If you thought classic betrayals only happened in WWE storylines, check this one out. Rival WWE company All Elite Wrestling (AEW) has just announced that it is making a foray into video games with former WWE game developer Yuke's.
Paying homage to the "number three" jargon in the wrestling industry, AEW plans to release three different games in the future. The main game in this line, which is expected to compete with WWE's 2K franchise, will be released on PS5, PS4, Xbox One and Xbox Series X / S.
For those who don't follow wrestling, AEW is arguably the second most popular wrestling promotion in the world. He has a roster of famous wrestling stars such as Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega, Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose) and Cody Rhodes.
In an event broadcast on YouTube, Kenny Omega announced AEW's very first video game - yet untitled - while performing a very precise impersonation of Steve Jobs. What caught viewers' attention the most was the involvement of Yuke, a developer with a history of making WWE games.
Yuke turns heel on WWE, alongside AEW
After a string of mediocre games that culminated in the ridiculously small cart WWE 2K20, publisher 2K Sports cut all ties with Yuke. The Japanese firm's WWE 2K series has been replaced by Saber Interactive's WWE 2K Battlegrounds, which has toned down the realism and falls more on the arcadey side than its predecessor.
Turns out Yuke's is now working with AEW for its first major release on current and next-gen consoles. Comparing the untitled game to NBA Jam and NFL Blitz, Omega revealed that the game would be "easy to take" but "hard to master."
The brief footage shown at the event gave us a glimpse of what to expect from the game. It didn't reveal much outside of the cartoonish graphics that suggest the developer took inspiration from WWE. 2K Battleground. Or, it could just be some really primitive work-in-progress graphics.
A screenshot of the first images of the game shown during the live broadcast. (Credit: AEW Games)In addition, two additional games, "AEW: Elite General Manager" and "AEW Casino: Double or Nothing", are also in the works. In Elite General Manager, you will assume the role of General Manager on your smartphone. On the other hand, Casino: Double or Nothing will be a virtual game of chance with AEW products as a jackpot.
Besides Yuke, veteran Game Director Hideyuki Iwashita, who worked on the game "WWF No Mercy", also plays an important role in AEW's game plan. So what these two bring could give a huge boost to the company's ambitions to compete with WWE on the gaming front.
Hopefully for WWE, AEW's partnership with their former allies will act as a wake-up call and ultimately lead to better WWE 2K games than we've seen over the years.
The AEW Tag Teams post with former WWE 2K developer for an untitled game first appeared on Fossbytes.
