Release Date von Smackdown 4

Der Referee ist im Ring und wird manchmal zur besseren Übersicht unsichtbar. AUßerdem bleibt er diesmal nach einer Aktion länger liegen.
Lawler und Ross sitzen nicht mit am Ring, sondern sie wurden diesmal ganz rausgelassen. Nur im Season Mode gibt es einige Cutscenes von ihnen. Von THQ wird behauptet, sie konnten sich nicht entscheiden, wo sie die Kommentatoren platzieren sollen, entweder wie bei RAW am Eingangsbereich oder wie bei SD! normal. Naja, wer glaubt.
Cole und Tazz kommentieren auch wieder und diesmal sollen alle Kommentatoren realistischer auf die Geschehnisse eingehen und stark verbessert sein!

schön,schön.choki weißt du wo ich ein preview find
und mach ma icq an

[URL=http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/reviews/0,10867,2897046,00.html]Gamespot Review[/URL]

Da das IGN Review nur für Members zugänglich ist, hab ich hier den Text:
WWE SmackDown! Shut Your Mouth
The Madden of pro wrestling finally nails it all down.

The SmackDown! series has settled into its groove at this point. Yuke's has gradually been reducing its various aspects to a simple formula, which can then be refined and updated on a yearly basis. The goal, I think, is to wind up with something like the Madden NFL games, which don't change a great deal on a fundamental basis each year, but nevertheless sell through the roof on the strength of an updated roster and presentation.

With the latest iteration, Shut Your Mouth, more or less all of the pieces are in place. This is a hell of a long way from the perfect wrestling game, but it's the first game in the series to nail down all the major flaws and genuinely deliver on all of THQ's promises. It's taken them four games, for example, but the Season Mode concept first talked about before the series began is finally worth the effort. The many fans who object on a fundamental level to the simplified SmackDown! grappling system won't have their minds changed, but at least the issues from Just Bring It have been nailed down.

The next generation of Anchor's RAW series promises a great deal, and it'll certainly look a hell of a lot better than Shut Your Mouth, but for those who've grown accustomed to it over the years, this is the best wrestling game available for the American PlayStation 2. If nothing else, it's almost entirely free of Michael Cole.

Gameplay
We are familiar with the SmackDown! grappling system, yes? To run things down for those who've been living in bomb shelters for the last five years, it relies more on positioning than timing, at least as compared to heavily timing-based systems like Fire Pro and the old Aki engine. One button executes strikes and another executes grappling maneuvers, which are in turn modified by motions on the D-pad and the opponent's state of grogginess. The single grapple button remains a limitation on the wrestlers' movesets, and I remain a partisan of Yuke's' old Toukon Retsuden system, which employed two separate buttons (one for power moves and another for submissions), but it appears that no amount of complaint will ever convince THQ to change that aspect of the game.

The most substantial change to the engine in Shut Your Mouth is the addition of more complex reversals. In Just Bring It, a move could be countered with a simple tap of the square button, which soon resulted in Dead or Alive-esque stalemates between players who had a good handle on the reversal timing. Shut Your Mouth switches over to a system similar to RAW or Wrestlemania X8, where a similar D-pad motion is required to reverse moves that use one. Thus, it's easy to reverse simple moves, but reversing more involved attacks demands an understanding of the wrestlers' movesets and an opponent's tendencies.

One problem that clearly remains from Just Bring It is the random nature of the "groggy" state. In theory, after you beat on an opponent for long enough, he'll be consistently dizzy and out of it, which makes it possible to hit him with more powerful moves and finishers. In practice, however, grogginess only seems to be triggered by certain key reversals and strikes, which makes the execution of power moves inconsistent and gives wrestlers with certain types of finishers a substantial advantage. Grappling finishers that require a groggy opponent are hard to perform reliably, while top-rope and ground submission finishers are easy as pie. Finishing moves are a fair bit more powerful in Shut Your Mouth than before, although submissions are still somewhat unreliable, so this clearly unbalances the game in versus play.

