WWF Betrayal

I try to avoid covering shovelware on here. It's too easy and low-effort to dog on a game made solely for a paycheck, with no artistic merit, that will be quickly forgotten about by the world at large. On top of that, I don't get anything out of playing games like that; there is no reason to waste my time on some half-assed game starring the Olsen Twins or the VR Troopers or whatever than investing time into any other game I have covered on this site. But WWF Betrayal is a piece of shovelware that I had to cover.

Betrayal is a Game Boy Color game by WayForward Technologies, made a couple of years before they hit it big by trying to convince you that no, Shantae is totally a good game, for real. And made before you were browsed a ROM site and remembered that time The Electric Playground recommended Sigma Star Saga, then you played it and got a harsh reminder that there was a reason you never, ever, believed a word that came out of the mouths of Victor Lucas and Tommy Tallarico. I don't like WayForward's games, is what I'm getting at.

Prior to this, WayForward had developed a version of WCW Mayhem, also for the GBC. It was a pretty generic game, with a small amount of liberties taken (example: Bill Goldberg doing Zangief Spinning Piledrivers). It was also really fucking bad! It looked terrible, sounded terrible, had terrible controls, it was just a rotten experience overall. Rotten, but also forgettable; no different than any other Game Boy shovelware you would have been gifted by an uninformed family member. I bring this game up because, despite the fact that WayForward did not give a fuck about this game, only giving enough of a fuck and having enough fun to (poorly) animate a Spinning Piledriver, it was simply a licensed wrestling game on a handheld. WCW Mayhem was a job that they did to get paid. Sometimes a job is just a job. WayForward were asked to make a game where two wrestlers wrestled in a wrestling ring, and that's what they did. Nothing more, nothing less. No need or desire to innovate, with the lone exception being the ability to fight in the backstage areas, much the same as the console version of Mayhem.

I bring this up because that leads to the actual subject of this piece. WWF Betrayal is also a terrible shovelware game for the GBC. It has the same problems that WCW Mayhem had, now with the added bonus of whatever spritework that wasn't hastily edited from that game being some of the worst I've ever seen on the Game Boy. Now, I'm not against making all of your sprites off of one base model, I do it all the time, but it would help to not have the base be the worst looking shit possible.

So why do I care? This is a terrible game based on a sports entertainment promotion I don't like made by a company whose work I don't care for. I care because WayForward cared enough to actually give this game something of an innovative concept. WWF Betrayal is not your average terrible American-developed wrestling game. No, Betrayal is a side-scrolling brawler where you pick one out of four possible WWF Superstars™️, beat up referees and security, on a quest to rescue Stephanie McMahon, who has been kidnapped by the other three WWF Superstars™️ that you didn't pick. Rescuing Stephanie will result in Vince McMahon awarding you the WWF championship.

It's a basic plot, sure, but it serves a greater point that I would like to reiterate. When I wrote about Wrestlemania XIX on the Gamecube, I made a point that I would like to see more non-wrestling games featuring pro wrestlers. CM Punk, before he killed his legacy forever, had talked about wanting to see a wrestling-themed version of Cannonball Run. The concept of taking the personalities and characters of pro wrestling, and introducing them to a non-wrestling ecosystem has some legs to it. It's not something that happens that often, and it especially doesn't happen all that often in games. If AEW were to suddenly announce a blatant rip-off of Pop'n Music with Mina Shirakawa and Harley Cameron, I would want to play that. Or maybe a management sim where you have to regulate the volatile alpha male mentality of the Don Callis Family. But we don't get that. We just get a bad WWF-themed brawler.

Your chosen WWF Superstar™️ moves incredibly slow and has small hitboxes, while every enemy in the game moves quicker, hits harder, has better range, and can stunlock you. There are no combos, not even a punch-punch-bigger punch. Levels are a straight line of two enemies at a time, because the Game Boy can't handle that many sprites that large. Weapons are terrible, barely doing more damage than a regular punch, and have shorter range. Desperately needed health pick-ups oftentimes will only restore a single point of health. The game is at most twenty minutes long, and you will not enjoy a single second. There is nothing here to get into, other than the concept. What is most frustrating is that there is a unique concept here: taking the over-the-top WWF Superstars™️ into the real world, using their particular brand of problem solving, and it's in a shitty game that doesn't utilize this concept to its fullest.

Something that other games like Wrestlemania XIX and WWE Crush Hour (don't play this either, it's not even bad in a funny way, but a really boring way) had was this sort of full-circle moment where all of the nonsense your chosen WWF Superstar™️ had to go through was orchestrated by one man, and you always ended that particular game by beating his ass: Vince McMahon. The WWF became a massive cultural phenomenon in the late 90s specifically because people wanted to see Vince McMahon get his ass kicked. In [CURRENT YEAR], people still want to see Vince McMahon get his ass kicked. WWF Betrayal gives you the indication the Vince McMahon is the final boss. Guess what? You don't! You don't even get that! You simply beat one of the other three WWF Superstars™️, and then you are presented with a fucked up recreation of the WWF World Heavyweight belt, before going back to the title screen.

If you want a good wrestling themed brawler, Toaplan released Knuckle Bash in the arcades. I'm pretty sure the sound has finally been properly emulated in MAME at this point. If you want a good official fish-out-of-water wrestling game, keep fucking waiting. If you want me to never play a terrible WayForward game again, give me a hell yeah!

And that's the bottom line.