''WCW Wrestling'' (a.k.a. ''World Championship Wrestling'') is a

Nintendo Entertainment System The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redesigned version, was released in America ...

professional wrestling Professional wrestling is a form of theater that revolves around staged wrestling matches. The mock combat is performed in a ring similar to the kind used in boxing, and the dramatic aspects of pro wrestling may be performed both in the ring o ...

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

that was originally released in Japan in 1989 under the name ''Super Star Pro Wrestling'', with a different lineup of wrestlers. It was later released in North America in 1990 with a more familiar lineup of wrestlers. It was the first (and, to date, only) video game based on the

National Wrestling Alliance The National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) is an American professional wrestling professional wrestling promotion, promotion and former professional wrestling governing body operated by its parent company Lightning One, Inc. Founded in 1948, the NWA ...

(at the time,

WCW World Championship Wrestling, Inc. (WCW) was an American professional wrestling promotion founded by Ted Turner in 1988, after Turner Broadcasting System, through a subsidiary named Universal Wrestling Corporation, purchased the assets of Nationa ...

was a member of NWA). After

The Road Warriors The Road Warriors, also known as the Legion of Doom, were a professional wrestling tag team composed of Road Warrior Hawk (Michael Hegstrand) and Road Warrior Animal (Joseph Laurinaitis).. They performed under the name "The Road Warriors" in th ...

left WCW for the

World Wrestling Federation World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., d/b/a as WWE, is an American professional wrestling promotion. A global integrated media and entertainment company, WWE has also branched out into other fields, including film, American football, and vario ...

(WWF), WCW continued to advertise the game in their own catalogs with a

mock-up In manufacturing and design, a mockup, or mock-up, is a scale model, scale or physical model, full-size model of a design or device, used for teaching, demonstration, design evaluation, promotion, and other purposes. A mockup may be a ''protot ...

cartridge showing

Sting Sting may refer to: * Stinger or sting, a structure of an animal to inject venom, or the injury produced by a stinger * Irritating hairs or prickles of a stinging plant, or the plant itself Fictional characters and entities * Sting (Middle-eart ...

on the label, though no such copies of the game with an alternate label are known to exist or believed to have ever been manufactured. To date, the game has sold over 100,000 copies.

Gameplay

Each wrestler in ''WCW Wrestling'' has eight "selectable" moves, two Irish whip moves, and a finisher.

Selectable moveset

''WCW Wrestling'' differs from most wrestling titles in that the players select their wrestler's moveset prior to the match. Each wrestler has a menu of eight moves (with each wrestler featuring a unique moveset), from which players choose four (each move selected is assigned to a direction on the D-pad).

Playable wrestlers and final opponent

Playable wrestlers in the game are

Ric Flair Richard Morgan Fliehr (born February 25, 1949), known professionally as Ric Flair, is an American professional wrestler. Regarded by multiple peers and journalists as the greatest professional wrestler of all time, Flair has had a career spanni ...

Lex Luger Lawrence Wendell Pfohl (born June 2, 1958), better known by the ring name Lex Luger, is an American retired professional wrestler, bodybuilder, and football player. In 2011 he began working with WWE on its wellness policy. He is best known for ...

Mike Rotundo Lawrence Michael Rotunda (born March 30, 1958) is an American retired Professional wrestling, professional wrestler. He is best known for his appearances with the WWE, World Wrestling Federation and World Championship Wrestling in the 1980s and 1 ...

Road Warrior Hawk Michael Hegstrand (January 26, 1957 – October 19, 2003) was an American professional wrestler. He was best known as Road Warrior Hawk, one half of the tag team known as The Road Warriors (The Legion of Doom in WWF), with Road Warrior Animal. ...

Road Warrior Animal Joseph Michael Laurinaitis (September 12, 1960 – September 22, 2020), better known by his ring name Road Warrior Animal (or simply Animal), was an American professional wrestler. Along with Road Warrior Hawk, he was one half of the tag team T ...

