forever Thread

Okay, I've been waiting 3 years for this and started playing at 9am.... by some stroke of luck, I had a pre-set vacation day today & absolutely nothing planned..... After playing all day, I'm a little bleary-eyed & tired, so I'll post a few thoughts (the good and the bad).

For quick background, my buddies and I spent countless hours in college playing the N64 WCW/WWF Aki games.... we spent many late nights just having every type of match imaginable. Just great memories for me. And over the years as the WWE2K games became popular, and with the impressive, huge rosters & amazing graphics - but I could never really get the hang of the controls - our group always eventually dusted off the N64 "No Mercy" and went back to having those 30-minute barn-burner matches, yelling & screaming at each other but always congratulating ourselves at the end on having fantastic competitive matches....

I'm now playing Fight Forever on X-Box, FYI.....

* Fun. The game is FUN.... I actually feel like I can think of a move in my head and then execute it..... a far cry from any of the WWE2K games where I just got frustrated & put the controller down. My son & I have had some wild matches today! Like the old N64 games, I actually feel like it makes a video-game pro wrestling match COMPETITIVE..... like if I'm strategic, I might actually WIN. Never got that from any 2K game. To me, the 2K games always felt like a lot depended on random luck, and my brain simply isn't wired to remember complicated button sequences to pull off moves.

* The championship belt just floats to whatever character wins it, which I think is cool. My son and I have been feuding all afternoon over this AEW World Title.....

* After trying several characters, I've decided the Bastard, PAC is my favorite to use (so far). Dude's quick, has good strikes, and a hard-hitting moveset. His specials are pretty easy to pull off, too. He is the character I've had the most success using today. My son has settled on Cody Rhodes. We have had a few bangers over this AEW World Title.....

* LIMITED MATCH OPTIONS: This, I did NOT expect. You can't really customize the match rules. What do I mean? Well, we had a tag team match against the Young Bucks. Could NOT beat them. So we wanted to do a Hardcore, Tornado-style Tag Team Match. From what I find - you can't do that. A tag team match is a tag team match, complete with DQ's and count-outs. I have not found a way to change any of the match stipulations for any of the pre-set matches.... Only in the 1-on-1 can you stipulate "Lights Out" or "Falls Count Anywhere" - and the only difference between those (that I can tell) is that on the Lights Out the weapons are already laid out around the ring. Very frustrating that I can't have a Tag Team weapons/falls count anywhere, Tornado style. You can't change any of those options.

* ROPE BREAKS SUCK - I mean, they are barely detected. Always. PAC had Cody in a submission hold and Cody's ARM WAS outside the friggin' ring, but no rope break was detected. On a similar topic, the ref takes FOREVER to make that 3 count. There's like 2 seconds before they count "1".... it's just kinda weird.... The officiating in this game is every bit as bad as AEW's..... but I don't think this is intentional.. On another similar note, I miss the "TIMER" from the N64 games - this game doesn't keep time for any of the matches, no time limit is shown or used. Tag team matches can be long - and if there were time limits, part of the charm was keeping an eye on the clock to see how much time is left.... that's all lost here.

* SIGNATURES GENERALLY END THE MATCH - Really seems like if a guy hits his signature move, you are down for the 3 count. No matter how much you "mash" the buttons. Which I guess makes sense but you eventually get to feel like it's pointless to try to kick out at all once you've received a signature move. I feel like "in the old N64 games" there was always still a slight chance your guy *MIGHT* just kick out under the right circumstances, especially if his "momentum bar" was up..... but here? Nope, once you take a signature move - you are down for the count every single time - regardless of your momentum. The whole momentum bar seems a little wonky.... you can be kicking a guy's TAIL hard and all of a sudden he's "on fire" and popping his signature move on you (and then, guess what, you lose).... on the flip side, you can be "On Fire" - take a signature move, and be down for the count (even while you are still "On Fire").... On the bright side, we do a lot of tag team matches (we actually did that back in the N64 days, too) - - - at least then, your partner can *possibly* save you once you've received a "signature move".....

