@Background Pony #8469
Slow paced? You clearly haven’t played 2K19, it’s a little
too fast sometimes. Like the game is on fast forward, I’ve never seen wrestlers move so quickly. The creators mentioned how they had heard criticisms about the game being a little slow and plodding and made a effort to speed up the action, the cruiser weights look like they’re on rollerskates.
And oh, the game just gave me a truly great feud, and I experienced the wonderful joy of being a booker and seeing my wrestlers do something I wasn’t expecting. I had a Becky Lynch moment.
This is outlaw, a rogue, renegade robot, who broke her bonds and fled her masters, and now fights for self determination! (hey, I never said I was original) Big babyface, the cool rebel type, fighting against evil corporate masters.
This is Anna, a state of the art, super shiny, totally flawless new android model, sent to take Outlaw down and prove the superiority of the newer models. She was designed to be as uncanny valley as possible, with alabaster skin and some of the less well done animations, but ended up oddly charming.
So Anna went up against Outlaw and lost, reasonably decisively. And the next week, continued the feud by coming out after Outlaw’s match and promising that she would win next time, and warning her to prepare herself.
And so they had their next match, and this time she came out with her manager and creator who honestly cheated like hell. Distracting the ref, distracting Outlaw… but in the end it was for nothing. Anna lost.
And… she offered a handshake. And I noted that though her manager cheated, she didn’t. She played a totally fair match. And despite this Outlaw slapped her hand away, and taunted her. And Anna was left standing in the ring, spirit crushed, her manager screaming at her from ringside.
So… final fight. And it was brutal, with both girls using almost entirely strikes. And eventually, Outlaw once more gained the upper hand. Anna took three finishers without managing one of hers… and yet, kicked out of all of them.
Then she took another. And another. And kicked out of both. The crowd went NUTS. (After the match, it was confirmed that Anna had indeed picked up injuries to her chest and head)
Eventually Outlaw went for a spear, Anna dodged it, picked her up and threw her into the ringpost, Outlaw bounced back into a running poweslam from Anna…
One, two three, and Anna won the match. And Outlaw threw a tantrum, screaming insults as she scrambled away, leaving Anna standing tall and proud.
The game just pulled off a double turn! Granted Anna was, despite being a heel, given mostly positive personality traits, and Outlaw negative despite being a face (being the face of the authority and a rebel respectively) but I didn’t expect their personalities to influence their behavior so much, and the whole thing was perfectly booked!