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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 10, 2002 16:58:40 GMT -5
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Post by The~Next~Big~Thing on Oct 16, 2002 14:56:05 GMT -5
THAT TOTALLY REEKS OF AWESOMENESS!:laugh:
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 16, 2002 14:58:15 GMT -5
Does anyone know if that stuff is all true? I know some of it is but a lot of those fan sites post rumors as actual features.  |
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Post by The~Next~Big~Thing on Oct 16, 2002 16:13:22 GMT -5
I have read lots of reviews and previews, and about 90% is true, which ISN'T A BAD THING.... (Next post continue).....
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 19, 2002 17:35:30 GMT -5
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Post by The~Next~Big~Thing on Oct 20, 2002 4:18:54 GMT -5
I've tried the links, but they don't work for me.... |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 20, 2002 8:56:27 GMT -5
Bad news!   The guy with the game posted this on Gamefaq's: This is Ken from RewiredMind.com. The editor/owner and guy who just watched the nWo come back in SDSYM Season Mode.
Yesterday, October 19th (UK) - We posted some screenshots of SD:SYM, they WERE exclusive screenshots until 18 other sites linked DIRECT to our images, effectively stealing our bandwidth.
Our bandwidth usage jumped from about 800mb/day to nearly 70Gb/day.
Also, folks seem to be posting "How does this work in the game? How does that work in the game?" when we've either a) Posted the answer, b) Posted a screenshot that answered the question or c) Promised to answer in the upcoming Q&A.
Also, the 600+ emails I got today didn't help, especially when I asked for people NOT to email me.
WHY CAN'T YOU PEOPLE READ?
I am doing you a HUGE favour by posting these screenshots for free and answering your questions for free. And how do you repay us? Oh yeah, ignore everything we say.
And as for our ONE form of advertising bringing in cash...our Amazon links....from about 40,000 visitors, we had 3 orders for SDSYM through Amazon.co.uk and ZERO through Amazon.com.
Yes, I'm a little PO'ed. My Moderators are leaving because you won't give them any respect. My hosting company is shouting at me because YOU broke our server. I have no more Pepsi and coffee to keep me awake and have smoked about 40000 cigarettes in the last 24 hours, during which, David and I have had NO sleep. Same as the day before.
Add this to the fact that people don't seem to think that we're telling the truth, despite having clear screenshots of a wrestler NAMED AS KEN BARNES (ie ME) walking to the ring, and a shot of ME HOLDING THE DISC.
Thanks for your support or lack thereof. Why do we do it? Hell knows. But David and I are still busting a gut to get a new server for YOU to abuse and blow up.
Ask IGN, ask Gamespot, ask Gamespy, hell, ask THQ if they would knock up a few screenshots for you, as and when you want them, as well as answer your questions over and over and over again. What do you think their answer would be? I can tell you....it would be NO. Because they don't care.
We cared. And look where it got us.
We'll be back soon, but I really can't tell you when. I'm going to sleep.
Peace out.
Ken Barnes,
Editor,
RewiredMind.comSo I guess that's the end of that! Since so many people directly linked to their images and stole them without giving any credit, we all have to suffer. |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 20, 2002 13:15:39 GMT -5
Good news: Hello there,
I finally got me an account here. I'm Ken from RewiredMind.com - I know that some have tried to impersonate me, but I am the real deal. I have no way of proving it, and quite frankly, I shouldn't need to.
RewiredMind.com DIED last night. Basically under the weight of the users that came to see the screenshots of SD4. We are currently arranging a new, dedicated server, and the site WILL return this week, with all the screens and Q&A's.
Here is a problem. We lost the questions! When the site died, the database fried and we lost a LOT of posts.
What I would like you to do, if you have a question, is send it to a new dedicated email box, which is sd4questions@rewiredmind.com
Now, I know all of our visitors didn't come from here, so SPREAD THE WORD! Let everyone know about the new inbox for questions.
Also, if you want an exclusive set of questions for your site...don't bother emailing me, as you won't get it. I notice that I got a lot of emails asking for screenshots, from webmasters who have know stolen our exclusive shots.
We've made mistakes. We should have watermarked and protected the images. I guess I trusted the SD4 community a little TOO much  It won't happen again. I find it amazing that I'm still getting flamed though...
Moderators: PLEASE do not delete this post. It is basically a public service announcement and will clear up some of the confusion on this board.
