Finally, The Rock
is not on the cover of a wrestling game! The "wrestler" turned "actor"
whose catchphrase gave birth to Smackdown on Thursday nights and four
videogames isnt around WWE very much anymore, so it is nice to see Y2J,
HHH, Angle, Brock, and Booker T get the cover spot. Tucked away inside
the improved cover art, WWE Smackdown: Shut Your Mouth is a fantastic
wrestling videogame that is definitely the best game in the Smackdown
series and may even stand as the best wrestling game ever released that
doesnt have to be imported from Japan.
The Smackdown
series has always been known for its easy controls and arcade style
gameplay. The first Smackdown game established the look of the series
and introduced gamers to the fast paced gameplay. Smackdown 2: Know Your
Role brought improved graphics and a ton of new match types such as Hell
in a Cell and TLC. The third game in the series, Just Bring It, was
basically just a prettier version of KYR, and many wrestling fans were
very disappointed with it. Now the fourth game in the series has come
out and it definitely makes up for Just Bring It. Shut Your Mouth has
excellent graphics, a great story mode, a new reversal system, and an
overall change in the pace of gameplay that makes it a lot more
realistic than the other games in the series.
The season
mode in Shut Your Mouth lasts through two years of WWE programming and
follows some of the same storylines that have appeared on Raw and
Smackdown over the last year or so. The only bad thing about season mode
is that you cant use a female superstar, but other than that everything
is pretty great. The first year of season mode starts off with the draft
and allows you to draft for either Raw or Smackdown or just edit
everything yourself. You can make everything true to life, or you can
make the rosters reflect how you wish they were in real life. I chose to
put all of my favorites on Smackdown and shipped all of the jobbers to
Raw, for example, but you can set up your season any way you like. After
the draft, you may be invited to be in the King of the Ring tournament,
participate in a six man elimination tag match at Survivor Series, or
even take part in the six man Hell in a Cell for the WWE Title that
happened at Armageddon a couple of years ago. Storylines such as the
"Hair vs. Hair" match against Kurt Angle, the return of the nWo, and the
battle for ownership between Vince McMahon and Ric Flair are just some
of the storylines youll be a part of. The first year in season mode
features storylines that should be pretty familiar, but the second year
of the season will throw a few completely new things at you.
The ad
campaign for Shut Your Mouth is probably pretty accurate. The ads state
that these are "The best storylines ever. Period. End of story." These
really are the best storylines that have been put into a wrestling game.
Sometimes there are a few inconsistencies, but it isnt really anything
WWE hasnt already tried to pull. The nWo storyline in particular is
kind of funny because it plays out exactly like it did in real life
Vince talks about injecting his creation with poison and then turns
around to reveal "NWO" written on the back of a chair and then the
group debuts and announces that Shawn Michaels is their new leader.
After about a month, the nWo disappears and is never heard from again,
just like in real WWE.
Throughout
the course of a season, you are given several opportunities to control
your own storylines. When you arent in a match, you are allowed to
wander around backstage in first person mode and talk to any superstars
you might find or even go to the big boss monkey men and ask for a title
shot. Depending on what you say to the people you meet, you can spark
new feuds or even find a new tag team partner. You can also choose to
interrupt matches in order to solidify friendships or just to piss
people off. Being able to choose your own adventure every now and then
when you arent involved in a pre-scripted storyline is pretty fun. I
actually managed to sweet talk Triple H into forming a tag team with
Chris Jericho (me) and we went on to win the tag titles. I also made
sure I was as nice as possible to the divas I met which resulted in them
accompanying me to the ring every now and then, and Trish Stratus even
gave me a valentine. Overall, the season mode in Shut Your Mouth is well
worth the effort. First of all, it is fun to relive all of the
storylines, and secondly, you unlock new CAW parts and moves and new
attire for all of the wrestlers whenever you win a match at one of the
fourteen pay per views.
Enough
about the story mode and on to the matches themselves. Shut Your Mouth
is a completely different beast than any of the other Smackdown games.
