THQ

WWF Royal Rumble is an underachiever, plain and simple. If there were ever a game that I thought would be a guarantee lock for ratings gold, it would have been this one. But like Dale, I was totally shocked at how the developers excluded so many standard home features and still thought they would have a serious market contender.

Game Description: Whether you are a hard core or casual bowler, Brunswick Circuit Pro Bowling 2 has something for everyone. Features include enhanced graphics, accurate reproductions of the latest bowling equipment, an improved interface, multiplayer support for up to eight players, and a completely overhauled create-a-bowler mode. Additionally, there are new modes of play (including team and skills challenge), real ProStaff tutorials, enhanced bowler and crowd reactions, auto-replay functionality, and dual-shock and analog support.

I believe that one of the biggest problems that befall Brunswick 2 is that it's based on a sport that is essentially boring.

Brunswick Circuit Pro Bowling 2 (Brunswick 2) strives for that larger-than-life approach, but it can't get past the fact bowling just doesn't generate much excitement unless you're directly participating. Bowling is repetitious by nature, and there's little this game can do to change that.

According to ESRB, this game contains: Animated Violence, Mild Language, Suggestive Themes

In the end, the graphics and sound may be lacking, but Smackdown! shows up where it counts the most, in the amount of features and the rock-solid gameplay. It's not without a bit of irony that at a time when wrestling game developers are trying to complicate a player's actions in a misguided attempt to create some sort of wrestling simulation, Smackdown! manages to do just that with a far simpler style.

So in Smackdown!, the ability to grow my character and further adjust his arsenal of moves with choices that only become available after I've reached certain levels of ability really caught my attention—hook, line and sinker. I simply couldn't stop playing there after, and Smackdown! became just plain smack for me.

Game Description: Lay the SmackDown! on your enemies with your own created jabroni or as one of the World Wrestling Federation's top superstars. Make friends and then break them as you roam backstage from the boiler room to the kitchen. Call upon your allies for help and then climb over them as you kick, grapple, and People's Elbow your way to the top. Just remember that backstage politics can work against you—don't let The Rock run-ins, well-placed metal chairs, and McMahon-appointed guest referees get you in the end.

When it's all said and done, this is simply the best there ever was as far as wrestling games go. From the realistic look to the moves and the action, it's everything a wrestling game should have been since we moved into the 3D age. Ease-of-use usually equals unparalleled fun and Wrestlemania is a fine example of this.