Thank you all,
Ken Barnes,
Editor,
RewiredMind.comAlso, if you want to see some of the screens, here is a link to one of the sites that stole them: www3.telus.net/smackdown/screens/screens.html |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 22, 2002 15:39:36 GMT -5
New IGN Videos can be found here: mediaviewer.ign.com/ignMediaPage.jsp?channel_id=70&object_id=482002&adtag=network=ign&site=ps2type%3Dpartnerviewer%26pagetype%3Darticle&page_title=WWE%20SmackDown!%20Shut%20Your%20Mouth Smackdown Season Mode Preview from IGN: The core of a sports video game has always been its simulation of the sport itself, the basic mechanics of gameplay, but in this day and age, it takes more than an accurate simulation to give a sports game longevity. That's true even for sports that most people don't consider sports -- professional wrestling, say. Followers of any sport will tell you that a season or franchise mode, something that injects continuity in between episodes of competition, are the key to a long-lasting sports game. Yuke's, Aki, and other developers have tried to perfect the concept of a wrestling season, with varying degrees of historical success. The Story Mode in last year's SmackDown! Just Bring It would probably be considered one of the failures in that regard -- it was a decent idea, perhaps, but very limited in its implementation. So Yuke's went back to the drawing board for the sequel, Shut Your Mouth, integrating new and old ideas into a redesigned Season Mode. Here's a look at the structure of that new-school Season. Selecting A Superstar Season Mode lets you pick one wrestler, real or created, and follow their progress through a year of WWE programming. It begins with the chance to pick that wrestler, and also edit their allegiances to a degree. The game's Stable system includes pre-existing teams with customized entrances (Billy Gunn and Chuck Palumbo, for example, are a team together and with Rico Constantino), but if you want to change the stable situation, you can do so in this menu:  Pick a stable, any stable. |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 22, 2002 15:48:19 GMT -5
The Draft Next, the draft begins. This, of course, is a re-creation of the brand extension draft from earlier this year, where the WWE roster was theoretically split into two halves -- one for Monday's RAW show, the other for Thursday's SmackDown. Shut Your Mouth lets you create your own draft up through the 20th pick, assigning wrestlers to one brand or another, but if you don't want to spend that much time on it, it's possible to let the game select for you. The result in that case will roughly mirror the real-life draft, although the wrestler assignments naturally won't be quite exact.  The SmackDown! selection screen. Ranking Now that your wrestler has a place in the roster, it's time to see where they are on the championship ladder. Superstar Points are the method used to reckon a wrestler's position in the title hunt, as well as other potential storyline opportunities. The draft determines default points -- the higher their draft pick, the more points a wrestler starts with -- and wins and losses affect the total from then on. A series of big wins will increase a wrestler's points, and with them the likelihood of a title shot or appearances in major events. For example, there's a minimum point level required to enter the Royal Rumble or the King of the Ring tournament. Vince McMahon can give an individual wrestler an update on his point total in between matches, and in between weeks of programming, you can check up on the status of the whole roster.  Lay it on me, Vince. Let The Games Begin Now that the draft is over, the season starts, progressing from week to week or month to month. As a rule, a wrestler competes five times each month -- four weekly TV shows and one monthly pay-per-view event. The wrestler you're playing as is always booked on the card, and it's easy to skip the other matches, which saves on the tedium encountered in the Know Your Role season mode. Here's a typical schedule for an event:  Who's on first? |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 22, 2002 15:50:35 GMT -5
Wrestlers just beginning the Season Mode typically compete in the first or second match, although that varies according to their Superstar Points. While checking up on the active schedule for your wrestler's brand, you can also have a look at what's happening on the other brand's program. Interference is only available as an option for matches on your brand, however.  A little warm-up before the main event. To interfere in a match, you have to enter the stage in the first-person Roaming Mode (more on that later) and select the option to run in. Doing so can naturally lead to a shift in allegiance and future feuds, although messing with matches low on the card may not necessarily lead to significant consequences in the future. In the middle of it all, of course, are the matches a wrestler competes in each week. Some of these are selected more or less at random -- why is Chris Benoit starting off the season up against the Hurricane? -- but as the year progresses, feuds develop and cinematics are added to give a little more rhyme and reason to events from week to week. For example, Benoit's first month led through a brief issue with Rikishi culminating into a match for a title shot at the Backlash pay-per-view (complete, incidentally, with