THQ has decided to reboot the Smackdown vs Raw franchise, not just changing the name, but changing many elements that fans have complained about over the years. Here's the article at IGN for a complete list of changes and upgrades http://ps3.ign.com/articles/117/1171529p1.html . WWE Day of Reckoning on the gamecube(2004) has every single one of the upgrades this game brings, apart form the 'Dynamic Comebacks' feature and the 'no analog grapples' feature(please read the ign article. I don't want to copy and paste the features here). That's why DoR is my fav wrestling game of all time and why I don't play Smackdown vs Raw.

I don't understand why this has happened as THQ also made DoR but they're just bringing these features to Smackdown, er WWE '12 eight years later! I haven't owned a wrestling game since DoR(still have the spoilt gc disk) but I beatthe first Smackdown vs Raw on a borrowed PS2. After that, I noticed it was almost the same thing each year and I kept waiting(honestly) for the features that are now being added, the most important to me being the 1st two features mentioned in IGN's article.

WWE All Stars will be the first wrestling game I'll get since DoR but I will probably wait for the inevitable WWE '13 which will probably smoothen out any minor problems '12 will have. There are usually those minor problems every time a series is rebooted. What do you guys think? Any Day of Reckoning/some other wrestling game with the same features share my opinion on this?

The last Wrestling game I played, was way back in the N64, WCW/nWo Revenge, and it was a great game. After that I lost all interest in the genre.

Day of Reckoning 2 was the last WWE game I bought.

SvRs gameplay was much more simulated, which I didn't like.

Maybe this will work out well, but I am not too hopeful. Also, Dynamic Comebacks sounds A LOT like DOR2's Momentum Shifts.

Me and my bros by SvR every year but we spend less and less time with them.. they need to do something to shake this series up

I want a less realistic route

Oh! I didn't play DoR2. So in other words, out of all the upgrades mentioned in that article, the only one that doesn't sound like a direct copy from DoR is the new grappling system.

i liked the n64 ones no mercy, wrestlemania 2000, wcwvsnwo, then was forced to go with the smackdown series last gen i didnt like none of them much till the sdvsraw came i think in 05 and 06s was one of the best since the n64 titles

after that 07 - current (havent played 11 but going by the forums the AI is still the same as 10) they all sucked for me it seems that once they went multi on the HDs the AI was terrible it was impossible to enjoy a match with the AI it was way to easy i ve tried all settings nothing made a difference it used to be a challenge with 06 and i would have 20min matches with the ones after i could only manage 3min AI could be pined for the 3 w/o hitting a finisher

i ve actually stopped watching the wrestling programs since about 02 but i still enjoyed playing the games up until sdvs raw 07 where the AI was dumb down

I grabbed every WWE game since the N64 games and Day of Reckoning still holds a place in my heart as one of the best.  I always preferred the Gamecube WWE games (except Wrestlemania X8) to the Playstation's Smackdown (and later, SvR) series.  I'm looking forward to a return to greatness.

I skipped SvR 2008 and 2009 and found myself really enjoying SvR 2010 and 2011 but, like a lot of people, I noticed that a lot of features from earlier games had somehow disappeared.  I'll probably grab 2012, for better of for worse but I'm going to wait about a month.  My biggest concern:  For the last two games, the "community creations" server has been as unstable as my relationship.  It's next to impossible to download anything from them.  I have SvR 2011 on 360 and my nephew has SvR2012 on the PS3 and we both have the same problem. 

Now, after paying the additional $10 or so for the bonus DLC that was promised to come out throughout the year, what we got was pretty underwhelming.  The only thing that could make up for it was the fact that we could download pretty much any wrestler (or character) that could be imagined, thanks to some truly incredible create a wrestler tools.  It sucks when you download one character and get kicked off of the server or almost download one and get kicked off the server.  It's like winning the lottery when you actually get one to download.  I made a list of wrestlers that I wanted to download last year and to this day, I STILL don't have them all!!  If the server issue isn't corrected this year, I'm not fucking with this game at all.

If i remember correctly THQ publishes the wrestling games but they don't actually develop them. Maybe that would explain the loss of those features.

Havent played smackdown since the 2nd on PS1. Too me they have become too simulated, im liking the arcadey AllStars and hope they continue that

I havent bought one since 2008. this reeboot looks promosing.