The most important announcement made on the eve of SummerSlam yesterday had nothing to do with the actual event at all. No, all the buzz yesterday was focused on the roster reveal for WWE ’13, arguably the most anticipated wrestling game of all time.
Why that bold a statement?
For one, WWE ’12 ended up – surprisingly — one of best video games period last year, chiefly for its convenient grab-and-go controlling, an amazing Create-A-Wrestler mode (that I only wished doubled or tripled in its roster length), and some of the very best cutscenes in wrestling video game history.
In fact, ’12‘s Universe Mode was so awesome, my “season” had instances that flat-out mirrored the current RAW and IMPACT. And absolutely nowhere else could you play with the nWo, Attitude Era WWF, TNA, ECW, and current WWE feds simulataneously.
Expect THQ’s new wrassler, out Hallo’s Eve [Oct 30th, 2012], to feature far more ol’ school get-ups, flashy costumes and nifty attires, but very few new faces. Sure, the roster of 85 is clearly the largest ever for a WWE game, but a lot of those “new” mugs appeared last year via DLC (Brodus Clay), or through CAW’s (Chris Jericho, Bret Hart). While it’s always nice to have the wrestlers official, this minister can’t help but feel let down by the lack of Attitude Era wrestlers now signed with TNA.
I know, I know. The exclusion of the Dudley Boyz, Hardys, Ric Flair, Kurt Angle, and other ECW greats such as Tommy Dreamer and Rob Van Dam was to be expected, as there’s just no way the majority of TNA’s roster could appear in a WWE game (although Angle told everyone on twitter otherwise, yap yap).
But, hey, now you can pit “The Next Big Thing” versus “The World’s Most Dangerous Man”!!!
Ha, I’m sure Dana White would get a kick out of that.
So, here’s a rundown of both rosters — current and Attitude Era — for WWE ’13:
CURRENT:
-Alberto Del Rio
-Big Show
-Booker T (hopefully with a suit, to play Smackdown GM)
-Brock Lesnar
-”Funkosaurus” Brodus Clay
–Chris Jericho
-Christian
-CM Punk
-Cody Rhodes
–Damien Sandow (DLC, Brother Joe’s favorite wrestler),
-Daniel Bryan
-David Otunga
-Dolph Ziggler
-Edge
–Epico
–The Great Khali
-”One Man Band” Heath Slater
–Hunico
-Jack Swagger
–JBL (current?)
–Jinder Mahal
-John Cena (Doctor of Thuganomics version.. ehh)
-John Cena
-”Mr. Excitement” John Laurinaitis (at least I get to live my dreams through the game!)
-Justin Gabriel
-Kane
-Kevin Nash
-Kofi Kingston
-Mark Henry
-The Miz
–Primo
-Randy Orton
-Rey Mysterio
-The Rock (Thankfully, now we don’t need to preorder the game or wait several months for him!)
-R-Truth
-Santino Marella
-Sheamus
-Sin Cara
-Ted DiBiase
-Triple H
-The Undertaker
-Wade Barrett (unfortunately, this will be his older gimmick before all of the recent “Fight Club”esque promos)
-Zack Ryder
–AJ Lee (DLC, since she’s now RAW General Manager – hopefully as a wrestler, too)
-Alicia Fox
-Beth Phoenix
-Brie Bella (I thought she was fired?)
-Eve
–Lita (hmmm?)
-Kelly Kelly
-Kharma
-Nikki Bella (see her sis)
Of course there’ll be at least 6 or so DLC spots, so there’s a solid chance we see some of these peeps down the line: Lord Tensai (a lock for DLC, I’d like to think), Vickie Guerrero, Layla (OK, so no Diva’s Champ? Weird), PTP a.k.a. Darren Young & Titus O’Neil, Ryback (“Feed me more!”), the Uso Brothers, Ricardo Rodrigues (remember that weird glitch?), “Magic Mike Mayhem” a.k.a. Curt Hawkins & Tyler Reks, Natalya, Antonio Cesaro, Tyson Kidd (surprise exclusion since he’s received a little push lately), Tamina Snuka, and everyone’s favorite Irish munchkin, Hornswoggle.
And now for the anticipated mode that a shit-ton of fans requested! Hey, got to give THQ some sorta credit here…
ATTITUDE ERA:
-”Road Warrior” Animal
-Big Boss Man (Attitude Era? Wasn’t “Big Bubba” just a jobber for the nWo around then?)
-”Bad Ass” Billy Gunn
-Bradshaw (APA)
-Bret “The Hitman” Hart
–British Bulldog
-Cactus Jack
-Chris Jericho (Y2J)
-Christian (Edge & Christian)
-Dude Love
-Eddie Guerrero
-Edge (Edge & Christian)
-Faarooq (APA)
–The Godfather (especially for the Hoooooooooooooo Trainnnn!!)