those cool swinging hooks around the entrance). In between matches, the game occasionally offers an opportunity to make a choice that might affect future events, like cutting a promo to call out a title holder:  Come get some! This may then be followed up by other cinematics in future weeks, although the news may not necessarily be good:  Aw, get bent, JR. Sometimes, a storyline fork may come out of the blue, without a connection to an earlier event. If you know a little about the structure of the WWE schedule, though, you can see some of them coming. Toward the end of the spring, for instance, JR will offer a shot to go on the UK tour for the Rebellion pay-per-view, leading to different matches and different issues on that little side-trip. That's also where you'll have to go if you want to snag any of the unlockable items related to the Rebellion event. |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 22, 2002 15:56:13 GMT -5
Wherever I May Roam In between matches, Shut Your Mouth employs the same Roaming Mode as Just Bring It, but it's been improved and changed in a couple of ways. While the first-person navigation controls remain familiar, the backstage areas are more sensibly organized in Shut Your Mouth. Different areas are arranged around the arena lobby, which serves as a central hub -- you can get anywhere from there, which saves some of the time you may have spent wandering around the arena in Just Bring It. These are the areas you can check out:   Merchandise Table The merch table delivers an accounting of what you've unlocked so far and what you can unlock in the future. Each monthly pay-per-view event is connected to five or six different items -- outfits, create-a-wrestler features, arenas, and so on. Fulfilling different conditions lets you pick an item and unlock it. The most common condition is simply winning a match at a PPV, but special events have more specific requirements for certain unlockables, like winning the Royal Rumble.  VIP Suite This is where Vince McMahon hangs out during the event. Checking in with the boss lets you look up your current Superstar Points and perhaps beg for a title shot.  Stage/Arena There are two entrances to the arena proper, one marked "Stage" and the other marked "Arena." Going to the latter leads directly to your wrestler's match for the evening. The former, however, offers the chance to interfere in preliminary matches on the card.  Downstairs This path leads into the basement areas of the arena, including the infamous boiler room. It's not so significant in Season Mode, since the only reason to go down there is on the off chance that there might be another wrestler to chat with. The same goes for the exit out into the street, although it's amusing to look across the way and see the famous SmackDown! Hotel.  Locker Room The locker room is another separate area where you may encounter another wrestler, and it's probably more likely that there will be someone to see there than there would be in, say, the parking garage. You never know, though.  When you do bump into someone around the arena, walk up and say hi. So far, these conversations seem to merely fill time, although they do so in rather amusing fashion. Tales of Val Venis' sexual conquests and Bob Holly's popularity (both presumably rather exaggerated) are rendered as always in a strange amalgam of Japanese syntax and American vocabulary. Yuke's' new Season Mode is showing substantial improvements in nearly every area. It has the details of Just Bring It, and repairs many of the flaws of Know Your Role while keeping its basic, effective structure. It remains to be seen whether it will meet all the hopes that wrestling fans have been building over the years, but if nothing else, the dialogue never fails to entertain. Look forward to further updates on Shut Your Mouth later in the week. Credit: IGN |
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 24, 2002 6:55:18 GMT -5
IGN's Create-A-Wrestler Info
Earlier this week, we were talking about the features required to give a sports game legs. Franchise and career modes are one popular hot button, which THQ and Yuke's hope to push with the revised Season Mode in WWE SmackDown! Shut Your Mouth. Another key extra is creation and customization modes -- in this case, the newly-upgraded create-a-superstar mode. The SmackDown series has always excelled in this regard, but it never hurts to add a few new parts and features, which Yuke's has most definitely done this time out.
As far as nuts and bolts go, there are 32 wrestler save slots available, so it's not possible to fill an entire fictional WWE in Season Mode with created wrestlers. However, the Season Mode would be a little lean with that many wrestlers, anyway -- the number of slots in each brand well exceeds the number of create-a-wrestler slots available. The size of the saved game, meanwhile, has been substantially reduced. An entire Shut Your Mouth save, created wrestlers and all, now occupies only 228KB, instead of the multi-megabyte monstrosity employed by Just Bring It.
When it comes time to actually create a wrestler, there are two modes as always: Appearance and Moves. We'll look at cosmetic customization first.
Appearance
This is the suite of options available for customizing the appearance of a wrestler -- a pretty broad category. However, it's broken down into a great many separate parts.
