Besides AEW Dynamite and quarterly pay-per-view events, one of the first projects announced by All Elite Wrestling was a video game based on the promotion. Not much has been shown of the AEW video game so far, but it features the involvement of the WWF No Mercy director and seems like it's aimed directly at fans of classic wrestling video games. While this is certainly cause for excitement, anyone expecting the graphics to match something like the upcoming WWE 2K22 video game will likely be disappointed.
In an interview with Wrestling Observer, AEW star and former AEW World Champion Kenny Omega discussed the upcoming AEW video game. "We'll never be [able] to compete with the production value of WWE's game. You look at 2K22, it's absolutely gorgeous," Omega said. However, it seems that the AEW video game is not necessarily looking to compete with WWE 2K22 in that arena, anyway; instead, it will be more focused on the gameplay. "[...] we just want the wrestling to feel like how it used to feel for the people who would play wrestling games back in the day."
WWE 2K22 graphics have been earning a great deal of praise based on what's been seen so far, and for good reason. While the jury is still out on whether or not WWE 2K22 is actually fun to play, it does seem to be a massive step forward in terms of graphical quality, especially compared to the disastrous WWE 2K20. It will also be the first WWE video game released on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X, allowing it to leverage the considerable horsepower of the new consoles.
As far as the AEW video game goes, too little has been shown of it to really make a judgment call about its production values either way. There's been some footage showing Darby Allin and Jungle Boy wrestling, as well as an early trailer showing the character models for Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega, and Hikaru Shida, but otherwise very little has been shown of the AEW game.
There was some hope that the AEW game release date would be sometime this year, but it's unclear if that will actually happen. The AEW video game has been in development for the past few years, though, so one has to imagine that more substantial information on the game is going to come sooner rather than later.
It will be interesting to see what match types are available in the AEW game and who will be featured on the roster. AEW has signed some big name talent in the years since the game was first announced, including the likes of Bryan Danielson and CM Punk, so on paper, the roster has potential to be stacked.
The AEW video game is in development.
Source: F4WOnline (via Wrestling Inc)
