WCW vs. nWo: World Tour
| WCW vs. nWo: World Tour | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Asmik Ace Entertainment Inland Productions |
| Publisher(s) | THQ |
| Platform(s) | Nintendo 64 |
| Release | November 28, 1997 |
| Genre(s) | Sports |
| Mode(s) | Single player, multiplayer |
WCW vs nWo: World Tour was a video game released in 1997 on the Nintendo 64 game console.
The Game
Although in the past the WWF had been known as a marketing machine with wide appeal to children and families, its attempts to produce a successful video game that captured the feel of actual pro wrestling were rather unsuccessful. WCW's young president, Eric Bischoff, wanted WCW to not just compete with, but effectively beat the WWF in all aspects of multimedia and marketing. The past WWF games, and the current ones of the time like the generally despised WWF In Your House and WWF WrestleMania: The Arcade Game were cartoony, silly, and hard to play and had little basis in actual wrestling.
WCW had one foray into the SNES with WCW Superbrawl Wrestling, a lackluster title that was inoffensive, and before that on the NES there was an NWA game simply called World Championship Wrestling that was very sophisticated for it's time, including many grapple holds, a weapon (a wrench), and specific finishing maneuvers for all characters, but it was criticized for its difficulty.
Asmik Ace and AKI began producing a wrestling game that was similar to Puroresu and fighting games for WCW. The game was very well received due to it's tight construction and ease of play, especially compared to Acclaim's comparatively more difficult and convoluted game WWF Warzone.
World Tour revolutionized wrestling games much like the nWo storyline did for wrestling. It was the first fully 3D wrestling game and introduced THQ's critically acclaimed grappling system where all moves are started by holds initiated with the tap of the "A" button. The game sold phenomonally well, and soon reached Player's Choice status. Unlike today's wrestling games, World Tour featured no create-a-wrestler mode, no "real" story mode and had a limited amount of actual wrestlers. But Asmik Ace and THQ got creative with the game and introduced a fictional cast of characters including many based on actual wrestlers from around the globe (including knockoffs of Hayabusa and Abdullah The Butcher). A sequel, WCW/nWo Revenge, was released in 1998.
Seeing the success that the WCW had with their video games and knowing that as they were rising again in 1999, the WWF decided they needed a marketable series of games for their fans. The WWF signed an exclusive contract with THQ to produce their wrestling games. This was a fruitful pairing and produced WWF WrestleMania 2000 and WWF No Mercy for the N64, which play like sequels to the two aforementioned WCW games.
Even though AKI and Asmik Ace no longer work on WWE titles, there is a strong demand for them to return to making wrestling games, and many current series including WWE Day of Reckoning and WWE SmackDown! vs. RAW use traits built from the AKI engine.