The addition of more complex object grapples is a nice touch, though, especially as it's accompanied by more intelligent foreign object physics. The tables and ladders still bounce around in somewhat unpredictable fashion, and putting an opponent through a table remains an inconsistent affair, but at least it works better than in Just Bring It. The new object grapples take care of the setup phase of the maneuver perfectly -- you can set up a table and put an opponent on top in one smooth movement.

Season Mode, fabled in myth, legend, and promotional materials for years now, is a hybrid of the Know Your Role and Just Bring It systems. This is undoubtedly the proper way to go. Know Your Role had the basic structure more or less right -- it just had titanic load times and a couple of boneheaded decisions regarding the interface design holding it back. Shut Your Mouth tidies up those problems, with fast loads, streamlined introduction for your primary wrestler into the title chase, and logical progression from match to match and feud to feud. The cinematic flash of Just Bring It is there, but it's the icing on the cake rather than the primary ingredient.

It could still stand a little tweaking, of course. The dialogue remains a strange Japanese/English hybrid that gets all kinds of bad laughs, and there are a few more cutscenes for victories and losses than absolutely necessary. Once or twice is nice, but after seeing the same animation after every win through months of WWE programming, the extra load time becomes tiring. The purpose of Season Mode should be, more than anything else, the simple delivery of matches on a regular basis, with a little rhyme and reason thrown in to spice things up. Too much window-dressing gets in the way of the action.

Create-a-Wrestler mode, on the other hand, only gets better this time out. The selection of cosmetic options has received the expected upgrade, including more basic parts and some great new systems for editing tattoos and other decals. The old animation creator now allows simpler editing of taunts and idle motions. There are also new systems for modifying individual body parts and facial features -- every part of the body can be altered on all three axes, and faces can be edited in both gross and fine deail. You can do just about anything you want with a created wrestler within the limitations of the 3D engine, which we'll discuss in just a little bit.

The main game mode, of course, presents enough match types to bury most players. This aspect of the game was in fine order two sequels ago -- most of the additions since have been overkill. Shut Your Mouth does add one key improvement to exhibition matches in the form of six-player support, though, so big groups with two multitaps can put on their own trios matches (and if I reckon correctly, there is a rules option to mimic the captains-fall style used in Mexico). To go hand in hand with the enhanced multiplayer support, the tag match mechanics are a little smoother now. In particular, the referee is less of a hassle, interfering less often than he did in Just Bring It

Presentation
When it comes to matching with the real-life programming, Shut Your Mouth is accurate up to earlier this year, around the time of the brand-splitting draft that created separate rosters for the RAW and SmackDown! shows. Vince McMahon is still a major storyline figure, and the belt structure is as it was up until the recent festival of reunification. There's one World title, plus Intercontinental, European, Hardcore, and Cruiserweight titles, and one set of tag titles.

It's hard to say what the most recent addition to the roster would be. Stone Cold Steve Austin appears, since THQ's license included the rights to his likeness regardless of whether he was still an active participant in the WWE. Contrary to previous assumption, it does not have the latest arrivals from the developmental territories (John Cena), and Rey Mysterio Jr. doesn't look to be in attendance either (note: if you do find Rey, don't hit me, just tell me how you got him). Rico Constantino and Randy Orton are there, however, and in one of those amusing egg-on-your-face turns of fate, the New World Order are major players (save for Scott Hall). Oh, and Diamond Dallas Page is still part of the roster, although we find this amusing enough to forgive.

The arena selection includes up-to-date RAW and SmackDown! arenas, the most recent WrestleMania, and every other regular pay-per-view, plus the two regular British events (Insurrextion and Rebellion). The arena modeling is first-rate this time out -- the giant SmackDown! fist is a hoot, and I love the big swinging hooks from the Backlash arena. Backstage, the size of the areas doesn't feel much bigger, but the layout is a good deal smarter than in Just Bring It, allowing easier progression through a variety of areas. Background objects are far more interactive, too, so you can chuck someone in a dumpster, set off the fire alarm, and otherwise pull off amusing bits of hardcore mayhem.