The pace of the game is noticeably slower than in previous titles. You
dont run around quite so fast and you can no longer jump up right after
Undertaker gives you the last ride. If you take a lot of punishment,
your wrestler will lay on the mat for a rather realistic amount of time.
This makes the matches much more dramatic as there are a lot more
occasions where you and your opponent manage to kick out after they were
seemingly gone for good. Another great change to the gameplay is that
you have to actually work on a specific body part before a submission
move will be effective.
Perhaps
the biggest change to the gameplay is the new reversal system. Last
years game, Just Bring It, had a reversal system but it consisted of
pressing the square button at the right time and the move would be
reversed 99% of the time. In Shut Your Mouth, you have to press the
directional button of the attack they are using on you. Not only do you
have to guess correctly, but you also have to time it right. If you
guess right, youll be rewarded by a cool reversal animation and the
chance to deal out some punishment of your own. If you guess wrong, you
are penalized by your opponent being able to get a few extra hits in or
your character going into a groggy state. Learning how to take advantage
of reversals is vital to your success in the ring, but it is fairly easy
to learn and is a great addition to the Smackdown series.
Another
change to the gameplay found in Shut Your Mouth is that the weapon
system has been reworked. When you hit someone with a chair, it actually
does a tremendous amount of damage and can turn a match around very
quickly. You can also do finishing moves with chairs such as RVDs
Vandaminator, a DDT onto the chair, or the Guillotine move that
Undertaker favored a few months back. You can now look under the ring
for weapons and find tables, ladders, chairs, and even sledgehammers. Of
course, you have to make sure the referee isnt looking when you use
these tools or you will be disqualified. Having to either distract or
just plain knock the ref unconscious adds a nice degree of strategy to
matches. Another great thing about the weapons in Shut Your Mouth is
that they actually deform when you use them. Chairs and trashcans bend
and crumple when you use them. It is also easier than ever to perform
moves on a table, and doing an F5 on someone through a table is exactly
as satisfying as you have probably imagined it. You can also now remove
the turnbuckle covers and throw your opponent into the exposed hardware.
Throwing your opponent into the exposed turnbuckle will make them groggy
and thus allow you to hit your special move rather easily. It is a bit
of a cheap way to win, but it makes the Slobberknocker mode a hell of a
lot easier.
All
of these changes to the gameplay result in Shut Your Mouth standing out
as the most realistic representation of fake wrestling you can buy. The
slower pace of gameplay, the fact the wrestlers actually get worn down
and cant just keep getting up, the improved submission system, the new
reversal system, and the improved weapon system all work together to
make Shut Your Mouth seem very realistic.
One
thing that sort of spoils the realistic feel is that there isnt any
sort of weight to strength ratio. It is pretty goofy when Stacy Kiebler
can suplex Big Show. No Mercy managed to tackle this problem two years
ago, so it is still a bit puzzling to see the Smackdown series not
correct it. This takes away from the realism factor, but it doesnt make
Shut Your Mouth any less fun, so it is just a minor complaint.
There
are tons of match types in Shut Your Mouth. You can enter standard
singles matches, tag matches, and hardcore matches as well as the Royal
Rumble and King of the Ring tournament. The special matches are what
have always made Smackdown really stand out and Shut Your Mouth has the
best match options available anywhere. Cage matches can now be won by
pinfall or submission as well as escaping from the cage. There are also
elimination matches available that allow up to six people in a match.
These are great for reliving past Survivor Series matches. Hell in a
Cell is now full sized (finally!) and it is much easier to fall off the
top of the cage. Pretty much any move can knock someone off the top of
the cell, but it is also easy to make yourself fall off if you miss a
move. There are Lumber Jack matches where four wrestlers surround the
ring and deal out punishment whenever someone leaves the ring. There are
also the rest of the matches you would expect, Table, Ladder, TLC,
Street Fight, Slobberknocker, and many more. Ladder and TLC matches are
better this year because two people can both be on the ladder and even
perform moves on it. You can also grab onto and hang from the belt if
the ladder is pulled away. The match options available in Shut Your
Mouth are great and add a lot of variety to the game.