Base Model
Very simple -- there are only two choices here. The Base Model option determines a wrestler's gender, male or female.
Base Edit
Ah, now we're getting into the good stuff. Base Edit is where you select the individual parts that make up a wrestler's body, clothing, and accessories. It's divided up according to body part location, for the most part, although there are some separate categories of items that can be placed in many areas around the body. It goes like so.
Odds and ends.
Head: The Head category includes Hair (128 options), Caps & Hats (42 options), and Horns (49 options). Horns is a rather broader category than you might think -- it also includes mask horns that are designed to work in conjunction with other mask parts located in the face editing category.
Face: Facial features, lots of these. Eyebrows (93 options), Eyes (54 options), Mustaches (75 options), Paint features (85 options), Masks (145 options), Glasses (42 options), and Accessories (88 options). The Accessories category covers everything from eyeliner to scarves to goofy clown lips. Masks and Paint, meanwhile, can be combined with Horn parts on the head to create complex masks (a la Jushin Liger).
Body: This is everything you could somehow fit on a torso. Skin (10 options), Underwear (close to 100 options), Tank tops (57 options), T-Shirts (124 options), Open Shirts (84 options), Vests (65 options), Costumes/Singlets (81 options), One Piece outfits (37 options), Jackets and Coats (85 options), Tattoos (27 options), and Accessories (55 options). Accessories in this category mainly denotes neckties and such.
Arms: Accessories for the arms. Elbow Pads (85 options), Wrist Bands (100 options), Tattoos (15 options), and Accessories (12 options). All of these selections except Tattoos have the option to place a part on both arms or only one. These accessories are mainly watches and bracelets, while Wrist Bands includes both small wristbands and full-length sleeves like those worn by the Hardy Boyz.
Hands: Gloves and wrist extras and the like. Gloves (42 options), and Accessories (17 options). Accessories in this case are rings and finger tape.
Waist: The Waist category includes traditional wrestling trunks. Underwear (145 options) and Belts (46 options).
Legs: Pants, pads, and more. Tights (163 options), Short Pants (127 options), Pants (145 options), Mini Skirts (61 options), Skirts (80 options), Long Skirts (182 options), Knee Pads (102 options), and Tattoos (13). Again, knee pads can be worn on one leg or both.
Feet: Because otherwise a wrestler's toes would get cold. Socks (148 options) and Shoes (75 options). Note that a wrestler may wear only one sock on a single leg, but he has to wear two shoes.
Design: This is one of the most interesting image editing options, because it offers the ability to lay out a variable image anywhere on a wrestler's body.
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 24, 2002 6:56:28 GMT -5
Tattoo! Tattoo!
Design requires a little more detail to explain. First, you select a Pattern, Word, or Letter. Pattern is an array of images divided into five categories: WWE slogans and icons (66 options), Simple Icons (172 options), Pictures (120 options), Flags (30 options), and Tattoos (53 options). Word is a selection of 142 different words. If the one you want isn't there, you can write it out with the Letter command in one of eight different fonts.
After picking an image, it can go on one of six body parts: face, torso, left arm, right arm, left leg, and right leg. It can then be moved around the model, resized, and rotated, all the while appropriately mapping itself to the curvature of the wrestler's body. Thus, it's possible to create very detailed custom face paint and tattoos.
Skin Colors
After that exhaustive selection of options, this is pretty basic in comparison. There are eight different skin tone options, ranging from pallid to extremely dark.
Figure
Figure is divided into two sub-sections, Form and Height. Height is relatively simple -- the base height of a wrestler, from a minimum of 5'3" to a maximum of 7'2". Form, however, is very complex now. It's possible to edit the size and shape of a wrestler's Head, Neck, Chest, Shoulders, Abdomen, Arms, Forearms, Hands, Waist, Thighs, Legs, and Ankles. Any limb part can be manipulated independently, so a wrestler can have one leg that's much bigger than the other, and all three axes are available for editing. This part of the game makes use of the dual analog controls, so it's possible to adjust length, width, and height of a part, all at the same time.
Sample Model
The uselessly lazy can pick from among 20 different pre-created fictional wrestlers, but what kind of fun would that be? Even so, it's interesting to check through this section and see what the Yuke's designers have crafted in their spare time.
