The long awaited follow up to WCW Nitro is finally here. Its called WCW/NWO Thunder. Although it could have been called WCW Nitro '99, because it feels more like an update rather than a sequel. The graphics have a touched up and our better than Nitro. The wrestlers have been completely updated which includes the addition of everyone's favorite Goldberg. Thunder adds a ton of new secret wrestlers too. The only thing they didn't update was Nitro's lousy control. In fact, it may have gotten worse. This control design is meant for a world champion wrestler evidently because its not for the average gamer. I could perform these moves better in real life than in this game. Thunder has added full motion video entrances with theme music for each WCW/nWo character which is kinda fun. The arenas are an explosion of detail and color. The fans look good enough. The secret weapons you can pull from out of the ring are nice, but once again the control damages the fun. Thunder has full commentary from WCW announcers Tony Schiavone and Mike Tenay. Which only deliver mediocre comments. WCW/NWO Thunder gives you steel cage matches, four wrestler battle royal, exhibition, two player matches, tag team, but no multi-player function in this game. Two players is the max for this Thunder. The sometimes humorous rants the wrestlers gave us in Nitro when choosing a wrestler is back in Thunder. Which has become a THQ on Playstation trademark. Thunder could have been the best WCW game ever to bear its ugly head on the Playstation, but the lack of control in this game makes it one of the worst. Its so frustrating. After a couple hours of playing this game if the controller or the game disc doesn't go flying out the window, than you've got better control than this game does. After a lot of noise this powerful Thunder just fizzles out.
PUBLISHER: THQ INC.
GRAPHICS: 7
MUSIC/SOUND: 6
CONTROL: 3
ORIGINALITY: 5
SECRETS: 10
FUN/REPLAY: 5
OVERALL: 6