The 00’s decade was such as great time to a fan of pro wrestling even though it was not quite as popular as it was during the mid to late 90’s. The 00’s was filled with many memorable pro wrestling games licensed by THQ and developed by Yukes for the most part. There were many popular pro wrestling games that emerged from the 00’s including WWF No Mercy, WWE Smackdown: Here Comes The Pain, Day of Reckoning 2 along with SvR ’06 & ’07. One of the few pro wrestling games from that decade that does not get talked about quite as much is Smackdown vs Raw ’09 which was released during the later part of 2008. Smackdown vs Raw 2009 was the direct sequel to SvR ’08 which was released back in ’07 and had replaced the game’s in-depth 24/7 mode with the introduction of Road to WrestleMania mode. While some people disliked the removal of the 24/7 mode others felt that it was a positive because it appealed more to casual fans and did not have repetitive cutscenes like the campaign mode from SvR ’08. The Road to WrestleMania mode had stories for the some of the main event level superstars from ’08 including John Cena, Undertaker, Triple H, Chris Jericho, Rey Mysterio, Batista and CM Punk. Smackdown vs Raw 2009 also placed strong emphasis on tag team gameplay in comparison to previous games within the series. SvR ’09 introduced game mechanics such as hot tags and allowed superstars to share a momentum during tag team matches. There were also a variety of tag team moves players could utilize when picking certain superstars depending on what button combination they utilized.
Along with having improved tag team gameplay mechanics SvR ’09 is the game that is known mainly for being the first WWE game ever to feature in Inferno Match. The gameplay mechanics that Yuke’s utilized to create the Inferno Match was very creative and was borderline “Mature” despite being a “Teen” rated game only because players could not kill their opponents. Along with the Inferno match there was a variety of other gameplay stipulations featured during battles including, Ladder, Hell in a Cell, Cage, First Blood, Handicap, 6-Man, Triple-Threat, Fatal 4 Way, Falls Count Anywhere, Ironman and Submission only. Similar to other games players were able to create their own superstars in SvR ’09 and enter them in the game’s Career Mode. However, the Career Mode featured in SvR ’09 was different from its predecessors because players were able to compete and defeat opponents in order to achieve the highest star rated match they could possibly get during each match. After winning each match superstars would not only see their attributes increase but their health would also regenerate slightly and they would one step closer to being the number one competitor for certain titles. Players could win various titles in Career Mode including WWE, World, ECW United States, and Intercontinental. SvR ’09 was also one of the pro wrestling games to feature online multiplayer gameplay with voice chat features for those who were PS3 and Xbox 360 owners. Even though, SvR ’09 does not standout as much as other WWE video games licensed by THQ many would agree that it was more memorable than a majority of the titles published by 2K Games throughout the 10’s decade.
Gaming Hearts Collection 