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Acclaim's WWF Warzone sold over 2.5 million copies last year. This year's WWF game is expected to sell even more units. EB World has stated that WWF Attitude has become the most pre-ordered game in their history. This year, WWF Attitude won't be the only WWF Nintendo 64 game on the market. THQ is expected to release WWF Wrestlemania 2000 this coming winter. What has Acclaim done to ensure that their game will be the first one WWF fans choose? Read on.

Presentation/Graphics : 85
The graphics are not revolutionary by any means but they are not bad. Each wrestler is easily distinguishable as they were in WWF Warzone. Even Al Snow's friend, "Head," is in the game. The motion capture animation looks above average. I also saw wrestlers' legs go right through the ropes in the game once in a while. Nothing that hurts the game too much though. The crowd graphics in the game are also improved. They can now move side to side.:)

Acclaim did a wonderful job with the wrestler's intros. Some wrestler's intros do contain music that is not appropriate for kids. Acclaim had the mind to create two options: one for teens and the default for everyone. If the teen language option is chosen, well, let's say teen language is used. Everything from Stonecold's intro music to Gangrel's fireworks are all in the game. There are a few things that were left out in the WWF Attitude intros but again, each intro is unique and can be distinguished.

Overall, a marked improvement on its predecessor.

Presentation/Audio : 70
The commentary in WWF Attitude is a disgrace. The announcers, Jerry "The King" Lawler and Shane McMahon do not call out any of the moves. They should have at least been able to call out a few selected trademark moves. Some of their calls are inaccurate. The lines sound too generic. After 3 or so matches, I started to get sick of the two guys. Needless to say this year's duo is better than the guys in WWF Warzone.

There are some positives in the audio department though. The wrestlers' music and voices are well done. Although for some wrestlers, players might have to change the language option from "everyone" to "teen" to get their authentic music. You are also able to hear the wrestlers yell when in pain. The wrestlers also yell out random taunts when they are beating their opponent senseless. An example is Stone Cold's saying, "3:16 said I just whopped your a$s!"

The audio overall is average at best. This is WWF Attitude's weakest area.

Interface/Options : 94
For those of you who have not played WWF Warzone, the controls are similar to Mortal Kombat's method of using directional arrow combination along with a button. Most moves are performed in the "ready position." The ready position is when the wrestlers are standing and facing each other. An example of executing a move is, forward, forward plus B would enable your wrestler to perform a body slam. The other moves in the game are all performed the same way.

So for those fans out there who hated WWF Warzone's control layout, expect the same this year with WWF Attitude. Thank goodness WWF Attitude allows players to pause the game and go to move list to see what moves a user can perform in that situation and how to do the moves. It does get annoying to have to keep on pausing at different situtations to see what moves can be performed. Would have been nice if Acclaim included a move list for each wrestler. With the hundreds of combinations, it would be crazy trying to memorize the moves.

The Create-a-Wrestler feature has to be the most in-depth of any game released in the United States. People have told me of a game called Fire Prowrestling G that is in Japan which has a very in-depth Create-a-Wrestler feature. Unfortunately I have never played that game. Back to WWF Attitude. Users can change everything from the wrestler's nose to a wrestler's pants. I can list all of the options you can change while creating a wrestler, but it would take all day. Users can even customize their wrestler's move set. I really love this option. You can have the Sweet Chin Music as a normal move. Imagine being able to do the Tombstone, X-Factor, the Pump Kick, the Stunner and the Rock Bottom with the same wrestler. Acclaim's revolutionary create a wrestler feature enables wrestling fanatics to do so.

The game also introduces a new King of the Ring mode. The mode allows up to 8 wrestlers to compete--any combinations of users and computers. So invite 7 of your buddies over and see who the King of WWF Attitude is in your neighborhood! Another feature the game has is the Pay-Per-View feature. Users can create their own pay-per-view. You can pretend to be a WWF official booking matches for your audience. You are able to select up to 8 matches for your custom pay-per-view event. Other options which coincide with the create a pay-per-view event is the ability to edit the arena in which your event will take place as well as naming it.

Other modes of play include: Tag Team, Triple Threat, Triangle, Tornado, Lumberjack, Survivor Series, War, Two-on-One, Three-on-One, Gauntlet, Stable Match, Battle Royal, and Royal Rumble. I know I am forgetting something. Too hard to keep track with all these modes of play. You can also have First Blood, Iron Man, I Quit, Last Man Standing, Steel Cage, Hardcore, Tough Man, Two out of Three falls and a few more.

The only thing missing that should have been included in the game is user records. Acclaim should have included the wins and losses in a wrestler's career. Would have been nice to see how a wrestler does in all the different type of matches included in the game.

A disappointment is the no show for the Training Mode. Acclaim received praises left and right for its training mode in WWF Warzone. I would think that is a good thing, but Acclaim felt otherwise.

