WWF Warzone on the Game Boy is Awful

I’m a little surprised that a Game Boy port of WWF Warzone exists. I’m not expecting it to be close to the PS1 and N64 versions of the game. Hopefully, it will be an entertaining experience.

This game was released in 1998, which was very late in the Game Boy’s life. This means the developers could get more in the game compared to the games in the early and mid-1990s. The control scheme obviously needed to change, so we’ll see how good this one is.

The game looks much better than the other wrestling games I’ve played on the Game Boy. The controls are annoying. It is going to take me a while to get used to them.

TLDR: A Terrible Port of a Game I Enjoy

Narrative

WWF Warzone doesn’t have a story mode or a backstory. This wasn’t removed when the developers ported this game to the Game Boy; the original didn’t have one either. It was common for wrestling games to be more of an arcade experience at this time, and the Game Boy would have limited what they could do.

Gameplay

It feels like I’m one of the few people who likes WWF Warzone. This version isn’t very good. The developers did a great job of getting a lot into the game, but the gameplay is very rough. Even with the manual, I was struggling to do anything.

There are four game modes. They are what you should expect from this game. Here is a list:

• WWF Challenge
• Vs.
• Tag Team
• Cage

The Roster is similar to the PS1 and N64 versions. It is a huge roster for a Game Boy game, and it makes me wonder what got cut from the game to get everyone in here. Here is a list of them:

• Shawn Michaels
• Kane
• Ken Shamrock
• Steve Austin
• Faarooq
• Goldust
• Triple H
• Mankind
• Owen Hart
• Rocky Maivia
• British Bulldog
• Ahmed Johnson
• Undertaker

This game falls apart because of the controls. Even with the manual in front of me, I have no idea how they are supposed to work. They feel unresponsive, or I’m doing something wrong.

The manual is available online. I like that it is easy to find it, and I wish it was more helpful. I’m glad I could find it so I had an idea of what I could do, but even on easy mode, the controls felt unresponsive.

It felt like I was trying to play with a broken controller. I tried this game on my Game Boy Pocket and on a Retro 5. I had a rough time when trying to play this on the Retro 5 and a Game Boy Color. The controls were equally unresponsive.

There is a chance that both controllers were broken. I would be shocked if this was true, but it is possible. Either way, I didn’t like the controls in this game, with the exception of the special attacks. Those are controlled by the select button.

I didn’t like the gameplay at all. The developers had to rework the control scheme due to the limitations of the Game Boy. Unfortunately, all their hard work resulted in a bad game with awful controls.

Visuals

WWF Warzone is the best-looking wrestling game I’ve played on the Game Boy. It looks very good for the time. It had to be changed from the PS1 and N64 ports, but I think the developers did an excellent job with this one.

There isn’t too much to say about this one. WWF Warzone was released late in the Game Boy’s life. It had been refreshed a few times, and developers had learned how to get the most out of the aging handheld. This is by no means a bad-looking game.

The digitized photos of wrestlers aren’t all that great, but they have never looked good on the Game Boy. You can tell who each wrestler is supposed to be, and the names are provided. This is a little thing that oftentimes gets forgotten in other games like this.

I don’t have anything else to say about the graphics. They look okay for a Game Boy game released in the late-1990s. This port of WWF Warzone doesn’t resemble the console games, but it couldn’t.

6/10. It looks great, but the gameplay is horrible. Changes had to be made to bring WWF Warzone to the Game Boy, but they ruined the gameplay when they did it.

Pros

• Good Graphics
• Big Roster
• Lots of Game Modes

Cons

• Horrible Controls
• Very High Difficulty
• Bad Digitized Photos

Conclusion

The controls ruined this game. It is close to being unplayable and reminds me of the N64 version of WCW Nitro. I was very disappointed with this game as I enjoyed the PS1 and N64 versions of the game.

There was no way for this to be as good as the console versions. When you look at the Game Boy game to the PS1 version, you can see that there was no way for this to be a good port of the game. The developers had to come up with a new control scheme for everything.

I feel like I’m the only one who liked WWF Warzone, so I was very disappointed with how bad this version of the is. My expectations of the game might have been too high, but I would’ve liked it if the game had better controls. A bad control scheme ruined everything else this game had going for it.

If you liked this post, please check out my other posts about wrestling games on the Game Boy, such as WCW Main Event and WWF Superstars.