, Steve Williams, Kevin Sullivan,

Ricky Steamboat Richard Henry Blood Sr. (born February 28, 1953), better known by his ring name Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat, is an American retired professional wrestler best known for his work with the American Wrestling Association (AWA), Jim Crockett Promot ...

Rick Steiner Robert Rechsteiner (born March 9, 1961) is an American real estate broker and retired professional wrestler, better known by the ring name Rick Steiner. Steiner is best known for his tenure with World Championship Wrestling (WCW), where he was ...

, Eddie Gilbert, Michael Hayes, and the opponent who is wrestled at the end of the game is a masked wrestler named the WCW master.

Irish whip moves

These moves are performed by first initiating an Irish whip (throwing the opponent into the ropes by pressing left and B or right and B) and then pressing either A or B when the opponent is near. Each wrestler has a different Irish whip moveset (though these moves are not selectable in the moveset menu).

Finishers

Each wrestler has his own finisher move. These must be performed in the middle of the ring and can only be accomplished when the opponent had two squares remaining on his health meter. The move is performed by pressing A and B simultaneously. Finishers deliver significantly more damage than a regular move and are likely to end the match in a knock-out or

submission Deference (also called submission or passivity) is the condition of submitting to the espoused, legitimate influence of one's superior or superiors. Deference implies a yielding or submitting to the judgment of a recognized superior, out of re ...

''Super Star Pro Wrestling''

''Super Star Pro Wrestling'' is a 1989 Japanese professional wrestling, or

puroresu is the predominant style of professional wrestling that has developed in Japan. The term comes from the Japanese pronunciation of , which is shortened to puroresu. The term became popular among English-speaking fans due to Hisaharu Tanabe's act ...

, game made by

Nihon Bussan was a Japanese video game developer and publisher headquartered in Kita, Osaka. In the past they had also manufactured and sold yachts. The main video game brand of the company was Nichibutsu (日物、ニチブツ), with adult video games (ma ...

and published by

Pony Canyon , also known by the shorthand form , is a Japanese mass media publishing company founded on October 1, 1966. The company publishes mainly physical home media on compact discs, including music, films and TV shows and video games. It is affiliate ...

for the

Nintendo Famicom The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit Third generation of video game consoles, third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the commonly known as the The NES, a redes ...

system. Released December 9, 1989, the game features play for both one- and two-player modes. It was released a year later in the United States as ''WCW Wrestling'' on the

, with different wrestlers. The game featured a different roster with wrestlers well-known in Japan's AJPW and NJPW promotions. It featured

Antonio Inoki Muhammad Hussain Inoki (born ; February 20, 1943 – October 1, 2022) was a Japanese professional wrestler, martial artist, politician, and promoter of professional wrestling and mixed martial arts. He was best known by the ring name , a homag ...

Giant Baba , best known by his ring name , was a Japanese professional wrestler, promoter, and professional baseball player. He is best known as a co-founder of All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), a promotion he founded in 1972 along with Mitsuo Momota ...

Jumbo Tsuruta , better known by his ring name , was a Japanese professional wrestler who wrestled for All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW) for most of his career, and is well known for being the first ever Triple Crown Heavyweight Champion, having won the PWF Heavyw ...

Genichiro Tenryu , better known as is a retired Japanese professional wrestler and professional wrestling promoter. At age 13, he entered sumo wrestling and stayed there for 13 years, after which he turned to Western-style professional wrestling. "Tenryu" was his ...

, Riki Chosu,

Akira Maeda (born Go Il-myeong (Hangul: 고일명, Hanja: 高日明), January 24, 1959) is a Japanese mixed martial arts promoter, writer and retired professional wrestler and mixed martial artist of Korean descent. Maeda was also known by the ring name K ...

Bruiser Brody Frank Donald Goodish (June 18, 1946 – July 17, 1988) was an American professional wrestler who earned his greatest fame under the ring name Bruiser Brody. He also worked as King Kong Brody, The Masked Marauder, and Red River Jack. Over the yea ...

