NSW Project

What the crap is this? Well its the logo (thanks to freem! for the pic by the way) of Neo Strong Wrestling, the akiverse name for New Japan Pro Wrestling. It's also that name that I used to use as a 14 year old whenever I created a promotion in vpw2. It was Ring of Honor before Ring of Honor, it was my teenage dreamworld of what I though wrestling should be. As a grown man I need excuses not to do real work and vpw2 tends to be my main distraction. I love this game, it has been there during real bad times in my life and allowed me to get lost in a fictional world. I'm in a great place in my life now, but I still love making up stories, I still love this game. There is a small but dedicated community surrounding this game and this project is for them. 

What is the project? Well it's a efed but not really. I want to write stories using some of the edits that I've created and present it to the community, I plan on releasing info on some of the dudes and kinda piece this thing together little by little. Twitter and this blog will act as my platform. There is no real set schedule yet, but I want to present this slowly and allow it breath so to speak. I want input from you the reader and if you have anything you want to see or contribute please let me know. I have no idea how to go about this but I know it' s going to be fun.  

I'm a terrible blogger...

I missed one of the most important days of the year, vpw2's birthday! It is officially old enough to start high school so that's awesome. Seems like so long ago that I was 14 myself and received the game in the mail from japanvideogames.com, which in itself makes it seem like for ever ago. I was beyond excited, this was the moment I went from being a wrestling fan to a full blown nerd about it. I'm 28 now and I've grown into a man that writes a blog about this game and the series it belongs to. I've had a long love affair with this game and just continue to find new ways to love and appreciate it. It may or may not be the greatest wrestling game ever but in many ways it is one of the most satisfying video game experiences that I've had. I love you aki and asmik ace for the work you did. I love you little gray cartridge that I've owned for the majority of my adult life, thanks for always being awesome. 

All the best,

Joe  

Perry Saturn United States Champion

It's funny, you leave the game for a while and in many ways forget that it exists. Then comes the day that there is nothing else to do and you boot up the game and BAM! Fucking Aki Wrestling. I have been playing these games since I was in 8th grade and yet I still go back to them. Why is that? Is it the nostalgia? Do long for the days where I had no responsibility and the only thing that mattered was how to make my match last forever and try to hit a billion head drops.

A lot of the posts I make are just spur of the moment. I have a twitter that I'm not that active with that is sorta the social media voice of the blog, yet I'm not for making this thing really public. I have so many plans that I never finish or in many ways even begin with, still I will always have these games as a place where I can pretend that I did become a pro wrestler and I can create myself on vpw2 and give myself the moves that I dig and create a character that makes me happy. These games make me happy.

I will admit that fire pro is a deeper game in terms of the things the game allows you to do. Logo editor, a deeper edit mode, more moves, blah blah blah. But while I love fire pro, there is a certain connection that I have to the aki/asmik/thq series, it has deep sentimental value to me. While I know a lot of details about pro wrestling now as an adult nerd, this game blew my mind as a kid who's only exposure to the sport revolved around wcw saturday night/ecw on the sunshine network and wwf raw.

I started to watch lucha libre on galavision (easily the best 3 hour block of wrestling at the time, you had CMLL for about an hour and then AAA for the next two hours on Saturday, fucking awesomesauce) because of this game in many ways. I used to dream who I would become as a wrestler and it allowed me to ignore the shitty environment during my early high school years.

I fucking love these games and if you happen to love them too, because you think its a cool puroresu game (vpw 1/2) or you like the wcw titles or you obsess over no mercy and still hold it as the standard (I think no mercy is easily the weakest entry of the series) then I love you too random stranger on the internet.

Good Night.

Reflections on past friendships ( or how I learned to appreciate wm2k)

With all the games that are part of the aki pro wrestling family, the one that is most misunderstood is wm2k. Thought of as the weakest entry in the series, on reflection some twelve years later, wm2k did a great job of recreating the way the wwf was like at the time. Look dudes, we all enjoy head drops and fancy 450 splashes, that just wasn't the way the wwf was at the time.

