With the latest game from THQ’s WWE series, WWE ’12 scheduled to hit stores this coming Tuesday, November 22nd, 2011 across North America and Canada and on November 25th, 2011 across Europe, I got the chance to try out the game, a few days prior to launch and came away wanting to have more time on my hands than I had, in order to play the game further. The game brings a new, fresh development to what lacked in the WWE SmackDown vs. RAW series and feels a much smoother, free-flowing and faster game overall, combined in with the ability to now attack opponents who are already engaging in a brawl, such as in Triple Threat matches, Fatal Four Way matches and even Royal Rumble eliminations, it makes the presentation feel more realistic than ever thanks to the Predator Technology now installed in the games, which sees improved character animations, ring physics and move transitions and less of the bumpy feel from the SmackDown vs. RAW series.

In getting down to business, the Road To WrestleMania feature is fantastic, for what I was able to get to play, mostly with Sheamus’ storyline and the formation of a faction with Sheamus, William Regal, Drew McIntyre and Wade Barrett, dubbed the United Kingdom who have their own titantron and entrance theme and dare I say it, look complete as a faction, something that should be utilized down the line on WWE television. For those who may not yet be familiar with WWE ’12 changes, the Road to WrestleMania feature has also changed and instead of the traditional 3-month storyline where you get to choose from certain WWE superstars, the Road To WrestleMania itself is now 18 months long and takes in 2 WrestleMania events, with 3 stories to tell, labelled as Villian, Outsider and Hero, where you take the roles of Sheamus, Triple H and a custom made character, called Jacob Cass, who is voiced by current TNA Wrestling X-Division Champion, Austin Aries, who worked on the game with THQ, prior to signing a deal with the company.

Moving back to Predator Technology and the gameplay overall, the ability to target anywhere on the body you want is something that is needed. A simple tap of the left stick and you can target the head, legs, knees, arm, whatever part of the body you want. The submission minigame is a nice feature, where you can power to reach the ropes, or try and hopefully break out of the hold to make a comeback. Speaking of comebacks, the comeback moments are another great new feature, where you could be on the verge of victory and in a sudden moment your opponent makes a comeback, builds up momentum, could potentially hit his/her finisher and win the match. As mentioned previously, it offers a sense of realism to the game, similar to what you may see on television, let’s say Randy Orton being dominated by Wade Barrett and out of nowhere, Orton builds momentum and hits the RKO, the exact same thing happens in WWE ’12.

The graphics are a huge step up from last year, offering a better presentation, similar to what you see on television, as well as the overall characters in the game, with blurryness seen on characters last year, gone this year, as seen in the Randy Orton photo below.

THQ’s Character Art Director, Jeff Godfrey spoke about those changes and the overall improvements previously. “Each year I strive to improve the Superstars’ likenesses and to make the models look more realistic. Part of that involves adjusting how they are lit. My goal in adjusting the lighting for WWE ’12 was to push it closer to WWE TV broadcast and increase the realism. The Superstars have 6 lights on them that I can adjust; each can be set to a different color and brightness, plus I can adjust the angle. All of this is done by adjusting numbers and watching the results on screen in the model previewer. This year I made sure the lighting feels like it is coming from above while still creating dramatic contrast on the Superstars. This gets tricky because you do not want to leave the Superstars face in a dark shadow. The lighting also has to work for a wide range of skin tones. At one point I tried using one of the lights to create a bright rim light coming from behind the wrestlers, but it washed out Sheamus’s skin so it had to be abandoned. When lighting the crowd I made it a little darker than broadcast so that the Superstars would stand out more. I made the Superstars stand out even more by having Yukes add depth of field. This makes the crowd get blurrier based on how far away they are. The end result is the Superstars pop off the background this year.”

Last but certainly by no means least, Universe 2.0 as it has been labelled by THQ and the creative features in the game, including the new Create-An-Arena are a step up from last year, but I’m still holding out hope for the return of Create-A-Championship in WWE ’13, even though there is over 20 titles in the game, including the normal title belts you see on WWE television on a consistent basis and the older/defunct titles, such as the WWE European Championship, the classic WWE Intercontinental Championship (with a black strap, which willplease fans of Cody Rhodes), the WWE Undisputed Championship, the WWE Women’s Championship and much more. Universe offers great match-to-match gameplay this year, not forcing you to return to the menu once a match has been completed and flows like a normal WWE RAW, WWE NXT, WWE Superstars or WWE SmackDown event would on television and the special features for a WWE pay-per-view event, with the voice-over man providing his “AND NOW, WWE PRESENTS……” combined with the pyro and effects for a PPV event, just makes it seem a great game overall.

The one unfortunate thing for me out of all this is that I will have to wait until Friday to pick up the game, however after getting a hands on experience with the game overall, I will be counting down those days even more so. To Quote former ECW announcer, Joey Styles on how good this game is, “OH MY GAWD” it’s absolutely brilliant!!!

OVERALL: 98% – This is the best wrestling game since WWE SmackDown: Here Comes The Pain.