Rumble Roses XX

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Publisher: Konami Developer: YUKE’s Future Media Creators/Konami Platform: Xbox 360 Genre: Wrestling, Fighting Players: Single, Multiplayer Input: Gamepad Mild Language Partial Nudity Sexual Themes Violence Related Links 360 News 360 Games 360 Accessories Discuss This Game

Since the dawn of mankind, men have been enamored by two things.  Ass kicking and hot women.  It was inevitable that someone will eventually think up of the Rumble Roses  series.  In the case of Rumble Roses XX,  the union of the two creates a certain…tension.

Let’s approach this from two sides.  On the one side, Rumble Roses XX is a fairly competent wrestling game.  Most of the grappling moves are real wince-inducers like real wrestling moves should be.  More importantly, these grapple moves only damage one 4 parts of the opposing wrestler, the arms, the legs, the torso or the head.  As these parts take damage, their effectiveness also decreases, so if the arms takes enough damage, any attacks of grapples that uses the arms loses some power.  It also makes breaking submission moves applied to that part of the body harder to break depending on it’s health.  Along with grapple, attack reversals,  special attacks, and special attack reversals, Rumble Roses’ combat have enough depth to satisfy most wrestling gamers.

On top of regular girl-on-girl matches, Rumble Roses also features 3 way royal (girl-on-girl-on-girl), 4 way royal (girl-on-girl-on-girl-on-girl), Handicap matches, Tag team matches.  These match types are a staple of wrestling games, but here Rumble Roses falter.  The addition of other wrestlers in the ring doesn’t really change the game.  All it does is complicate matters without adding anything different from the simple one-on-one match up.  Other wrestling games at least adds the possibility of ganging up on another wrestler by doing a joint grapple, but here, those are reserved for tag team and handicap matches.  Rumble Roses have two other match types, but I’ll get back to those later.

The strangest absence in Rumble Roses is the lack of any storyline.  The first Rumble Roses gave each wrestler some kind of a storyline to play through, but here, everyone is just a hot wrestler chick who happens to give their attire some kind of a theme (Nurse, cowgirl, schoolgirl, stripper).  Its absence becomes increasingly noticeable as you slog your way through each randomly generated match towards…what exactly?  Rumble Roses does have a slew of unlockable costumes and character alter egos to justify playing, but nothing more than that is given.  After a while, the prospect of unlocking a bathing suit becomes less and less tantalizing.

Like Sears, Rumble Roses XX have a softer side as well.  The softcore porn side that is.  A good 80% to 85% of Rumble Roses grapples could have come out of the WWE, but the other 15% or so could’ve come out of some softcore wrestling porn.  None of which is explicitly pornographic, but that element is unquestionably there.  Look no further than the humiliation meter to understand just how pervasive this is.  Certain moves in the game are considered humiliating to the opponent.  It ranges from something benign like a slap to the face all the way to a submission move involving a knee being…uhm…pushed up.  Once this meter is filled up, that wrestler is now susceptible to a special humiliation submission.  Once again these ranges from somewhat benign looking to eye opening, eyebrow arching level stuff.  Even the two previously unmentioned match types cater to this side of Rumble Roses.

The Pure Humiliation match and the Queen’s match will never show up in any other wrestling game not named Rumble Roses.  The former, as the name implies, can only be won by using the special humiliation submission.  The latter is a normal 1 on 1 match up, but the victor gets to chose from a list of task to make the loser do like Limbo or get pushed into the swimming pool.  Did I mention the victor also gets to chose what the loser wear while they do said task (Yes, I checked.  That option is not there)?

These two sides of Rumble Roses feels…at odds to me.  Namely, Rumble Roses doesn’t really pull off either very well to make a name for itself.  Only the fact that it combines both into one game is Rumble Roses worth noting.  As a game, Rumble Roses XX barely passed by with it’s combat mechanic which have some flaws, but lacks a driving force for the player to continue playing aside from unlocking more revealing costumes (French maid costume anyone?).  As a piece of adult entertainment, I suggest getting an Internet connection.  Even free porn is better than this.

Graphics: The girls are even hotter now that they look and move next gen.

Story: What story?

Gameplay: Although varied, some flaws dampen the overall combat mechanics.  Loads of unlockable alter egos and costumes.

Music and Sound FX: The music almost rarely veer from generic hard rock while the voice acting is undeniably Japanese-people-talking-English-y.

Game Over: Great first time shock value, but degrades in time.

3 of 5