Hey everyone its Jay aka BanTheTesters here to once again drop some nerd knowledge on you for one BIG article. If anyone has ever followed the FGC closely you know that wrestling and fighting games almost go hand and hand, but some of you might not know how close together the groups get, and today I’m here to explain more…
Back when no one knew this stood for “World Wildlife Fund”…
Ah it was like yesterday, good old 1995 the year of the dragon….the Mortal Kombat 3 dragon that would change gaming forever. Sweet new graphics and a Dial a Combo system would set the world on fire NBA Jam style…but there was another game that might have been overlooked in 1995 that dropped to arcades…a game by the name of “WWF WrestleMania: The Arcade Game”..let’s take a look and see a gem we might have missed
Now who here REALLY wanted to see if Bret Hart Could Pick up that Arcade Cab..?
WWF the arcade game was released in 1995 developed exclusively by Midway (the developer's of the Mortal Kombat franchise…wink wink) with home console ports done by a few different studios (more on that later). The game wasn’t developed by the "original" Mortal Kombat team but by a group who had VERY close ties to the development team for MK namely Mark Turmell ,Sal Divita, and Josh Tsui! Lets take a look at some of the team shell we?
Album Cover of the YEAR!!!
First up we have Mark Turmell, Born in Bay City a “weird” teen he made a game for the Apple 2 and was collecting checks for up to $10,000..again as just a teen! He would later help developed and ship games such as “NFL Blitz, NBA Jam, and Smash TV! He also took pride in blowing off the one and only Bill Gates to work with Atari instead. He even admitted that the NBA Jam was “rigged” against the Chicago Bulls (Turmell was a Pistons fan by the way) which would start producing “bricked” aka missed shots if taken during the last seconds of a game. Mr. Turmell would later go on to work for EA Games as a senior director then left there to join Zynga.
For those wondering, no…he no longer has the long hair…
Next up is Chicago born video game designer Sal Divita. Some of you may know Mr. Divita as the characters Nightwolf, Cyrax, Sektor, and Smoke in Mortal Kombat 3,UMK3 and MK Trology. He is also a voice over actor and Motion Capture artist, who also worked on the NFL Blitz series doing football player animation Motion Capture work and fighting the good fight with Mark Turmell to keep some of the cartoonish violence in the NFL Blitz arcade game after the NFL decided to “wash their hands of it” and even tried to give Midway the license fee money BACK. His last game credit was in 2011.
The face you constantly make when your a Bad Ass
And last but not least we have Josh Tsui who was born in Korea (and his parents are in fact Chinese). He later moved to Chicago to study film which then sparked his interest in animation. While trying to follow a friend into a job working on video games at Midway didn’t pan out at first he would later join after 8 interviews over a year after his boss convinced Midway they needed his “video guy skills”. Soon After his honeymoon he got a call to work on WWF the Arcade Game. He would go on to work with John Tobias on such titles as Mortal Kombat 2,Mortal Kombat 4 and Mortal Kombat Mythologies! He kept on trucking by working for Mr. Tobias at his new studio “Studio Gigante” to help develop Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus for Microsoft. The game sold well but no squeal was made due to the team taking up THQ’s WWE Wrestlemania 21.
Surprisingly when Searching for photos of Josh, a Pics of Nick Jonas popped up..why?
Mr. Tsui later got wind that a certain “dream project” of his was in need of being made. A new Tony Hawk Game was on the horizon and Tsui wanted in. He would go on to form his own studio “Robomondo” which lead to a deal with Activition and developed such games as “Tony Hawk: Ride”, Tony Hawk: Shred” , 2012’s “Tony Hawk HD” and 2015’s infamous “Tony Hawk Pro Skater 5”.
Regardless of your feelings on the new THPS5 at least we got a new game..
WWF the Arcade game plays just like the Mortal Kombat series before it in a very similar fashion. It’s a 5 botton arcade fighter with a run button combination (pressing 2 botton's at once). The game is also EXSTEMELY fast paced with a cartoonish and humor citric style. Players have a total of 8 characters to choose from featuring Shawn Michael's, Razor Ramon, The Undertaker, Bam Bam Bigelow, Doink the Clown, and others. Instead of blood the characters “bleed” certain objects such as Hearts coming out of Bret Hart.
Side by side who’s scarier Doink the clown…or IT…?)
Players have a choice to choose to go for the Intercontinental Title or the Federation one. Only four characters appear on the screen at the same time and only ONE known character had a “finishing” move similar to a fatality. The Undertaker was said character and while other finishing moves were planned for the later versions of the game, none were made. Ringside Commentary voice work was done by Vince McMahon and Jerry Lawler.
