Rumble Roses XX

In the years since the PlayStation exploded the videogame market into the mainstream, there has been a concerted effort on the part of game developers to extend the appeal of gaming past the boundaries of the 18-34 year old male demographic and entice potential female consumers. Rumble Roses XX is NOT an example of this movement. Konami’s first venture into the next generation brazenly flaunts the sexualized nature of the game’s female-only stable of combatants and the positions they find themselves in over the course of a match from the moment the intro cinematic starts, deliberately flying the face of every effort to shift the depiction of women in games to the politically correct end of the spectrum. The game certainly holds appeal outside of the lovely leading ladies however, boasting a solid grappling system, a robust character creation feature, and online play for up to four people. That said, the absence of a real story or campaign mode and lack of variety in match types leaves the overall package feeling as skimpy as some of the character’s outfits.

Sex Appeal

Rather than skirt the issue (pun fully intended, sadly), I’ll get the obvious out of the way and confirm that yes, the girls of Rumble Roses XX are just as naughty, border-line tasteless, and wonderfully rendered as you’ve no doubt read by now, and they fill the screen with enough jiggling ‘T’ and gyrating ‘A’ to make Itagaki and the rest of Team Ninja feel down-right prudish. The initial selection of femme fatales cover most of the bases as far as fetishes and personalities are concerned, from the cute exotic foreigner, to the punk-rocker catholic school-girl (a personal favorite) and uptight stocking-clad teacher, the all-American blonde-and-blue-eyed cowgirl, and the naughty nurse among others – all of course, sporting voluptuous curves in all the right places.

Additionally, each character has an alter-ego of the opposite predisposition, so antagonist characters (heels) are complemented by an unlockable protagonists (face) and vice-versa. More than mere palette swaps or costume changes, each of these complementary characters comes with her own distinctive personality and fetish theme, as well as a significantly altered move set, effectively doubling the character roster. For example, the aforementioned catholic schoolgirl has a good-girl cheerleader alter-ego, complete with a new costume, entrance, finishing maneuvers, and a move-set that features less dirty tricks than her bad-girl counterpart. Finally, each wrestler has a ‘Superstar’ incarnation that features skimpier attire and a more powerful move-set, making for a grand total of well over 20 gorgeous wrestlers to choose from.

The figures and fetish costumes are only half the story however, as the sexualized nature of the presentation really start to kick in once the women begin moving and grappling with each other. Every motion, from the sultry walk down the ramp during entrances that resemble over-the-top music videos, to the litany of suggestive positions the women find themselves in over the course of a match, are hyper-sexualized and played up as opportunities to show off the women’s bodies. There is plenty of bending over and leg-spreading, an abundance of panty-shots and bouncing breasts, and a constant stream of girl-on-girl contact and entangled bodies. Everyone stays fully clothes and all the naughty bits remain covered – even if it seems like that would be physically impossible given some of the outfits – but the proceedings are still quite raunchy, albeit presented in a tongue-in-cheek manner. We’ll let individual players decide whether or not this is celebration of the female form or exploitation of it, but we’d be lying if we didn’t say the titillation value didn’t add something to our enjoyment of the first few matches played. The problem of course, is that eventually the shock and awe wears off.

Gameplay

Based solely on the merits of the gameplay, Rumble Roses XX feels a little bare (again, pun fully intended). There is no story or campaign mode to speak of, and the single player game is little more than a map with several venues at which to enter matches against random opponents. Certain venues always feature the same type of match, but for the most part the type of match is randomly selected as well, with no indication provided to the player before they actually select a venue. With no real storyline, progress can only really be measured in terms of money, popularity, and the stats of the player character, and the major goals for completion are limited to collection of unlockable characters and content. Money is earned through winning matches and can be used to purchase new costumes for the wrestlers, as well as artwork, unlockable game modes, and humiliating tasks for a beaten opponent to perform after losing in the ‘Queen’s Match’ match-type. Unlocking everything actually doesn’t take as much time as one would think, as it only takes about 6-matches worth of money to earn each of the items, and many of them are not character specific – using one character does not allow access to different exclusive humiliation tasks, and costumes opened with one character are often available for use with other characters. As such, players will typically have no trouble earning all of the extra goodies through the in-game store as they unlock each of the variations of the initially selectable wrestlers, which is simply a matter of winning enough matches.

