WWE 2K developer to create secondary wrestling title to compete with itself

Like when Vince split the brand because reasons

Yuke’s, longtime developer of pro-wrestling video games, has announced plans to create a second wrestling IP, with aims of providing competition with its own long-stagnant WWE 2K series. Speaking in an interview with Video Games Chronicle, Yuke’s Senior Vice President Hiromi Furuta related her concerns that the lack of competition in the pro-wrestling video game market was not healthy for business, or for the future of the genre.

“When we had competitors in the wrestling space, we were determined not to lose and that was a great motivator for creating something great, ” said Furuta. “But right now, looking at the market demands, players are expecting something new every time we release a game and we feel like we haven’t achieved what we’ve really wanted to do.”

There was no specific information mentioned regarding this new project, so we don’t know whether it’ll be a secondary WWE game, or an over-the-top fantasy title, or based around a Japanese promotion, or anything. Furuta did note that the 2K series would continue, jesting that “WWE would never allow us to stop making these games!”

It’s not going to happen, but the WWE video game series just needs to take a sabbatical. The dev teams have to be burned out creating these identikit releases year after year. The product has also suffered hard, with the games simply not being up to the same standard of fun and longevity of AKI Corporation’s N64 releases – such as WWF No Mercy – or even the earlier titles in Yuke’s own SmackDown! series.

At least the developer is clearly aware that the series is stagnating, and hopefully, whether through a secondary title or otherwise, will be able to steer the ship into exciting new waters, without increasing the workload put upon its team with these pointlessly insistent annual releases.

WWE 2K studio creating rival wrestling IP [Video Game Chronicle]