For the first time since 2008's TNA Impact (or 2000's WCW Backstage Assault if we aren't counting TNA as a real competitor) there's two officially licensed wrestling games on the market.
All Elite Wrestling (AEW) is the first true competitor the WWE has had since WCW and ECW were bought by Vince McMahon back in 2001. The company was founded by Tony Kahn (son of Fulham FC owner Shahid Khan) and some of New Japan's best and brightest, including Kenny Omega and Cody Rhodes (who has since returned to WWE). AEW has become a monster in its own right, and is set to hit Wembley Stadium for their upcoming All In event (making for the highest paid attendance for a wrestling event since 2016).
AEW: Fight Forever launched this week across a range of platforms and picked up a respectable 3/5 from us here at Mirror Gaming. The game is an intentional throwback to the games AKI Corporation (now known as syn Sophia) made for the Nintendo 64 like WWF No Mercy and Virtual Pro Wrestling. When AEW: Fight Forever was announced back in 2020 WWE Games were the most stagnant they had ever been, WWE 2K20 was an embarrassment and caused the once-yearly franchise to skip two years.
However, AEW: Fight Forever's long development due to COVID-related development issues has landed it in an era where WWE Games are the best they've been since the PS2 era, and thus has a much harder mountain to climb. So if you're unsure which wrestling game is for you, we've done the work and determined what game exceeds in different categories.
WWE 2K23 Vs AEW: Fight Forever – Gameplay
This one is subjective as WWE goes for a more simulation focused style vs AEW's arcadey format. Personally I'd take the WWE games one, thanks to the changes to the gameplay in 2K22 that introduced the reversal combo breaker system things finally feel like they're in a good place for the franchise. Plus WWE's style allows you to do those long epic matches that headline PPV's, with the timing based pin system allowing for shocking pin escapes.
AEW on the other hand is focused on quick, snappy, and – most importantly – simple action. While it'll take a while to get to grips to the breadth of WWE's systems, anyone can pick up AEW and have fun with it. However, matches won't last much longer than 5 mins for the most part.
Verdict: Draw – WWE is better for realism, AEW is better to pick up and play
WWE 2K23 Vs AEW: Fight Forever – Visuals
This one isn't exactly fair, WWE obviously wins by a landslide due to 20+ years of scans to pull from, and what was very likely to be a substantially higher development budget. AEW instead goes for what's supposed to be a stylised look that's meant to evoke the feeling of action figures coming to life, however, that could just be a cover for why the models look ripped from a PS3 game.
Verdict: WWE
WWE 2K23 Vs AEW: Fight Forever – Content
My single biggest complaint about AEW: Fight Forever was the dire the lack of content. Even if we ignore the match types which WWE games have been able to port over from game to game (having had most of them since the PS2), WWE is miles ahead of AEW here.
AEW: Fight Forever has the Road to Elite story mode, which is a pretty standard wrestling career mode, which is echoed in WWE with MyRise. However, that's about it. WWE 2K23 still has 2K Showcase: John Cena, a GM mode, MyFaction and Universe mode. Once again, this is probably down to budget, but there's no denying WWE has the leg up in this category.
Verdict: WWE
WWE 2K23 Vs AEW: Fight Forever – Roster
This is another subjective one, if you like John Cena, Bayley, and Gunther you'll like the WWE roster more. If you like Abadon, Brian Danielson, and CM Punk you'll like the AEW roster more. And if you like Cody Rhodes he's in both anyway so.
Like before, WWE has the advantage of having all of these models on deck available to be ported over and has over 170 playable characters (even if over 10 of them are John Cena). Even then AEW has some glaring omissions from the roster, FTR, Danhausen, Claudio Castagnoli, the current AEW Women's Champion Toni Storm, and The Acclaimed are all nowhere to be seen. However it does have the first Video Game appearance of Owen Hart since 2004.
Verdict: Draw – really depends on which wrestlers you like
WWE 2K23 Vs AEW: Fight Forever – Multiplayer
We've alluded to this before, but AEW is the far superior game for pick up and play multiplayer. it's simple to play and learn with matches that fly by, as opposed to WWE's more complex systems.
Both games have online multiplayer, but AEW has crossplay which automatically puts it ahead in that department.
Verdict: AEW
Final Thoughts
So by my metric WWE 2K23 is the better game, but it almost has to be considering the 20+ year history of the series and presumably higher budget. For a first attempt to the throne AEW makes a solid shot at a WWE alternative, even though it's going for a different style of game (although it would be nice to facilitate longer matches).
WWE Games are finally at a good place, and AEW's debut is a solid contender, let's hope both series' continue to adapt and improve and we can once again enter the golden era of wrestling games we had back on the PS1 and N64 between Smackdown! and the AKI games.