Gameplay : 88
Many fans are probably wondering how the gameplay is in WWF Attitude. For those who have WWF Warzone, expect a very similar game engine. WWF Attitude is little slower than WWF Warzone. The new game should produce a lot of arm bars and wrist locks when in the tie-up position due to the methods of performing a move usually requiring some type of directional arrow along with a button. When in the tie-up position, only a press of one of three buttons can result in the dreaded wrist lock or arm bar. It seems Acclaim indirectly created the game to appeal to both the arcade and sim wrestling gamers, if there is a such thing as a sim wrestler gamer.

There are hundreds of moves in the game. It is amazing how much effort the developers spent on the moves. Everything from the Sky High to the Death from Above finisher by Mark Henry are included in the game. The one thing I did not like about performing finishing moves is that your opponent has to be facing you. This should have been fixed. Also, it would have been nice to have something in the game that distinguishes a regular move and a finishing move.

The computer AI has been improved by a great deal. In WWF Warzone, I remember setting the difficulty to the highest level right away. I had no problem with beating the computer. So when I first started up WWF Attitude, I did the samething. Boy did I feel stupid. I played 3 matches and each of the 3 matches, I lost in less than 5 minutes. After I realized that I better turn the difficulty down to medium, my luck was not too much better. At least I actually won a few matches. I turned it down to easy, (no, I'm not ashamed of admitting this) and started moving up in the ranks. After 5 or 6 matches, I felt I was ready to move up to the medium difficulty level. The point is the majority of the people who get the game should start off on easy to get warmed up and not be a show-off and set it to hard right away.

The AI could also have used some tuning up. There are a couple of tricks I used against the computer. I kept on doing this whenever I was losing, not that it happened too often.:) Just run outside of the ring and stand near the edge of the ropes. Wait there till the computer comes flying out. Once he/she is in the air, run back into the ring and the opponent flying in the air will lose some energy. When he/she comes back in, do the same thing and repeat. It works on all the difficulty levels. Another trick is whenever you are playing a tag match and the opponent in the ring has low energy and is trying to tag their partner, send your tag partner into the ring before the opponent gets a chance to tag. By doing so, the opponent's partner not in the ring will come inside and the opponent will not have a chance to tag his fresh partner in.

For some reason Acclaim decided to take the whip from the ready position out of the game. Although you can toss your opponent to the ropes from the tie-up, it is nearly impossible to do so against the computer on the highest difficulty level. I used to use the whip against human opponents who overuse block, but WWF Attitude does not allow you to do so. You would have to grab the other wrestler and attempt to do so from there.

Users can also call in wrestlers to "help" them out. I am assuming players can only use this feature in exhibition 1 on 1 matches. There is a possibility of calling out a wrestler in a 1 on 1 match while in the career mode; however, I could not test this feature out because unfortunately Acclaim did not include in the manual how to do so. Safe bet it is in the study guide though. Another negative is there are no weapons in a regular match. Weapons are only available in Hardcore Matches.

Replay Value : 90
WWF Attitude will keep one's interest for a long time. The game offers a good challenge with an endless number of features that will keep a person playing the game for a while. The all-important career mode is in WWF Attitude. The career mode in the game starts you off on the bottom of the ladder with around 19 wrestlers/teams ahead of you. You work your way up by fighting at Monday Night Raw, Shotgun, House Events and Pay-Per-Views. Along the way you go through different types of matches, tornado, gauntlet, regular matches, steel cages and other such situtations. There are a couple of things I wish Acclaim had done differently. Winning any matches will only move you up one place higher on the ladder. Nothing wrong with this except when it comes to fighting gauntlet matches. A gauntlet match is when you fight 5 wrestlers/teams. Once one wrestler/team is defeated, another comes out and etc... Acclaim should have made it whenever you win a gauntlet match, you move up to take the place of the highest ranking wrestler/team you fought. The only other thing is when players win a belt, their wrestler(s) do not come out with the title belts. The wrestlers should actually come out with the belts they worked so hard for.

Acclaim also included a bunch of secret characters which can only be accessed if a user wins a belt with a certain wrestler. It usually takes around 20 matches just to win the lowest belt, the European Championship Belt. It should take around 20 more matches to win the Intercontinental Championship Belt. Which leaves the World Heavyweight Belt. That one should take probably close to 5 matches.

As you can tell, Acclaim produced the game in a way that should leave gamers playing WWF Attitude till they pass out or when they realize after a few hundred hours that there is a world outside their window.

Fans can also change the atmostphere around them when they are sick of the same old ring. Users are able to change the rope color, ring post color, logo design on the apron, and almost anything else which is a part of the ring.

Overall : 85
Acclaim has a real winner with WWF Attitude. Of course there are some minor flaws in the game but nothing major at all. With the create-a-wrestler feature, career mode and the pay-per-view feature, fans will be glued to their Nintendo 64 for a long time. WWF Attitude and WCW Mayhem are currently the only N64 wrestling game out. I strongly recommend WWF Attitude verus WCW Mayhem unless you have a grudge against the WWF.:)