One
thing that fans expect from the yearly update of Smackdown is an updated
roster. Shut Your Mouth has almost everyone that has been on TV in the
last six months or so. It is a bit ridiculous to me that wrestlers such
as Diamond Dallas Page (retired), Shawn Stasiak (released), X-Pac
(released), and Kevin Nash (only wrestled two matches this year and got
severely injured in both of them) are included when other wrestlers like
Rey Mysterio, Chris Nowinski, and Tommy Dreamer arent in the standard
character set. They are easy enough to make in the Create A Wrestler
mode, but it is a bummer they arent on the regular roster. Key
additions to this years game are Hollywood Hulk Hogan, Booker T, Brock
Lesnar, Goldust, Rob Van Dam, The Hurricane, Ric Flair, and Tough Enough
winner Maven. All of the characters look and act the part too. RVD and
The Hurricane both have their unique stances and fighting styles and
Chris Jericho has a ton of extra heel-ish animations. He slaps people
around when they are down and takes every chance he can get to prove he
is the king of the world. All of the characters have little extra moves
like this that make them pretty darn close to their real life
counterparts.
All
of the moves and little added individual mannerisms are great, but there
are some moves that launch into long strings of predetermined
animations. Rob Van Dam, The Hurricane, and almost all of the other
cruiserweights are big messes of canned animations. Sure, the moves all
look great and the styles are matched perfectly, but you just dont feel
like you have the same amount of control you have over other characters.
Some of these canned animations consist of six or seven different moves
and all you can do is sit there and watch. Not all of the characters
have these sort of moves so this isnt a huge complaint, but I would
have liked it better if I had more control over some of the wrestlers.
The
Create A Wrestler (CAW) mode is back and better than ever. There are
more parts available than ever before and now you have the option to
morph the face of your created wrestler in order to get them to look
exactly like you want them to. There are sample CAWs that range from
aliens to exotic looking humans to WWE superstars who werent included
in the game such as Jamie Noble and John Cena. Also, some WWE superstars
who arent in the game are especially easy to make in CAW mode. All you
have to do is put in all of the face parts that are the same number.
Scott Halls face parts are #7, Mick Foley is #11, and Tommy Dreamer is
#16. There are several other superstars available this way as well. Of
course, it is still up to you to give them the right clothing, but at
least the faces are already done for you. There are also 58 pre-made
move sets that are specifically made for certain real world wrestlers.
Rey Mysterio Jr. is move set #18, Goldberg is #5, and Sergeant Slaughter
is #58. There is a lot of fun to be had with the CAW mode besides making
all of these real world wrestlers, though. I managed to make Goku from
DBZ, Spider-Man, Solid Snake, myself, and all of my friends fairly
easily. The only problem with the CAW mode is that there doesnt seem to
be any way to give your created wrestlers teeth. They smile and "talk",
but they dont have any teeth so it just looks like a giant pink hole in
their face.
There is also a mode that allows you to create your own animation.
Fighting, running, walking, winning, and taunt animations can all be
completely customized. I made a pretty basic animation that consisted of
the character banging his head and raising his hand and rocking out.
Another animation I made was just completely goofy. The legs moved
around like the character was dancing a jig, the arms flew around like
windmills while the hands turned in the opposite direction. You can use
this mode to make animations as funny or as realistic as you want. It is
fairly easy to use, and is well worth it to completely customize your
CAW.
The graphics in Shut Your Mouth are improved over Just Bring It in
just about every way. The wrestlers are made using double the amount of
polygons that were used for Just Bring It and it shows. The faces are
very detailed now and the bodies have an overall smoother look to them.
The female wrestlers are also a heck of a lot better looking than they
were in JBI too. A lot more curvy and feminine looking than the horse
faced cross dressers that were in JBI. The animation is also very smooth
and looks great.