Man that is SUPER creepy without the official game sound music,no?
In retrospective all of Mark Turmell’s “16 hour work days” paid off as the game has the look and feel of the Mortal Kombat titles, as well as the button style (with the exception of the way running was done). Over the course of a few years there were several ports of the game some of which were published by Acclaim (yes THAT Acclaim that Mr. @jamessmk worked for!) for the SNES, 32X, Sega Saturn,DOS, and Playstation. The “CD Rom” versions of the game are considered the “closest” ports to the original arcade version with the minor exception that the game Freezes when loading certain elements of the game. During it’s run, GamePro called it “one of the most addictive arcade games to date”!
You have to admit this is probably the BEST behind the scenes vid ever right?
Alas all is not lost….while “arcade” centric style sports games are just about a thing of the past there are still ways to quench your wrestling thirst! Just before the Midway Studio closure they pumped out 2008’s “TNA Impact” (from the original studio that brought us MK Shaolin Monks!) for the PS3,Xbox 360 and Wii consoles. A motion capture masterpiece true to the TV show it’s based off of featuring tag, single, and Ultimate X matches. And in 2011 the Sal Divita produced arcade style romp fest “WWE All-stars” hit the mate of the Xbox 360 and Ps3 with its very own freaking FIGHTSTICK! While a huge exaggeration to the “arcade feel” of wrestling the online servers for the game have since been shut down as of 2013.
How many Midway Game Easter eggs can you spot in this video?
Well I think that just about raps it up for this very long article! I hope everyone had fun reading it, and I will hopefully be back with more stuff later on down the line or add to this series if need be. Big shout out again to @Tim Static and TYM for giving me a chance to bridge the gap between MK and Wrestling fans to more for the masses. Hope to see you guys in a bigger capacity here soon,Thanks for reading!
Back when no one knew this stood for “World Wildlife Fund”…
Ah it was like yesterday, good old 1995 the year of the dragon….the Mortal Kombat 3 dragon that would change gaming forever. Sweet new graphics and a Dial a Combo system would set the world on fire NBA Jam style…but there was another game that might have been overlooked in 1995 that dropped to arcades…a game by the name of “WWF WrestleMania: The Arcade Game”..let’s take a look and see a gem we might have missed
Now who here REALLY wanted to see if Bret Hart Could Pick up that Arcade Cab..?
WWF the arcade game was released in 1995 developed exclusively by Midway (the developer's of the Mortal Kombat franchise…wink wink) with home console ports done by a few different studios (more on that later). The game wasn’t developed by the "original" Mortal Kombat team but by a group who had VERY close ties to the development team for MK namely Mark Turmell ,Sal Divita, and Josh Tsui! Lets take a look at some of the team shell we?
Album Cover of the YEAR!!!
First up we have Mark Turmell, Born in Bay City a “weird” teen he made a game for the Apple 2 and was collecting checks for up to $10,000..again as just a teen! He would later help developed and ship games such as “NFL Blitz, NBA Jam, and Smash TV! He also took pride in blowing off the one and only Bill Gates to work with Atari instead. He even admitted that the NBA Jam was “rigged” against the Chicago Bulls (Turmell was a Pistons fan by the way) which would start producing “bricked” aka missed shots if taken during the last seconds of a game. Mr. Turmell would later go on to work for EA Games as a senior director then left there to join Zynga.
For those wondering, no…he no longer has the long hair…
Next up is Chicago born video game designer Sal Divita. Some of you may know Mr. Divita as the characters Nightwolf, Cyrax, Sektor, and Smoke in Mortal Kombat 3,UMK3 and MK Trology. He is also a voice over actor and Motion Capture artist, who also worked on the NFL Blitz series doing football player animation Motion Capture work and fighting the good fight with Mark Turmell to keep some of the cartoonish violence in the NFL Blitz arcade game after the NFL decided to “wash their hands of it” and even tried to give Midway the license fee money BACK. His last game credit was in 2011.
The face you constantly make when your a Bad Ass
And last but not least we have Josh Tsui who was born in Korea (and his parents are in fact Chinese). He later moved to Chicago to study film which then sparked his interest in animation. While trying to follow a friend into a job working on video games at Midway didn’t pan out at first he would later join after 8 interviews over a year after his boss convinced Midway they needed his “video guy skills”. Soon After his honeymoon he got a call to work on WWF the Arcade Game. He would go on to work with John Tobias on such titles as Mortal Kombat 2,Mortal Kombat 4 and Mortal Kombat Mythologies! He kept on trucking by working for Mr. Tobias at his new studio “Studio Gigante” to help develop Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus for Microsoft. The game sold well but no squeal was made due to the team taking up THQ’s WWE Wrestlemania 21.
