Day 305, Game 305 - WWE 2K14

When I first got this game delivered to my doorstep, thanks to the every increasingly impressive Amazon Prime, the very first thing I did when I opened it up was take out the box art cover, flip it around and put it back in. While I have nothing against The Rock and all of his awesomeness that he has brought to the wrestling universe over the years, let's face it. Daniel Bryan is one of the best things to happen to the WWE in a very long time, along with CM Punk of course. Apparently, there was some sort of contest to decide the alternate cover athlete, and Bryan Daniel won I'm guessing, so there you have it. Good for him, I say.

Not familiar with wrestlers and the universe they reside in? Don't worry, you don't need background knowledge to keep up with this blog post. While WWE 2K14 is the newest addition to the wrestling game genre, and also the first WWE game made by the 2K Sports team, it doesn't bank on gamers being avid watchers or even followers of the current storylines. Sure, the game is more enjoyable if you are at least familiar with the wrestlers, especially all the current day ones, but it's not a breaking point for the game. 

You see, if you have any sort of history with watching wrestling in your lifetime, chances are there is something for you to enjoy in  2K14, especially if you are feeling particularly nostalgic and want to take a trip down memory lane. In the last WWE game (which I wrote about, as you should recall), they introduced a new mode that revisited the Attitude Era of the WWE, recreating all the biggest matches and events from that important piece of the wrestling timeline, allowing you to participate and attempt to duplicate them as best as possible. I wrote then that it was absolutely the best part of that game, and if that mode was the only thing in the game, I would still feel satisfied. 

Well, the new development team took that idea and ran with it. Just because it wasn't their original idea doesn't mean it wasn't a good idea or one they couldn't use. They saw the bigger picture of the mode, and what it could entail. So instead of pinpointing a specific era, they decided to pay homage to the grandest stage of them all, WrestleMania, and the thirty years it encompasses. Going back all the way to the first WrestleMania, you can play as all the wrestlers you may remember from back in the day, in the biggest and most well-known matches of all time, trying to recreate all the important moments of each match. 

Long story short, going back and and visiting so many vivid wrestling memories was amazing. The game looks great, and it's safe to say that the franchise is in good hands. 

YES! YES! YES!

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