Do you have what it takes to finish your story in WWE 2K24?
WWE 2K24 has finally made its arrival to the WWE Universe. As we’ve thoroughly enjoyed last year’s WWE 2K23, we now enter a brand-new era in the 2K series, and there’s no time like the present to get into this bad boy. We’re just a month away from the upcoming WrestleMania 40. And to prepare for the Grandaddy of them all, we delve into a brand-new installment, where you take your superstar and relinquish your opportunity to finally finish your story inside the squared circle.
WWE 2K24 has one of the best-designed WWE game covers. Two-time Intercontinental Champion, six-time Tag Team Champion, the winner of both the 2023 and 2024 winner, is arguably the new face of the company and so happens to be the son of the late WWE legend Dusty Rhodes, The American Nightmare, Cody Rhodes. Being the cover star for the standard version, which is his first ever feature on a WWE game cover.
Whereas both the current WWE Woman’s World Champion, Rhea Ripley, and three-time WWE Woman’s Champion, Bianca Belair, are the first to be on a female-only WWE 2K cover for the deluxe version. All three can feel incredibly proud of themselves for this achievement. Plus, there are a number of superstars for the 40 Years of WrestleMania edition.
You’ll be amazed how much more realism, content, improvements, and enhancements were either added or reintroduced to deliver the most authentic professional wrestling experience in WWE 2K24. Stick around, and you’ll know what those are and why this has drastically surpassed last year’s game.
WWE 2K24 has one of the biggest and most stacked rosters in a WWE game ever, if not the most extensive and most stacked roster ever. It is an immense mixture of perfectly designed Raw, SmackDown, NXT, legends, and multiple versions of certain superstars. Plus, plenty of more superstars will come in the form of DLCs throughout the year. So, you get to go ahead and take this roster, watch their exceptionally realistic entrances, and enjoy an abundance of incredible matches with them in many stunning arenas.
Visual Concepts has introduced new match types and improvements to the existing ones. Gauntlet, Special Guest Referee, Casket, and Ambulance matches have finally made their way into the WWE 2K franchise. Meanwhile, matches like Extreme Rules, Hell in a Cell, TLC, and the highly chaotic WarGames that made its debut in last year’s game return.
The Backstage Brawl now includes up to four-player support and brand-new environmental elements, giving you more ways to inflict pain on your opponents. Whether with throwable beverages from vending machines or live elevators, it’s up to you how far you want to take your brawls. And the Royal Rumble, in the 30-man online matches, now allows up to eight players to bring the noise and fight for who can be the last remaining player in the ring.
In the ambulance match, anything goes, and you go through intense mayhem against your opponent. To win the match, you must close both of the ambulance doors, and of course, there’s a mini-game you need to win successfully. Also, you can use the ambulance, especially the doors, as a source of weaponry. Pretty cool, right?
The Casket match also features a mini-game, as you’re required to place your opponent into the Casket and shut its lid. The Gauntlet matches have three types: Standard, Eliminator, and Turmoil. The Standard is where the opponents are against each other in one vs one until the last man survives. Elimination for two superstars begins, and more will enter gradually until there’s only one left, ultimately becoming the winner. As for Turmoil, it’s one guy against an entire group and must eliminate all in one vs one battles to be victorious.
Before you start your first match, especially if you’re new to WWE 2K games, I strongly recommend you first enter The Performance Center practice mode. You can learn WWE 2K24’s basic fundamental mechanics there. Moreover, as a bonus, you’ll earn a MyFACTION reward. But I will discuss MyFACTION mode in more detail in a few moments.
As you’re playing a match, you’ll notice more gameplay changes. It’s not just the enhancements of superstars’ strikes, grapples, moves, animations, behaviors, and so on that make your virtual matches far more accurate than what you see in actual WWE matches. There are additional and improved features and mechanics that also made this possible.
WWE 2K24 has finally added the brand new ‘blow for blow’ mechanics that involve exchanging strikes with your opponent with a mini-game. When you’re trading blows, you’ll get locked in a dual of strikes against the opponent you’re facing. During the process, you’ll have to hold the required button and release it when the marker lands in the green zone.
If you miss the green zone, then your strike will be countered. You’ll lose the mini-game if you miss the green zone three times. A gold zone arrives when the mini-game escalates, and if you land the marker in the gold zone, you’ll win the mini-game immediately, and this will follow with a reward and your enemy stunned.
You can select which type of strike you execute and taunt your opponent during the blow-for-blow to take things up a notch. This feature is only available in one-on-one matches, but this is a tasty alternative to the chain wrestling system that fans have been begging to return. Surprisingly, this hasn’t been a thing until now, but it’s better late than never.
If you enjoy playing tag team matches, you’re really going to love the brand-new tag team commands system in WWE 2K24. You can now order your AI tag partners to remove turnbuckles and attack the opposing team’s illegal partners. You can also tell them to bring in a weapon, including setting up tables to spice up the matches. Just be sure to make sure the referees aren’t watching you make such illegal moves.
Speaking of referees, it’s fantastic that WWE 2K24 becomes the first to bring real-life referees to you and not just the generic ones you usually get. That’s right, seven real-life male and female referees have been added and will call the matches right down the middle. As for special guest referees, you can now play as one, and whatever you say goes. You decide whether to be impartial or play dirty, as you let them know who’s in charge.