You need to accept the less is more idea, build around that and it well set you free. If you look at the way the wrestlers were built by the aki team you will notice kinda bland move sets for a majority of the roster and I think that was intentional. I always thought that it was a case of just following the world tour/revenge formula of building move sets, a set number of weak/ front and back grapplers and that was the reason that everyone had limited move sets in comparison to what was available to you in edit mode. Nah everybody if you allow yourself to be taken in by it it changes how you play the game.

The big move is the big move, this is American entertainment style wrestling where dudes have a set finisher, so if you build your caw to have a million MOVEZ! then your dude feels out of place and the game feels wrong. Follow the receipt and it changes the game all of a sudden it opens up for you, you begin to play your matches in a different way.

The reason that wm2k feels unfinished is because in some ways it is. With how close to perfection world tour and revenge stood, wm2k was going to fall short. The wrestlers all play alike in many ways, but that is a product of the company it was based on. If you shift focus and play it as a wrestling game based on 1999 wwf then it did a good job.

Thesis kinda thing...

Hi,

Just a quick little aki/asmik related rant. I hate No Mercy, or rather, its my least favorite of the aki/asmik wrestling games. While that maybe blasphemy to some (like 97% of the people that enjoy these family of games), I really don't like no mercy in comparison to the other games, it feels off and just doesn't play smoothly to me. Based on pure playing, Revenge is my favorite to just pick up and play, I've played like all of my favorite battle royals and tag team matches on that thing (Kanyon and Booker T: GREATEST TEAM EVER). Its just a really great game, and might be the best playing of the aki/asmik games.

The trio of revenge/wm2k/vpw2 are the pinnacle of the series to me and really flow well together. Revenge set the stage, introducing new player models and introducing the look that would define the series in my mind, wm2k always seems like an unfinished game to me, like it was a work in progress with ideas that were fleshed out in vpw2. Virtual pro 2 is my favorite game (tied with mvp2005 as the two games I've probably more time than any other games in my life), yet I wished it played like revenge if that makes any sense.

Anyway back to why I dislike no mercy. I hate the player models, fucking hate the shit out of them. Fucking terrible looking, all the wrestlers look like douchebags. All of them. I really like the look of the revenge/wm2k/vpw2 dudes, cartoonish yet cool looking. The crappy player models, combined with disjointed playing makes for such a shitty experience for me. Story mode while cool, tag team wrestling on no mercy is such a fucking drag, something that was so awesome in revenge, that you can't sit down and enjoy tag team story mode. I would rather a title road/road to wrestlemania/royal road succession mode that I can sit down and enjoy wrestling matches, than the fucking kick in the balls that story can be on no mercy. Also fuck taking out create a title, I love that shit (EWF Intercontinental Television champ, son).

There are somethings I enjoy, some of the new moves (rikishi driver/olympic slam...wwf finishers of that era/return of the cryonic kick/double underhook backbreaker/etc.), the new getting hit by a lariat/clothesline/axe bomber animation, being able to brainbuster a dude on a table and the ladder match was kinda neat.

I guess it boils down to just not vibing with the whole no mercy experience, it wasn't meant for me I guess. I just dislike the wwf vibe the game gives off (which I guess is plus for the game since thats what its trying to achieve), I'm just used to my aki/asmik games being what I wanted that to be, if that makes any sense.

Thanks for reading this long-winded rant, you are the best internet.

Joe

Such an awesome animation. 

Kinda random...

So I'm watching Barry Windham vs. Ric Flair at Battle of the belts 2 and instead of coming to ring  to "Dawn" section of the tone poem Also sprach Zarathustra by Richard Strauss (longest song title ever by the way) he comes to the ring to "Easy Lover" by Philip Baliey and Phil Colins. It was amazing y'all.