Graphics
Okay, end the praise. Most of it, anyway. It must be said that this game is in dire need of a new graphics engine -- it's gotten to the point that THQ is roundly smoking its own product. RAW on Xbox looks to be improving by a leap and a bound, while SmackDown!'s visual steps forward could only be described as incremental. Yuke's is obviously doing its level best with the technology available, beefing up the animation library and putting together some excellent arena designs, but the character models are just not up to snuff.

Take Kurt Angle. In reality, Kurt Angle doesn't come off so bad with no hair. The look takes some getting used to, but he's got the body and the facial personality to make up for it. Unfortunately, the virtual Kurt Angle in this game doesn't quite compensate in the same way. With his textured-on outfit and smooth, low-detail model, he looks uncomfortably reminiscent of that godawful Johnsons gimmick from NWA TNA. If you don't know what I'm talking about, thank whatever god you believe in. Other wrestlers who don't have very simple distinguishing features -- Brock Lesnar is another victim -- clearly show up the engine's failings in texture detail and modeling.

The worst glitches in Just Bring It have at least been taken care of. There are fewer egregious clipping errors when it comes to wrestlers with long hair, and some facial features have received a much-needed going over. Chris Benoit's face is vastly improved, for example. But the fact of the matter is that this game needs more polygons, lest the gap grow even worse in next year's model.

Of course, there's a clear reason why we haven't seen a jump in engines. That would likely require considerable revision of the animation library, and Yuke's has invested an awful lot of equity in the animations featured here. The cinematics for wrestler intros are superb, and the create-a-wrestler move archive includes a huge selection of signature finishers, wrestler-specific animations, and unusual Japanese maneuvers for re-creating your favorite puro stars. There's an awful lot of work that's gone into all that -- the game's only failing when it comes to animation are occasionally bollixed transitions -- but THQ is going to have to make a hard decision on this score eventually.

Sound
The voice commentary in Shut Your Mouth has not exactly improved over Just Bring It, but the aural experience in general has, because THQ had the sense to reduce the number of comments delivered by a good 90% or more. Where there was once a continual stream of nonsense spewed forth from the mouths of Tazz and Michael Cole, there's now the odd bit of color from Jim Ross or Jerry Lawler. The individual comments are really no more of an addition to the action than they were in the last game, but the presence of blissful silence during matches is a welcome change. The wrestlers still don't speak, but at least the ring announcements are now authentic ("Now entering the ring," etc.).

Aside from the commentary, the audio is as per Just Bring It, with some minor improvements in the quality of the jangling electro-metal that accompanies every match. The music fills me with less desire to burn things than before, which I guess is a compliment of sorts. The effects library hasn't changed a great deal, but that's one aspect of the game that never needed to -- it's solid, if somewhat limited. Wrestler-specific effects would be great (digitized grunts, reactions, and the like), but that's hardly priority one.
Closing Comments

As always, I would rather be playing Fire Pro. Also as always, you could do far worse than SmackDown!, given that it's the only game in town. It still has some nagging problems, and the graphics need an overhaul that I fear may never come, but this is the first time there hasn't been an obvious, glaring problem with the series' gameplay, which is cause for some kind of celebration.

Multi-console gamers are advised to wait a little while until RAW throws its hat in the ring, just to be on the safe side. Heck, the open-minded might even want to give Def Jam Wrestling a go. Die-hard devotees of the WWE shouldn't have too many complaints with the latest SmackDown!, though, especially since they can rest secure in the knowledge that they don't ever have to listen to Michael Cole again.

-- David Smith



Presentation
Season Mode has received some major improvements, although the dialogue still needs work. Load times in general are substantially improved.
8.0

Graphics
The animation is generally great, and the arena modeling is sharp, but these character models need an overhaul.
6.0

Sound
The music still ain't much, but at least the commentators know when to shut up, and
6.0

Gameplay
SmackDown!'s grappling system remains solid, if limited. The mode selection is still huge, create-a-wrestler is excellent, and Season Mode finally works.
8.0

Lasting Appeal
Wrestling fans have more than enough to occupy their time here, and Season Mode in particular gives the game single-player legs.
8.5

OVERALL SCORE (not an average)
8.2
©

thx choki
ich hab auf playstation.com gelesen das das erscheinungsdatum von sd 4 der 18.11 ist