Popularity and character stats are determined by the actions taken during the match. Seeing as this is sports entertainment, winning alone will not guarantee that character moves up the ladder in terms of fan appeal. Players can increase the popularity of their character through using moves that embarrass the opponent, and making good use of counters and specials. This, in conjunction with a healthy dose of boasting to the crowd (taunting) and actually winning the match, players can gain a few points on a scale of 0 to 100, with 100 being the most popular. Losing a match causes the character to lose almost double the amount of popularity points gained through winning a match. Once players cross a certain threshold, they will unlock the superstar version of their character, and maintaining a higher level of popularity will make title challenges more frequent. Character stats are automatically affected by the maneuvers players use throughout the course of a match, and have a direct impact on future performance. For example, using a great deal of suplexes will eventually increase the character’s skill at performing them, thereby increasing the amount of damage done by each subsequent execution of the move. Running/sprinting more often will eventually lead to your character gaining a faster walking speed, and escaping submissions will increase flexibility, allowing the character to take less damage from such maneuvers. Its a very fluid, natural development system that works quite well, and rewards players for succeeding in matches on their own terms, with their own play style.

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Unfortunately, players are only able to develop their characters through participating a very limited number of match types. Whereas the WWE themed titles are able to replicate all the patented matches that the creative team has managed to think up over the years, there are no Hell-in-the-Cells or Elimination Chambers in this game. While that’s somewhat excusable, the absence of fare such as ladder matches and cage matches – staples of the wrestling industry, WWE-related or not – is hard to overlook. Rumble Roses XX only offers variants of standard matches, those being the classic singles match, tag-team matches, three-ways, four-ways, handicap matches, pure humiliation matches which can only be ended with a specific humiliation maneuver, street fights, and Queen’s matches. The Queen’s match is essentially nothing more than a standard single or tag match, the only difference being that once the match has ended, the winner is able to subject the loser to a humiliating or titillating action of their choosing, be it being squirted with a water gun, limboing, or simply providing a sexy pose. The street fight match feels like a throwaway, and plays like an incredibly limited version of Tekken with ridiculous physics and juggles. As an extra its fine, but touting it as one of the major match types as Konami does is somewhat ridiculous.

Controls
The underlying wrestling engine is quite solid, which isn’t surprising considering it was developed by Yukes, the team responsible for the wrestling engine powering the very popular WWE Smackdown franchise on the Playstation consoles. As in that franchise, players have separate commands for strikes and grapples, and charge of a meter through dealing damage to opponents that once filled, allows for a powerful finishing maneuver to be performed. The system in Rumble Roses XX is at once a simplified and over-the-top rendition of this system, providing slightly less variety in the number of standard grapples available, but boosting the number of special moves that can be built up.

The player character can be moved using either the d-pad or the control stick (both work equally well), can dash by pressing A with the intended direction, and can perform standard strikes by pressing the X button. Grapples are performed by pressing the Y button and a direction to initiate the grapple; pressing up or down during this phase will allow the player to perform standing grapples, while pressing to the right or left will lead to grapples that automatically ground the opponent. From the initial grapple, players can either press Y and a direction to perform one of four grapple maneuvers, or they can press the X button to strike the opponent. The B button functions as a supplemental action button, used to pick up weapons, enter and exit the ring, climb the turn-buckles, tagging in partners, and pinning opponents. There is also a fairly simple counter system in place, wherein players can hold down the right bumper to block strikes, press both the right bumper and the Y button to counter throws, or press the right bumper and the X button to counter strikes. The timing is tricky to master at first, but once players get the hang of it, they’ll find themselves dominating the computer on even the hard difficulty setting.

As the player deals damage to the opposition, their character’s special meter builds and once full, the player has access to a ‘killer move’ a special maneuver that deals a greater degree of damage than standard grapples. The meter can be filled multiple times, allowing players to save their specials for critical moments in the match. Furthermore, in certain situations – such as when an opponent is dizzy, or slumping against the ropes, or when the player is wielding a specific weapon – a ‘killer move’ will be replaced by a ‘lethal move’, an even more damaging special that is essentially a guaranteed pin if successfully pulled off. Finally, damage dealt through counters, as well as certain grapples not only contributes to the player’s special meter but to the opponent’s humiliation meter as well. Once full, the opponent in question is susceptible to a humiliation move, a maneuver that displays the female grappler in a particularly exposed or embarrassing manner in addition to dealing damage. The opponent is susceptible to such maneuvers until the bar eventually drops, or they lower it through fighting back and ‘saving face.’

The single biggest problem I had with the game was that there was no means of manually changing which opponent the player character was focused on. The game automatically attempts to focus the player on the nearest target, and it works fairly well – better than expected actually – but it still created some problems. I was unable to attack a tag team partner standing on the apron, and there were many instances in which I attacked the wrong opponent in a 3-way or 4-way because the opponents were close together. Considering the right trigger isnt used for anything, I dont see why it couldnt have been assigned this function.