* Casino Battle Royale - wow what a freakin' complicated setup.... it took us like 30 minutes to figure out how to set up our teams properly, the menu is just set up strangely (and I think it locks up occasionally) - and even then - it doesn't seem like you can select who the CPU uses - - - so you inevitably find the CPU using some of the same guys YOU selected, and certain guys enter the match TWICE.... which becomes really confusing. That being said.... the match itself is FUN as heck..... it's all over the top rope elimination, and it's not too difficult to toss guys if you know how to do it. Which is nice, because a "Signature Move" doesn't necessarily guarantee defeat here; We had a really fun Casino Royale match - - - just wish we could customize which wrestlers the CPU is using and avoid seeing the same wrestlers in the match twice (or in some cases, at the SAME TIME);

* Exploding Barbed Wire Match - the ring explodes every time after 120 seconds. Whoever is closer to the ropes takes the brunt of the bombs.... but you both will sustain damage. Then you just fight to the end and it's almost always very bloody.... These matches are actually probably a lot more fun than I'm making them sound. We had a few good ones. Kind of wish you could have more than just two wrestlers in this though.

* Online Play - so far this is kind of a disaster; I had five online matches, and only two of them made it to the end. The bad ones got REAL GLITCHY... like, ridiculously glitchy... guys floating around the ring, no collision detection, wrestlers freezing.... usually when the glitching got bad, my opponent appeared to quit the game (or the connection just dropped out, I couldn't tell) - - - the two Online matches that I did successfully complete were a LOT of fun.... so I'm hoping this will get better. It's only Day One..... I'm sure they'll work some of this stuff out.

* Ladder Match - we had a lot of fun with this. Pretty true to the N64 version - - - use the ladder as a weapon, climb it, fight at the top, etc. Pretty straight-forward and lots of fun!

* If you are looking for Broken Matt Hardy, you have to add him manually. Go to Modify Wrestler, add a "Preset 2" to his profile, and add the costume. It'll then show up as an alternate attire when you select Matt Hardy. It is odd that almost none of the wrestlers have any alternate attires (yet) so I presume they'll be adding additional attires as the months go on - and we'll have to do this for everyone.

* I didn't delve into the "Create-A-Wrestler" section too much, it looks pretty basic. I always prided myself on creating cool characters even with limited options... my son created a character and he really liked using it. Honestly I didn't play around with this too much other than to add the manual costumes to Matt Hardy and the Young Bucks.

So, my thoughts after Day One: No, this game isn't perfect.... BUT, as someone who was a hardcore fan of the N64 AKI games - THIS is the game we've been waiting years for. There are some small glitches here and there but I'm sure they'll be doing updates and patches..... and I look forward to all the upcoming DLC and alternate attires..... I HOPE they'll be adding more match types..... and I really hope they add a feature that lets us change the match stipulations - AT LEAST let us have a Tornado-Style Tag Team Match (no tags)!

This game really shines as a multi-player "party" game. When my son and I were "competing" it was a blast, and I can't wait to have a "Fight Forever Party" with some friends to really get some feuds going.... I also really enjoyed the two "good" Online matches that I had. When my son took a break I found myself getting a little bored when I was just playing against the CPU..... This game really thrives when you are competing against other people!

My son and I had a blast playing this all day! We're planning to spend some more time with it on Friday, can't wait!

There is always this and all the other mods. I see people complaining that No Mercy is better.


Anyways, there are a lot of themes in the game. Some I don't even know, but there are a lot for wrestlers who aren't in. It really makes me wish we had Kaz and/or Daniels.

I got it on Switch so my son can play it too. Ehhhh. It's ok. I was actually caught off guard by some of the things I thought were going to be great, or looked great, and don't really play great. It's pretty clunky mechanically imo. The customization is... very bad. I haven't done the Elite story yet, but I was able to unlock Cody/Aubrey/Bucks attire/Britt attire after one match. Which I thought was kind of odd but I guess I like just having Cody.

I'm going to keep messing around with it later, but my initial reaction is that it's pretty mediocre. The roster feels so thin. I know they can update that via dlc but I also feel they rushed this out because it's taken so long and there are obvious problems that need fixed. Entrances being 3 seconds long. The reversal system isn't very good. I had really high hopes for this one. Maybe they can iron it out over time, but they may lose a lot of people out of the gate where that doesn't matter.

The reversal are definitely annoying me. I can reverse some strikes, but I’m having a terrible time reversing grapples.

Amazon was supposed to deliver it today, but of course they haven’t taken the funds yet. So much for having it on the release day. Amazon sucks. So I canceled my order this morning and ordered it at GameStop for pickup. Heading over there in a little while.

So far so good. Played it Wednesday & Thursday night. Had no issues playing online against a friend, which was so much fun.

Battle royal in the opening of RTE is the biggest load of crap ever. You can be full momentum and someone comes in with a finisher and immediately hits it and throws you out

I lasted a while, time wise (I think 3 people were eliminated), but the momentum was a little frustrating.

I’m wanting to unlock Brodie but I read you have to win the battle royal first and I can’t get it done no matter how many times I try