Well i've said before that im not a fan of the lurch towards arcade over simulation, i feel like 2K20s disaster scared them so badly that they swerved so hard in the other direction that the steering wheel broke.
More specifically, i don't see any reason at all why we can't have both the new features and mechanics while still having the old ones. With some adjustments, there's no reason we can't have grapples without lock-ups or a proper functioning stamina system that actually effects match pace and animations. I don't see any reason why we can't have combos but also have start-of-match collar and elbow tie ups. Frankly I think they tied the gameplay so heavily to the combo system and the.. frankly, awful rock paper scissors reversal system that they've actually hurt themselves when they could have a game that makes both sides happy.
I don't think the combo system has to go, I think its amazing for strike-based wrestlers; but they focused so heavily on it that it ironically makes every match, even against big lumbering grapplers, feel the exact same. Say what you want about 2K19 (and despite how good it is, that game has a *Censored* ton of issues of its own) but different types of wrestlers did at least feel different. Match pacing is also really.. really bad with the new system. There's no lull, there's no period of recovery. It feels less like i'm playing a pro wrestling game and more like im playing street fighter with a crappy grapple system ticked on.
The worst thing though? They could easily make a ton of old stuff optional in settings so that players who prefer the newer arcade style still get what they want. They could make collar and elbow tie ups optional, they could make stamina optional, they could make reversal slots optional (hell, they were optional when they existed. you could turn them off at any time). Frankly I WISH they'd make the rock paper scissors reversal system optional, i do not like reversals being arbitrarily decided by the AI.
CAW mode desperately needs work. Yeah, the new face textures are nice and all but.. there's so much more the mode needs, badly.
They'll obviously ignore me on this but i'll say it anyway. *Censored* their obsession with patching MyFaction even when the game is in desperate need of adjustments and bug fixes. I don't care how much money they make off it, it's disgusting that they will actively ignore issues with the gameplay (running inside springboard finishers are infuriating to use right now because of the small distance it requires) or bugs, just to update their "GIB US MONEY NOW!!" mode.
I also just.. really want them to hire someone else to write their MyRise mode. The writing in 2K23 isn't... too bad, it's certainly not as bad as 2K20s was, but its still pretty damn awful.
Universe mode.. enough said. It's been in desperate need for love for years and it gets ignored every time.
Also. Stop removing moves for no good reason. Stop it. Stop. It. I don't care what the excuse is, knock it off. There's no reason for moves, especially moves we paid for in DLC in the past, to be taken out; especially if they don't get replaced. The moonstomp is a great example. Focus on fixing the animations they keep breaking instead of arbitrarily removing moves for no good reason please. There are still quite a few broken or slowed down moves in 2K23 and I absolutely guarantee some of them will still be broken in 2K24.
Some kind of basic moderation of the community creations would be nice too. I'm not asking for them to remove hacked models or movesets or anything, but how about some kind of consequences to the people constantly uploading porn into the images, or just re-uploading the same caw as a hundred other people have and claiming it as your own?
Finally.. DLC. I only speak for myself here but goddamn do I hate what DLC has become in this game. We used to get some pretty awesome packs, I always looked forward to the move pack for instance, but now the DLC tends to be bare bones in one case or hyper situational in another. I don't want *censored*ing MGK, I want wrestlers you left out. I want move packs, I want wrestlers that you wouldn't expect. I WANT BRONSON REED DAMMIT.
In terms of good feedback, their animation chaining is something i'm a real big fan of and going back to pre-WWE 2K22 games makes it abundantly clear how much that helps, and I hope they expand on it further. I would also like to see more varied "initiation" animations, as currently there's some moves that don't have initiation animation that match them. Think of quite a few running grapple moves that lose momentum because the initiation animation has them run and grab at them when the move itself doesn't feature that at all. Same with reversal animations, why is it that when I go for a cutter and get reversed, it makes it look like I was trying to go for a shiranui?
Finally, regarding showcase mode. I really enjoy these modes but i'd like to see us go back to something more like the one we got for the attitude era and stone cold instead of just "here's a list with [person] talking in kayfabe about the match". Give us a timeline, give us fully animated cutscenes. Set it on a time period instead of one person, maybe that way we'll get a bit more variety in who is on the roster. Not a deal breaker but I just am getting a bit burnt out on that.
Oh, and seriously, give me my damn sit-out axe guillotine driver. Please. And please let us disable that damn fighting stance. It only looks good on a very small number of wrestlers who would actually behave like that, it looks terrible in pretty much every other case. Why is my uber edgelord dancing around like he's avoiding boxing punches?
