Rumble Roses

Written by John Scalzo  on October 29, 2004

Final Glimpse: Brown paper bags to hide your shame available upon request

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With the WWE having a stranglehold on professional wrestling, the number of wrestling video games has fallen considerably. Other companies have tried to pick up the slack, Eidos is readying another game in the Backyard Wrestling series even after the bad reviews for the original and EA has found a hit with the Def Jam series. But all of these games still hinge on large burly men engaging in pseudo-homosexual grappling. So what does Konami do to try to break into the brave new world of wrestling games? They create the first game ever that involves scantily clad women engaging in pseudo-homosexual grappling. Then they call it Rumble Roses and give it a holiday release date. Merry Christmas kids.

Just seeing the ads for Rumble Roses with their big-breasted, bikini-clad bimbos wrestling in mud is enough to make some people reach for a paper bag to wrap the magazine in. On top of that, the blatant lesbian overtones show you exactly what's on the minds of the marketing execs at Konami. But let's also face facts, a ridiculous premise can still produce a good game and Rumble Roses does have a pretty decent pedigree. The girls have been created by Polygon Graphics, the same team that created the lovely ladies for another girlie-show: Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball. On top of that, the development duties for the actual wrestling have gone to Yuke's, the people behind a very long line of WWE games. The circle of life is complete.

Word has it that the wrestling in Rumble Roses will be much like the volleyball in DOAXVB, simple. And I guess this makes complete sense as the screenshots (and the aforementioned magazine ad) are will be what drives people to Rumble Roses. There will ten female wrestlers in all (with more able to be unlocked as the game is played) and each will have a full story mode that can be controlled by the player. Before each match, players can take part in the Vow System, which is basically just a goal for your character during the match. Vows can include things like not using any weapons, only using a certain move, and on and on. By fulfilling vows players can move up or down the morality ladder making their character more of a face (good guy) or heel (bad guy). As a character moves closer to the end of the spectrum their appearance (and wardrobe) changes. Don't you want to be a bad girl?

Elsewhere, Rumble Roses will treat players to something they could only dream of in DOAXVB, mud wrestling. The mud match is where the graphics engine of Rumble Roses is supposed to shine. And we all know mud shines. As the ladies grapple with each other in the slop, mud will cling to their bodies. Over the course of the match the mud will "realistically" slide off of the girls in a dazzling display of... something, I don't know. In a recent issue of EGM, the director mentioned that he would like to use Jell-o and chocolate sauce if a sequel were ever greenlighted. I don't think he was joking.

In addition to the grappling moves, each lady will be able to use a variety of weapons throughout the match including whips, chains, baseball bats and other implements of love/mayhem. A counter system can also be used in a grapple to fight off an attacking opponent. For example, if after a grapple your opponent throws a haymaker with Square you can press R1 plue Square to block that punch and roll away. Finally, Rumble Roses features the ultimate finish to a foxy fight in the form of Humiliation Moves. Performing a Humiliation Move places your opponent in a compromising (and sex-ay with a capital A) finishing move that will leave them begging for more... err mercy.

A lot of people accused Xenosaga of being a game that required you to watch more than you played. Rumble Roses goes a step further and encourages gamers to watch the CPU ladies go at it in fights and in a training mode. The training mode is little more than a woman working the speedbag, but with this watch mode, gamers can move and zoom the camera to their heart's content.