Surprisingly when Searching for photos of Josh, a Pics of Nick Jonas popped up..why?
Mr. Tsui later got wind that a certain “dream project” of his was in need of being made. A new Tony Hawk Game was on the horizon and Tsui wanted in. He would go on to form his own studio “Robomondo” which lead to a deal with Activition and developed such games as “Tony Hawk: Ride”, Tony Hawk: Shred” , 2012’s “Tony Hawk HD” and 2015’s infamous “Tony Hawk Pro Skater 5”.
Regardless of your feelings on the new THPS5 at least we got a new game..
WWF the Arcade game plays just like the Mortal Kombat series before it in a very similar fashion. It’s a 5 botton arcade fighter with a run button combination (pressing 2 botton's at once). The game is also EXSTEMELY fast paced with a cartoonish and humor citric style. Players have a total of 8 characters to choose from featuring Shawn Michael's, Razor Ramon, The Undertaker, Bam Bam Bigelow, Doink the Clown, and others. Instead of blood the characters “bleed” certain objects such as Hearts coming out of Bret Hart.
Side by side who’s scarier Doink the clown…or IT…?)
Players have a choice to choose to go for the Intercontinental Title or the Federation one. Only four characters appear on the screen at the same time and only ONE known character had a “finishing” move similar to a fatality. The Undertaker was said character and while other finishing moves were planned for the later versions of the game, none were made. Ringside Commentary voice work was done by Vince McMahon and Jerry Lawler.
In retrospective all of Mark Turmell’s “16 hour work days” paid off as the game has the look and feel of the Mortal Kombat titles, as well as the button style (with the exception of the way running was done). Over the course of a few years there were several ports of the game some of which were published by Acclaim (yes THAT Acclaim that Mr. @jamessmk worked for!) for the SNES, 32X, Sega Saturn,DOS, and Playstation. The “CD Rom” versions of the game are considered the “closest” ports to the original arcade version with the minor exception that the game Freezes when loading certain elements of the game. During it’s run, GamePro called it “one of the most addictive arcade games to date”!
Alas all is not lost….while “arcade” centric style sports games are just about a thing of the past there are still ways to quench your wrestling thirst! Just before the Midway Studio closure they pumped out 2008’s “TNA Impact” (from the original studio that brought us MK Shaolin Monks!) for the PS3,Xbox 360 and Wii consoles. A motion capture masterpiece true to the TV show it’s based off of featuring tag, single, and Ultimate X matches. And in 2011 the Sal Divita produced arcade style romp fest “WWE All-stars” hit the mate of the Xbox 360 and Ps3 with its very own freaking FIGHTSTICK! While a huge exaggeration to the “arcade feel” of wrestling the online servers for the game have since been shut down as of 2013.
Well I think that just about raps it up for this very long article! I hope everyone had fun reading it, and I will hopefully be back with more stuff later on down the line or add to this series if need be. Big shout out again to @Tim Static and TYM for giving me a chance to bridge the gap between MK and Wrestling fans to more for the masses. Hope to see you guys in a bigger capacity here soon,Thanks for reading!
Catch me on the Inter-webs:
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/BanTheTesters
- Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/banthetesters
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjdfXNDYZYfD7fRsJM7peug
- https://killscreen.com/articles/pre-game-interview-mark-turmell/
- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/26/nba-jam-rigged_n_3998321.html
- http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/08/how-mark-turmell-went-from-creating-nba-jam-to-match-three-at-zy/
- https://sports.vice.com/en_us/article/how-in-the-hell-did-nfl-blitz-ever-get-made
- http://mortalkombat.wikia.com/wiki/Sal_Divita
- http://www.giantbomb.com/sal-divita/3040-11171/
- http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/1/24/3754750/from-fatalities-to-flip-tricks-josh-tsuis-20-years-of-chicago-game
- http://www.giantbomb.com/wwf-wrestlemania-the-arcade-game/3030-8027/
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWF_WrestleMania:_The_Arcade_Game
- https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_MwN50cCI3ENzGIbq8_hCQ
- https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZMU_HpPrqpvV0QvDoGqjoA
- https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOp8wkVqdrWbFYHjDv946QQ
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWE_All_Stars
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TNA_Impact!_(video_game)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midway_Studios_Los_Angeles