The arenas that you wrestle in are also much more detailed than
before and there are eighteen different sets that represent Raw and
Smackdown as well as all of the different pay per view events. You cant
go into the crowd like you could in JBI, but that isnt a very big loss.
The crowd looks better than before and has a pseudo 3-D look. The
backstage area is modeled after Madison Square Garden and offers
fourteen different areas to fight in ranging from the boiler room to the
parking lot. In a great effect, the weather is different in the outside
areas depending on what time of year it is in season mode. In the
winter, there is snow on the ground, but the rest of the year the
weather is pretty clear. Overall, the graphics are detailed, smooth, and
look great. There are some instances of clipping around the ring ropes
and some problems when two wrestlers of different heights square off,
but these are problems that plague almost every wrestling game and
arent something that is likely going to be fixed any time soon.
The sound is the only area where Shut Your Mouth doesnt drastically
improve over Just Bring It. The commentary, which was absolutely
horrible in JBI, has been redone with JR and the King instead of Tazz
and that assclown Mitchell Cole. JR and the King dont say nearly as
much as Tazz and MC did and what they do say is a lot more relevant to
the action and to storylines than before, but there still isnt nearly
enough of it so youll hear the same things over and over and over.
Luckily, you can turn off the commentary when it really starts to grate
on you. In a nice touch, there is now a ring announcer that announces
the matches and then introduces the wrestlers complete with their name,
weight, and hometown. Some of the wrestlers also recorded a few things,
but nothing too huge. Youll hear Ric Flair say "Whoooo!", Booker T call
you a "Suckah", and The Rock ask "If you smell-la-la-la, what The Rock
is cookin?". The sounds of wrestling are also very good. Punches and
kicks and chair shots and body slams all sound realistic and help the
great graphics and animation to make these moves seem like they are very
painful.
The music is another aspect that is vital for a wrestling game to get
right. Almost all of the entrance music you hear on TV is included in
Shut Your Mouth. The only wrestlers that dont have the right music are
the Hardy Boyz and Maven. Everyone else has the right music and it
sounds great. I got goose bumps the first time I watched Hogans
entrance to "Voodoo Child" by Hendrix. Alternate themes are available
for some characters as well. "Real American" is included for old school
Hogan fans and you can also listen to Kurt Angles music with or without
the "You Suck" chants. The Raw and Smackdown theme songs, performed by
The Union Underground and Marilyn Manson, are also included in the game.
The music that plays during matches is the typical blaring electric
guitar found in most wrestling games. Other than the commentary, which
is still pretty crappy, the sound in Shut Your Mouth is great.
A few technical issues have also been fixed in Shut Your Mouth. In
last years game, the load times were unbearably long. The load times in
Shut Your Mouth are much quicker. Another problem with JBI last year was
that it took over half of a memory card just to save your game and it
took about two minutes. This year, the game only takes up 228 kb and
saving and loading your data take only a couple of seconds. The long
load times and huge save files made Just Bring It a pain in the butt to
play, so it is with great joy that I can say Shut Your Mouth fixed these
problems and allows you to get into and out of matches in mere seconds
instead of minutes.
Overall, WWE Smackdown: Shut Your Mouth is the most enjoyable
wrestling game I have ever played. There are a few areas where the game
can be improved, but the positives far outweigh the negatives. The
graphics and sound are top notch and the gameplay is as solid as ever.
The reversal system and improved submission system make the game a lot
deeper and a lot more strategic than previous Smackdown games. I know
what a lot of people are going to say and I do realize that No Mercy on
the N64 did all of this first, but Shut Your Mouth simply does
everything better. This game oozes WWE out of every pore and no matter
what your opinion of the current state of WWE is you will still enjoy
this game. Just like every other wrestling game, Shut Your Mouth is an
excellent party game. Up to six people can play at once and whether you
are a fan of WWE or not, it is pretty hard not to enjoy beating up on
your friends in such a zany, over the top exhibition. Shut Your Mouth is
a must buy title for fans of the Smackdown series and is definitely
worth checking out for even the most die hard No Mercy or Fire Pro
Wrestling fan.