Stan Hansen John Stanley Hansen II (born August 29, 1949) is an American retired Professional wrestling, professional wrestler. Hansen is known for his Glossary of professional wrestling terms#S, stiff wrestling style, which he attributes to his poor eyesigh ...

Big Van Vader Leon Allen White (May 14, 1955 – June 18, 2018), better known by his ring names Big Van Vader or simply Vader, was an American professional wrestler and professional football player. Throughout his career, he performed for New Japan Pro-Wrestli ...

Abdullah the Butcher Lawrence Robert Shreve (born January 11, 1941), better known by the ring name Abdullah the Butcher, is a Canadian retired professional wrestler. He has a reputation for being involved in some of the most violent and bloody hardcore wrestling matc ...

, Road Warrior Hawk & Animal, and Andre the Giant under his Giant Machine gimmick. Below is a list of which WCW Wrestlers took the place of the original ''Super Star Pro Wrestling'' roster. * Lex Luger is based on Antonio Inoki * Ric Flair is based on Giant Baba * Mike Rotunda is based on Jumbo Tsuruta * Kevin Sullivan is based on Genichiro Tenryu * Sting is based on Riki Choshu * Rick Steiner is based on Akira Maeda * Ricky Steamboat is based on Bruiser Brody * Road Warrior Hawk is based on Stan Hansen (even though he is in both versions, the ''WCW Wrestling'' version of Hawk is not based on the ''Super Star Pro Wrestling'' version. This is why the US version uses Hansen's trademark Western Lariat as a finisher in the game) * Michael P.S. Hayes is based on Road Warrior Hawk * "Dr Death" Steve Williams is based on Big Van Vader * Eddie Gilbert is based on Abdullah the Butcher * Road Warrior Animal is the only one who remains unchanged. * WCW Master is based on André the Giant, who also appears as the boss of Super Star Pro Wrestling. His mask is reminiscent of André's "Giant Machine" gimmick. There are some inaccuracies in the game, mainly with the birthdates of some wrestlers, and

's hometown and date of birth are not listed in order to protect his

gimmick A gimmick is a novel device or idea designed primarily to attract attention or increase appeal, often with little intrinsic value. When applied to retail marketing, it is a unique or quirky feature designed to make a product or service "stand ou ...

Other games

''WCW Wrestling'' was the

working title A working title, which may be abbreviated and styled in trade publications after a putative title as (wt), also called a production title or a tentative title, is the temporary title of a product or project used during its development, usually ...

for at least two other WCW games. One was a canceled game for the

game.com The Game.com is a fifth-generation handheld game console released by Tiger Electronics on September 12, 1997. A smaller version, the Game.com Pocket Pro, was released in mid-1999. The first version of the Game.com can be connected to a 14.4 ...

handheld system. The other was a

sequel A sequel is a work of literature, film, theatre, television, music or video game that continues the story of, or expands upon, some earlier work. In the common context of a narrative work of fiction, a sequel portrays events set in the same ...

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...

' ''

WCW Mayhem Mayhem was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by World Championship Wrestling (WCW) in the month of November in 1999 and 2000. It replaced the promotion's November PPV event World War 3 which was held from 1995 to 1998 a ...

'', intended for release on the

PlayStation 2 The PlayStation 2 (PS2) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on 4 March 2000, in North America on 26 October 2000, in Europe on 24 November 2000, and in Australia on 3 ...

platform (the game was later renamed ''WCW Mayhem 2'', and eventually canceled when WCW was sold to the WWF).

References

External links

A Japanese review for ''Superstar Pro Wrestling'', the basis for ''WCW Wrestling''
at

GameFAQs GameFAQs is a website that hosts FAQs and walkthroughs for video games. It was created in November 1995 by Jeff Veasey and was bought by CNET Networks in May 2003. It is currently owned by Fandom, Inc. since October 2022. The site has a databa ...

{{WCW video games 1989 video games Multiplayer and single-player video games Nintendo Entertainment System games Nintendo Entertainment System-only games Professional wrestling games Video games developed in Japan World Championship Wrestling video games