For kids who loved video games and rap music, it was enough. Its roster of playable characters (which included DMX, Redman, Scarface and Joe Budden) only stretched to 11 real-life rappers, which paled in comparison to the WWE games of the time, and it also lacked plethora of game modes, like weapons and cage matches.īut that didn’t matter.
#Def jam vandetta fight for new york ps2#
The rest was history.ĭef Jam Vendetta was released on the PS2 and GameCube in 2003. This led him to cross paths with EA producer Josh Holmes – one of the people assigned to come up with something to do with the AKI engine - who happened to be a big hip-hop fan, and actually had pitched a rap theme for the AKI game. Video board game Atmosfear will return after smashing Kickstarter target READ MOREĪccording to an interview with Okayplayer in 2018, Liles got in touch with EA to discuss having hip-hop feature in games in a bigger way than just on the soundtrack. They started considering original characters and properties to fill the void. Which kind of ruined EA’s plans to release any WCW branded games.īut EA still had this great engine for a wrestling game from AKI kicking around, just with no licence to put on it.
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But then in 2001, World Championship Wrestling went out of business and was purchased WWF owner Vince McMahon. Some of the most beloved grappling simulators of the period were made by Japanese developer AKI (if you remember any of the classic N64 wrestling games, those were AKI titles).ĪKI was hard at work on creating WCW Mayhem 2 for the PlayStation 2, to be published by EA.
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In the early 2000s, wrestling was coming off the golden era of Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock, and wrestling games were big sellers. The story of how this random mash-up came to be is almost as interesting as the games themselves. Just like wrestlers, rappers create larger-than-life personas for themselves that slot perfectly into the world of games (plus Method Man and Ghostface Killah had both already been in their own fighting game, the not-actually-very-good Wu-Tang: Taste The Pain). Which initially seems like a totally mad concept, but makes more sense more you think about it.
#Def jam vandetta fight for new york series#
New Netflix series with 100% on Rotten Tomatoes already lands second season READ MOREįor the uninitiated, the series, that ran for three instalments (2003’s Def Jam Vendetta, 2004’s Def Jam Fight For NY and 2007’s Def Jam Icon), was essentially a wrestling game, but instead of The Rock or John Cena, the roster was filled with real-life rappers like DMX, Ludacris and Method Man.