The engine works well, providing fast-paced wrestling action along the lines of the WWE Smackdown franchise, moreso than the slower-paced and much-loved Nintendo 64 efforts from AKI and THQ. There is one notable tactical element to the gameplay however, in that the health of the body part being attacked is displayed, allowing players to focus attacks on specific limbs leading up to a submission victory. Outside of that however, the gameplay is simply a matter of providing enough variety in attacks to keep from being countered too frequently, while attempting to pull off as many specials as possible. The matches rely heavily on the skillful use of countering, and as such are much more entertaining played against a human opponent than the computer AI. While the AI isn’t awful, it isn’t particularly challenging either; it will counter a move here and there and players that try to perform the same maneuver over and over will certainly be punished, but the computer has a hard time recognizing the repetition of longer strings of attacks and grapples.

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Graphics

It’s difficult to find fault with the character models in Rumble Roses XX, each of which features a great deal of detail. Konami went for a quasi-realistic approach, leaning more heavily toward the realism end of the spectrum than Team Ninja did with Dead or Alive 4. Muscle tone is accurately modeled and changes in accordance with the player’s stats, while self-shadowing adds depth to each facial feature and brings out all of the sexy curves, both obvious and subtle, from giant breasts to tiny curves across tight stomach muscles. Clothing flows and folds realistically as the character moves, and is textured wonderfully with bump-mapping that brings out the textures of the various materials in each of the costumes, from leather to silk. The hair is slightly less convincing however, as it moves in a stiffer fashion as though tankers full of hairspray had been applied to each characters head.

All the stages are highly detailed – some with fully rendered crowds – and feature fantastic lighting, from the bloom-effect of the hot, sun-lit beach, to the moving search light of the passing helicopter on the rooftop stage, and all the colored arena lights in between. All of the characters react magnificently to the light as well, casting shadows on each other and the stage around them. The entire affair is bathed in a soft filter that gives the entire experience something of a dream-like feel, and as an added bonus the somewhat plastic look that character models have had in other Xbox 360 titles has been eliminated as well.

The animation is similarly high quality in most cases, as each character moves with convincing weight and momentum, and all the right parts of the body bounce appropriately. There are a few instances in which the women move in a slightly robotic fashion, though oddly enough this rarely occurs in the ring whilst in the midst of an exchange of grapples. Usually the movements in question involve transitions from walking to running, and getting into and out of the ring. The game maintains a high framerate throughout without even a hint of a stutter, even with four players going at it in the most detailed stage in the game.

Audio

The music supports the over the top feel of the title, with outlandish hard rock blasting throughout. At first it was a welcome change from the Rap and Hip-hop that gamers are typically bombarded with, but after awhile the cheesiness outweighs the novelty, and most gamers will likely find themselves making good use of the Xbox 360’s custom soundtrack feature. On the other hand, the sound effects are top notch, as each distinctive personality of the grapplers comes through via the sassy comments delivered over the course of the match, and the action benefits from the assortment of satisfying thuds and slaps of body-on-body and body-on-canvas contact. The chanting and booing of crowds not only adds to the immersion, but serves as a good indication of how well the player is doing in terms of popularity – the louder they get, the more points the player is likely to get out of a match.

Replay Value

One of the most impressive features of Rumble Roses XX is the extensive create-a-wrestler feature that comes close to rivaling that in the WWE Smackdown franchise. While no doubt a certain portion of the gaming audience will most immediately be fascinated by the ability to adjust the bust size of the wrestlers, that particular feature is only one out of many customization options. Players can adjust everything from the superficial things like face, hair, costume, to features such as the size and proportions of the character’s bust, body, hips, arms and legs. Additionally, players can adjust the muscle mass of the character’s arms, body, and legs, the effects of which directly impact the gameplay, allowing players to deal more damage with certain moves, or move at different speeds. Additionally, the player’s fighting style and move sets are selectable, so players can create a character they will enjoy playing as. All of the stats set in the creator will be affected by matches in the single-player campaign as well.

Rumble Roses XX features online play for up to four players in every gameplay type available offline, and each match-type is assigned its own leader board for players to keep track of their stats. As in many online titles, players gain points for winning matches and rank accordingly anywhere between F and S (which, for those new to videogames, has been repositioned in front of A in the alphabet), a designation which can then be used to search for matches against those of a similar skill level. Hosts are provided with a few options, including limits on ranking, the speed at which the special and humiliation meters charge, and thankfully, the option to turn off intros as well. Players that prefer not to have their skills labeled can compete in unranked matches. Unlike in single player matches however, the player’s character stats do not change, ensuring any online contest is a measure of skill, rather than a measure of who spent more time leveling up. We experienced lag very infrequently in our time online, so it seems as though the dedicated servers for the game are more than ready for the imminent release of the game.

Overall

Rumble Roses XX is a perfect example of a game you should rent before you buy. Fans of wrestling, character creation, or sexy women will fall most likely fall in love with what the game has to offer and get extra mileage out of the game’s somewhat limited gameplay features. Others will likely have a fun weekend with the game, getting the most out of the game’s undeniable sex appeal and solid grappling engine before tiring of whats available and finding their way back to Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter or Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.