Profile
This is where you give your wrestler a bit of a personality. He has a Name, a Ring Name, a Call Name, and a Nick Name, all of which affect what he's called at different junctures in the text and voice portions of Season Mode. Call Name is the one that's spoken -- including the names of real wrestlers, there's a total of 192 different names available. Variables for his progression in Season Mode is set in his Biography, where he gets a gender, a weight class, and a face/heel orientation. Incidentally, there is an "other" gender available if you like. Finally, as before, a wrestler gets two signs that will appear in the crowd during his matches.
Ability
120 points are available from the beginning to customize a wrestler's abilities when it comes to attack and defense. Four basic categories exist: Powerful (power moves), Speedy (agile/high flying moves), Technical (mat wrestling and submissions), and Rough Neck (brawling and weapon moves). Points can be allocated toward attack and defense in all of these areas, enhancing a wrestler's ability to use those kinds of moves or defend against them. For the lazy, there's an automatic setting option to create a wrestler skilled in a particular area, rather than very precisely tuned for a player's likes and dislikes.
Moves
It's possible to skip out on the move editor entirely and select a move set geared toward one of the four aforementioned styles, a completely average move set, or one that's already been designed for a particular wrestler. If you do this, however, you are silly.
Logic
This category determines a wrestler's behavior while under the control of the computer AI. Two adjectives can be set to govern how he behaves, from an array of six: Brawler, Grappler, Submission, Luchador, Striker, and Balanced. If you plan on using a wrestler as a tag partner, it would be wise to select this with an eye toward's his moveset and abilities.
Okay, so are we happy with how our wrestler looks? Then we can move on to how he wrestles. The options available here are much simpler and more familiar than those in the cosmetic customization mode -- as always, it more or less boils down to putting moves in slots. Here's a rundown of the categories available.
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Post by Bruce Bolt on Oct 24, 2002 7:03:20 GMT -5
Bases These aren't moves, per se, but the basic animations displayed when a wrestler idles or performs basic navigation actions: Ring In Move, Ring Out Move, Taunt, Fighting Style (a reversal activation animation), Walking Style, Running Style, Winning Move, and Entrance. That last selection is broken town into three options -- entrance animation, entrance movie, and entrance music. It's worth noting that while there seem to be no original entrance movies (as were planned for the original RAW), some wrestlers have more than one movie -- Billy Kidman, Brock Lesnar, Hollywood Hogan, and others. Ready Moves These are straightforward strikes and grapples, usually performed toe-to-toe with an opponent: Attack (6 slots), Grapple (12 slots), Back Attack (8 slots), and Edge of a Ceiling (4 slots). That last category covers moves performed on top of the Hell in a Cell cage. Ground Moves performed on a grounded opponent: Attack (3 slots) and Grapple (6 slots). Turnbuckle Not top-rope maneuvers, but moves performed on an opponent who's been whipped into the turnbuckle: Attack (3 slots), Grapple (5 slots), and Back Attack (4 slots). Rope Opponent These are moves performed when an opponent is sitting groggy against the ropes, or when the player is ready to fly over the ropes (pescados and such): Rope Down (1 slot), Rebound Attack (3 slots), and Jump Down Over (1 slot). Aerial These are top-rope maneuvers: Standing (2 slots) and Down (3 slots). The qualifiers there refer to the state of the opponent being targeted, of course. Running Moves performed while running: Attack (2 slots), Grapple (2 slots), Back Attack (2 slots), Squatting Attack (2 slots), and Counter (3 slots). Double Team Shut Your Mouth has a substantially expanded array of double-team moves, although the conditions to perform them are the same as before: Stand (5 slots), and Turnbuckle (4 slots). The latter refers to a situation when the opponent is whipped into the turnbuckle near your partner. Special Not only finishing maneuvers, but also favored maneuvers and weapon grapples: Special (2 slots), Favorites (3 slots), Special Weapon (2 slots), and Combination Moves (3 slots). That last option allows three moves to be performed in a special combination sequence. Shut Your Mouth looks to deliver as detailed a creation mode as we've seen in a wrestling game yet, especially with its new decal editing and placement system. Unfortunately, the previously-touted password system -- which would have reduced a created wrestler down to an easily-shared code -- has been scrapped in the interim, but the new, smaller data save goes a little way towards making it easier to trade wrestlers. And, after all, there always has to be something left to add next year.         Sounds awesome! Too bad they took the password system out though. |
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The guy with the game posted this on Gamefaq's:
It won't happen again. I find it amazing that I'm still getting flamed though...