WWE 2K Battlegrounds by Sabre Interactive and Published by 2K, is a wrestling game that has a story. Crazy right? Stone Cold is recruiting new comers for the WWE, so this is a great way for players to learn each of the play styles and learn each game mode from standard matches to Royal Rumbles.

There is local play and online with cross-play supported. There are a variety of game modes that you will find that fill up the content; good old fashion One vs One, Tag Team both normal and Tornado Tag, Cage matches, Gauntlet and Royal Rumble. There are also eight arenas to fight at, six of which have interactive environments, such as alligators, helicopters and a remote control goat. Players can also create their own arenas for a personal touch.

The controls for Battlegrounds are really easy to learn. It has a decent counter reaction for grapples, and it does have a bit of a parry system, if you can manage to hit block as a punch or kick is about to hit the player, you can stumble the opponent, leaving them open for a combo to throw at them. In addition to the easy controls, special grabs can be performed with the right stick in directions to perform.

When a signature attack is ready, which will be displayed by the blue circle underneath the character, you can execute it by pressing two triggers at once. To gain the best experience during a match, on- screen requests by fans such as do a taunt, submission or hit someone with a chair can be required, so keep the fans happy to max out the experience per match.

There are 70 playable characters in the roster including ‘Hall of Fame’ characters like Mankind and Andre the Giant, alongside the old stars the big name ones are also present such as John Cena, Triple H, The Rock and Roman Reigns. Future DLC will also bring an additional 63 characters to the game for free, with the roster expanding to include more Hall of Famers and many more favourites.

Players can head to the store to purchase characters to unlock either with the in game currency that is quite easy to earn from the campaign, or you can purchase gold coins from the Marketplace to unlock characters and outfits. Each character has their unique finisher and intro music. As well as a badass intro music for certain characters there is also a great solid in game announcer that will keep track of events of the fight as they progress.

The animation style of the game is very cartoonish which suits it well as the overall feel for the game feels like a great pick up for the younger gamers. As the story in the campaign takes place it is in a comic book format so it is not like players can miss context as it is in panels.

I only came across one issue with the character models on the Everglades arena where the model would become invisible but it did quickly correct itself. It was just annoying with how often it happened.

Overall, I felt the game was too easy. I was unable to find a way to adjust the difficulty during the campaign but was able to do it during single matches. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for the DLC drop and seeing if there will be more packs coming much later to add to the large roster of playable characters.

Written by: Shane Walsh