If you like the franchise’s finishers, then you’ll really love the brand-new super finisher mechanic. This takes your finishing moves to a different level by causing much more devastation to your opponents and would require a miracle to break out of them. To perform these, you must store three finisher bars, and you’ll unleash mayhem on your opponent. However, this feature is only applicable to certain superstars. But the silver lining is that if your favorite superstar doesn’t have a super finisher, you can assign them one with create-a-moveset.
You can now jump from the top rope and land on multiple opponents instead of just one. For all the hardcore match fans, you now have additional weapon choices, such as microphones and trash cans, and you can throw them and get caught if you reverse successfully.
But that’s not all. There are other brand-new and returning features in WWE 2K24 that’ll please the fans. The advanced blood system now enables blood to drip, causing stains on the ring or outside it. Activities on the announcer tables have returned. Certain superstars being able to pull the straps on a singlet has returned. Brand new spectating camera angles when viewing AI Vs. AI matches. They’ve added Rhea Ripley’s specific pinning style. I could go on about the gameplay changes, but we could be here forever. That’s how much better WWE 2K24 is than its predecessor.
We’re edging towards the 40th anniversary of WrestleMania. There’s that one feature you’ve been itching to play: the 40 Years of WrestleMania, 2K Showcase of the Immortals mode. Just like a decade ago with 30 Years of WrestleMania, you get to relive five decades of many unforgettable matches in the grandest stage of them all.
There have been some speculations over how many matches you could play in the WWE 2K24 2K Showcase of the Immortals mode. If you recall, WWE 2K14 had a whopping 45 matches to choose from. Sadly, for 40 Years of WrestleMania, the number isn’t even close to that, for obvious reasons such as certain superstars are contracted to other professional wrestling companies.
Instead, with the excellent narration by Smackdown’s color commentator, Corey Graves, you’re guaranteed a total of 21 matches where you complete a series of objectives to truly encounter the exact events and sequences during these matches. Remember, you must complete all objectives not only to gain access to the next match but also to obtain all fabulous rewards. And don’t worry, just because the number of matches has significantly decreased, that doesn’t mean you won’t get a thrilling 2K Showcase experience.
Thankfully, there are still a compelling number of great matches to enjoy in WWE 2K24. The likes of Ultimate Warrior Vs. Hulk Hogan, Ricky Steamboat Vs. Randy Savage and Razor Ramon Vs. Shawn Michaels. Then, of course, WrestleMania III’s iconic main event battle between two of the biggest superstars in WWE history, Andre The Giant Vs Hulk Hogan, for the WWE Championship. Which is one of the matches I wanted to personally experience.
MyFACTION now comes with the ability to compete online with the likes of seasonal leaderboards and a rebuilt Faction Wars 2.0 that now features additional real-life professional groups, 4 Vs 4 match types, and much more. Plus, you get regularly upgraded theme card packs and goals throughout the entire year. But wait, there’s more. You’re getting a new multiplayer experience to sweeten your taste buds.
WWE 2K24 MyRISE introduces two brand new storylines: Undisputed – Men and Unleashed – Women; that’s more immersive and exciting than last year as they feature Cody Rhodes, Roman Reigns, WWE Hall of Famer, Mick Foley, and more in the combined 6+ hours of Career Mode. You have to take your character – either through creating a character or importing one and guide them on the path to becoming WWE legends in both storylines.
Undisputed’s story is about Roman Reigns vacating his title, ending his record-breaking run. Now that the head of the table is up for grabs, you must do whatever it takes to achieve that or forever stay in the shadow of the former Tribal Chief. As for Unleashed, you make your own rules, and the professional wrestling company you built has become the biggest in the indie scene. But when WWE comes calling, you decide whether to step into the next level or decline such a huge opportunity.
For more incentive, you get an abundance of great unlockable items and rewards. Undisputed and Unleashed both contain a number of crucial choices that’ll send you toward particular pathways. Here’s another kicker; if you were to play both storylines multiple times, you can witness other outcomes.
MyGM brings in more match types, dramas, title belts, and much more as you have total control of your brand and make it the hottest in the WWE. There’s also the brand new Superstar Journey feature that involves superstars leveling up, earning XP, and more when playing their matches.
WWE 2K24 Creation Suite allows you to become more creative and create your own referees and signs. You can also create your very own Money in the Bank briefcases with the use of colors, logos, and textures, and they can be used in matches or, even better, share your artistic vision with the universe. Moreover, you’re getting additional animations, parts, and more for customized entrances, superstars, belts, arenas, and more.
With all of the great deal of improvements, you can’t really say the same for Universe mode. That’s not to say there aren’t any improvements to the mode – there are, but it’s little. Only a few additions were made, such as selecting referees for your shows. There’s still not much expansion on the mode. Furthermore, you still can’t create a story. This feature would’ve been gold, especially with WWE 2K24’s theme being “finish your story”.
It’s also worth mentioning WWE 2K24’s soundtrack list has improved from last year. Especially having to listen to the likes of award-winning artist Post Malone. Also, all of your matches come with much more authentic play-by-play coverage involving the likes of the legendary Michael Cole. Albeit, it would’ve been better to have more commentary teams instead of just one. I would’ve liked to enjoy some NXT matches while listening to six-time World Champion Booker T call my matches.
WWE 2K24 has all the fine makings of being one of the greatest WWE games of all time. With the abundance of additions, improvements, and content, how could it not be? This installment will keep you occupied throughout the year until the next game. Lastly, having to experience some of the greatest matches with the 2K Showcase of the Immortals mode had gotten me more excited than ever for the upcoming WrestleMania 40.
