A special match – WWF Smackdown! 2: Know Your Role

[This is another of my guest posts where I hand over the blog for another viewpoint. For this one I am happy to welcome Matt Gardner, editor of the excellent site GameTripper, where I previously wrote about Little Big Adventure 2.]

**WWF Smackdown! 2: Know Your Role** (Yuke’s/THQ, PlayStation, 2000)

In 2000, two of the biggest things in many youngsters’ lives would combine to create one of the best gaming experiences of all time. What’s more, both the console and the game’s subject matter were at all-time highs. It truly was a pair of golden ages, working together to create a sure-fire platinum title.

On December 1st, 2000, WWF: SmackDown! 2: Know Your Role launched on the PlayStation, capping off the best year in the now-WWE’s history with what was, arguably, the greatest wrestling game ever made.

At this point in time, the first PlayStation was in full stride, as were wrestling games’ popularity. In 1999, THQ began its quest to monopolise the market; before THQ’s reign, Acclaim had full control of the WWF licence, and was responsible for passable titles like WWF in Your House, WWF War Zone and WWF Attitude, three releases that barely captured the most exciting era of professional wrestling.

THQ’s first stab at the WWF licence arrived on the Nintendo 64 in 1999: the excellent WWF WrestleMania 2000, which would later be followed by the even better WWF No Mercy in late 2000. These bookended the PS1 SmackDown! series (as well as the utterly dull WWF Royal Rumble for the Dreamcast). Arguments still rage today over which console had the better grappling titles, but the SmackDown! games certainly proved easier to pick up and play, especially for newcomers.

Building on the incredible work done by its predecessor to simplify the action with a more arcade-like feel, SmackDown! 2 offered even more customization, creativity, storylines and, crucially, the entire arena to pagger your foes across, including the option to literally run them over in a forklift truck. You could refine your moves, taunts and finishers and, crucially for me, create a stable.

And boy, I abused stable mode in the most cringeworthy way. Buckle up.

The year 2000 coincided with the moment I, at age of 13, hit full puberty. This went into overdrive when I combined the game’s enhanced Create-a-Wrestler and Create-a-Stable modes with my own, carnal desires.

First up was my own character, Matty Too Fatty. I was called Matt, and in real life, I was fat. Self-deprecation was the only anti-bullying mechanism that worked at school, and it paired nicely with the naming convention of Scotty 2 Hotty, the one-time tag-team champion who paired with the late Grand Master Sexay as part of Too Cool. I dressed Matty like a character from Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 and was about seven foot tall. And, weirdly, I was thin and buff. Clearly, my self-awareness was at an all-time low.

Next up was my stable. The Hardy Boyz were my favourite tag team, but the only wrestler I loved more was their huracánrana-dispensing, but more importantly human female, ally Lita. Yeah, you can see where this is going.

For similar reasons, i.e. being an attractive woman, I also adored Trish Stratus, despite the fact she was a consistent heel. Then there was the delightful Jacqueline: a veteran wrestler and manager who made more than a mark on my psyche during an event which, looking back now, represents one of the most stomach-churning moments in WWE history, for countless reasons.

During 2000, misogyny in professional wrestling was at an all-time high. One of the worst offenders was January’s Royal Rumble, which infamously held its Miss Rumble “swimsuit” competition (in reality, all bikinis) including an enthusiastic Jacqueline, as well as Terri Runnels, Barbara “BB” Bush and then-women’s champion The Kat, while an embarrassed-looking Ivory and an entirely pissed-off Luna Vachon captured the more accurate, reflective disgust of the occasion.

To understand how bad it was, you need to see it. Women were “judged” by a more-embarrassingly-lecherous-than-usual Jerry Lawler, as well as four ageing male wrestlers, the comedian Andy Richter, and just one female: The Fabulous Moolah, who was potentially the worst person in the room, given she was ultimately accused of financially and sexually exploiting female wrestling trainees throughout her career.

And so, in front of a packed crowd, these trained athletes were scripted to showcase their bodies for fans exactly like me. It worked. At least, it did until Mae Young, who was around 75 at the time, came on in an actual swimsuit – the only one of the night – and “freed her puppies”.

Wearing a fake set of boobs that looked like a pair of tights filled with coins and sadness, she got her “tits” out for the lads, though she was eventually covered up by her lover, former world powerlifting champion Mark “Sexual Chocolate” Henry. Naturally, she won Miss Rumble 2000 (there was no Miss Rumble 2001). Mark Henry would later kayfabe impregnate the septuagenarian, though sadly they didn’t have a child; she ended up delivering nothing more than a bloody rubber hand after the wheelchair-using pensioner was powerbombed through a table by Bubba Ray Dudley, effectively murdering her unborn son or daughter.

I digress. Despite this horrific landscape for women in professional wrestling, WWF SmackDown! 2 enabled me to make Lita, Jacqueline and Trish Stratus into members of Matty Too Fatty’s stable, the lazily titled “Gardner’s Angels”. All wore the scantest negligee available in the Create-a-Wrestler mode, which was basically just a black bra and knicker combo. And I made their breasts the biggest I could. Thanks to developers who presumably didn’t know any better, the results looked more like Albanian bunkers than their real-life counterparts.

I narrowly avoided adding insult to injury as I couldn’t have Matty Too Fatty walk out to The Godfather’s “pimpin’ ain’t easy” music. The wrestler’s popular “story” was that he literally sold women for sex and made a cut of the profits, and was loved by one and all because of it – but by the time SmackDown! 2 arrived, he was part of Right to Censor.

Still, I must reiterate, I was 13 and didn’t know better. But having these three incredible women at my side, I felt like a wrestling god. I didn’t get off, in the traditional sense, on low-poly depictions of the women I lusted after; in a weird way, SmackDown! 2 fulfilled my lust for being an athlete; being a main-eventer; being loved by a crowd. It provided unfettered access to escapism, powered by an utterly immersive story mode that provided greater personal development than was available to me in real life.

And yet, as I continued to play the game, I realised I didn’t need gargantuan, otherworldly 32-bit tits alongside my persona avatar to feel good about myself. I just needed to get to get to grips with my own gargantuan, real-worldly tits and embrace who I was. That took a few more years to do. In the meantime, SmackDown! 2 was the perfect, massive, expansive, endlessly playable wrestling game I needed to make myself feel happy, even if it was initially in the worst possible ways.