-”Road Warrior” Hawk
-Hunter Hearst Helmsley
-Kane
–Ken Shamrock
-Mankind
-Mark Henry (Nation of Domination)
–Mike Tyson (DLC)
-Mr. McMahon
-”The Big Show” Paul Wight (I don’t remember him ever using this name, do you? “The Giant”)
-”Road Dogg” Jesse James
-The Rock
–Shane McMahon
-Shawn Michaels (D-Generation X)
-”Stone Cold” Steve Austin
-Triple H (D-Generation X)
-The Undertaker (The Lord of Darkness)
-Vader
–X-Pac
-Lita (Attitude Era)
-Stephanie McMahon (The Billion Dollar Princess)
-Trish Stratus
To be fair, there’s a hefty selection here. Most of the time THQ resorts to including “Stone Cold”, Shawn Michaels and The Rock and not much else. The APA? (We better get some bar brawls) A full Degeneration-X? (Your ass betta call somebodyyyy!!) Lita vs. Lita vs. John Cena vs. John Cena vs. The Rock vs. The Rock vs. Chris Jericho vs. Chris Jericho vs. The Undertaker vs. The Undertaker vs. Triple H vs. Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs. Edge vs. Edge vs. JBL vs. Bradshaw vs. The Big Show vs. Paul Wight vs. Mark Henry vs. Mark Henry vs. Christian vs. Christian vs. Mankind vs. Cactus Jack vs. Dude Love??? (Yes! No! Yes! No!)
Notable “Attitude Era” Omissions: Aside from wrestlers who sported ECW on their T-shirts, or those currently signed with TNA, where the hell is Brian Pillman? I even own a WWE Legends action figure sporting the Attitude Era’s “Loose Cannon.” Okay, so he’s my all-time personal favorite (along with “Mr. Perfect” Curt Hennig, who was with the nWo at that time), but seeing him would have been fantastic. The gun pulled out on “Stone Cold” was perhaps the most notorious incident of that era.
That’s if you don’t include the death of Owen Hart. No surprise here, that the “King of the Slammys” was absent considering his widowed wife would allow no such thing. Perhaps no female (if you wanted to call it that at the time) wrestler represented Attitude more than Chyna. She beat the hell out of everybody, including X-Pac in the bedroom. She even dated Triple H (at least he upgraded to jackpot proportions).
A couple more surprisingly absences are Sycho Sid and Rikishi. Hell, these dudes even had actual matches on recent RAW’s! “Sycho” Sid had plenty of memorable wars against Mankind, Bret Hart and Vader, so FTW. And finally, the most surprising of all… Goldust. Hell, he was in last year’s game! While there were some other pretty controversial figures at the time — Val Venis, Gangrel, Hardcore Holly– did anyone represent “pushing the line” like this guy? Dustin Runnels character even made Vince so uncomfortable he got himself a raise and a classic feud with Roddy Piper!
Now that’s #winning.
Either way, this entire article is most likely all for naught. Because, with yet another delicious CAW mode hopefully underway, you’ll be able to make any character of any fed to your liking. And since this expansive WWE ’13 roster should take up many of those CAW slots for you, one could only fathom the possibilities.
Ladies and gentelemen of the church, “Loose Cannon” or not, this is my most anticipated game for the rest of 2012.
When will the Attitude Era officially stop?
Looking at that list made me say “huh” a couple times.
LOL, yeah I read somewhere that their ditching the RTWM and having new improved story mode.
Prime Time Players and Ryback are the 2 that jump out that are missing.
I am so GLAD they made Booker T look like himself this year! Last year he had like a caramel skin tone and looked ridiculous!!
Missing Scott Hall/Razor Ramon.
Liking what I see so far! Although a 6man tag between HHH vs. Taker is going to be rather strange 😀
I don’t think any other match would suffice beisdes the Dead Man. If Terry Funk was capable of wrestling like The King Jerry Lawler at his age that would be an entertaining angle to work in for one last hardcore tilt. It would have to be the Undertaker though for sure.
Like any other speculation, this is a long shot in the dark. A power shall come to PUNISH the meek A FAMILIAR FORCE shall avrrie to claim what is his This obviously indicates someone of WWE past, who is dominate, powerful, and capable of running through the entire WWE roster to claim what is his, assuming this to be WWE title. Let is begin? Or HERE COMES THE PAIN? Yes, this is a very slim to none possibility, but if The Rock can return, why not Brock Lesnar? He’s on good terms with the WWE (re: WWE12) and with Vince working hard to get the WWE Network up and running, crossover exposure would help immensely. Brock is competing for the UFC on Dec30, very close to Jan2, however it doesn’t mean he has to come in and wrestle a match on Raw that night. An appearance, a storyline, something short term. It would make more sense for him to come back to the WWE right after a UFC fight, instead of coming in when he’s busy training closer to his next fight in 2012.The most obvious guess is The Undertaker, since the WWE has put a lot of effort into his vignettes of the past. The tagline for the video is “Prophecy1yt” This would be a term most likely associated with Taker, but why not just “prophecy?” Could the 1yt mean anything? The WWE could have aired the video on TV, but they wanted everyone to flock to YouTube. Could all these little details be clues? Age of the YouTube user is 43. Could this mean anything? The closest to this age, of WWE’s past, is Batista. But this could be reading way too much into nothing that’s there.It virtually could be anyone, this vignette leaves so much to the imagination. I’m glad WWE did this and I’m glad they posted it weeks in advance, instead of 1 or 2 weeks beforehand. It builds suspense and it peaks interest. To throw out two more final guesses Worst Case Scenario: Andy Levine, “Silent Rage” from Tough EnoughBest Case Scenario: Stone Cold Steve Austin
actually-(i’m serious here)-he can’t wrleste anymore and never will-my older bro knows *a lot* about him, and after having wrlested only one match has decided to remain doing what he’s doing right now. i don’t remember what the match was that he had, but it really messed up his back big time (as if he hadn’t already been having a lot of back problems for *years*). It obviously hasn’t been officially, nor publicly announced, but you can be rest assured he won’t be wrestling ever again. Was this answer helpful?
STOP YOUR BITCHING moody!