Fire Pro Wrestling Returns

Publisher: Agetec
Developer: Spike
Genre: Wrestling
Release: November 13, 2007
Platform: Playstation 2

Reviewer: Dan

A few months ago, Eric told me about this wacky 2.5-D wrestling game out in Japan. He was ranting and raving about how good this budget title was and how awesome it was that a version was coming to the U.S.. I was a bit skeptical at first. Old style graphics and a bunch of generic wrestlers? It didn't sound good at first, until I saw some YouTube footage of the electrified barbed wire exploding ring death matches you can have in the game.

There's really no storyline or career mode in this game. Well, there might be one, but it's probably in enough broken English to make it uninteresting. The game is just straight up wrestling, which is the kind of wrestling I can remember when I was young. There are plenty of match options to keep you and your 7 other friends entertained (multi-taps and 7 other controllers not included) with standard exhibition matches to full blown tournaments. The match creation can be a bit counter-intuitive. You really need to know your wrestling lingo to know what some of the options are allowing you to do. You can get pretty detailed about the rules for each match, but there are nowhere near as many match types as your typical Smackdown vs. Raw game.

There are 6 basic match types you can choose from. First there's plain old Normal Match, which has all your basic rules like length of match and how a winner is determined. Then it gets a bit more spicy. You can set up a Steel Cage death match, which really doesn't live up to its name. Moving on, we come to the exploding ring barbed wire death match. This one puts you in a ring surrounded by exploding barbed wire with a massive explosion set to blow the ring up halfway through the match. Then there's my personal favorite, the landmine death match. This one has barbed wire wrapped landmines surrounding the outside of the ring that explode if your guy is tossed over the ropes onto them. You also have your choice of barbed wire or fluorescent lights to line the corners of the ring. The other two matches are a departure from "traditional" wrestling. The SWA Rules match is basically a MMA style match you'd find on UFC or Pride. The final match type is basically kickboxing, so there is really a bit of love for any fan of hand to hand combat.

Remember how I said "Generic Wrestlers?" Well, they're generic in name and wrestling organization only. Basically each wrestler in this game exists in real life, but to avoid copyrights and all that, the people who made Fire Pro just put the looks and the moves into the game. Granted, the great majority of the wrestlers in this game are Japanese, but you will find the heads and faces of many WWE, TNA, WCW, and ECW wrestlers to put on highly customizable bodies. But looks aren't where this game stops. If there was ever a reason to own an Action Replay Max with MaxDrive, then the edit mode in this game is it. There are over 1,600 different moves you can choose from to give to your wrestler and you can tweak the AI of your created wrestler to fit the most stringent standards. And with 500 slots available for created characters, you'll have plenty of room to add in your own wrestling association you and your buddies made back in high school. You can also customize rings and create your own logos for the mat. You can even edit belts.

All that editing may seem a bit overwhelming, but with numerous MaxDrive save files available for this game, recreating real wrestling associations is a breeze. With all these great things about this game, it may seem like it will wind up with a perfect score. Well, there are a few things I have a problem with. If you've never played this game before, you will NOT do well at all versus a computer opponent even on the easiest setting. This is not a button-mashing fighting game, so a n00b may have a hard time with this one. It can be frustratingly difficult, much like Tiger Woods was for me when you first create a character. It also doesn't help that there are (and I actually counted in the game manual) 98 different buttons/combos you need to know to take full advantage of your wrestler. This is not including the controls that you'll have to figure out on your own, nor does this cover how the directional buttons come into play. But then again, I guess that's just really a curse of all wrestling games, so I can't knock it too much for that.

Final Verdict

Fire Pro Wrestling Returns is pretty much a must own for wrestling fans. This game brings back memories of the original ECW with the insane matches and overall mayhem that can be caused in the ring. This one is also great for you crazy people that spend hours upon hours customizing things. You'll spend plenty of time on this one, and at only $19.99, it's a freakin' steal. I can confidently give this bargain treasure a 8.75 out of 10 .

Fire Pro Wrestling Returns Promo