Double Dragon Revive acts as a sort of direct sequel to the classic beat ‘em up franchise, with the trailer describing its story as being a new one that takes place in the same world. The game, described as “a true modern beat ‘em up action experience”, takes place in a desolate world ravaged by nuclear war.

The two protagonists – Billy and Jimmy – have learned that their childhood friend – Marion – has been kidnapped by the Shadow Warriors gang. The duo decide that they must once again take on some gang members in melee brawling action to rescue their friend. The description of the story essentially sounds like it might have been written for one of the classic Double Dragon games.

When it comes to core gameplay, Double Dragon Revive will feature similar side-scrolling beat ‘em up action as its name would suggest. Much like the classics, the upcoming game will also allow players to travel vertically through its levels to take on enemies coming in from different angles. The title is structured around completing missions, and there are four playable characters to choose from.

Along with taking enemies on with intricate combos that can be pulled off by a combination of buttons, players can also grab enemies to use different moves, like beating them up more, or throwing them into environmental hazards or even the waiting punches and kicks of another player. All characters are also equipped with unique Hyper Blows that can help out if they get surrounded by enemies, pushing all of them away. Hyper Blows can also be used in the air to make use of unique attacks.

When it comes to its missions, Double Dragon Revive will have unique gimmicks for each of its stages. Along with plenty of terrain and objects being available to be taken advantage of, stages will also have their own unique hazards, from wall-mounted flame throwers to the lack of guard rails on paths over bottomless pits that enemies can be thrown into. Some stages even have gimmicks strong enough to take down enemies in a single hit if the player can find and use them.

Arc System Works has also revealed details about the Limited and Deluxe Editions of the game. The Limited Edition will come with the game, three character cards, and additional outfits for its characters. The Deluxe Edition will include the Limited Edition contents, along with adding in the digital OST, the digital artbook, a Steelbook, a printed artbook, and a poster. It is worth noting that Double Dragon Revive Deluxe Edition will only be available physically, and only on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. A digital release of the Deluxe Edition will be available on all platforms.

Double Dragon Revive was announced back in July 2024. The game was described by the studio as having “intuitive gameplay” that revolves around the player learning enemy patterns and figuring out the ideal attack timings. The title is currently available for pre-orders across all of the digital distribution platforms that it is available on, and will be coming to PC and consoles on October 23.

While touting the same “intuitive gameplay,” Double Dragon Revive aims for more variety instead of being a “simple button-masher.” Players must learn enemy patterns and discover the “most effective attacking timings” to succeed. However, like the older titles, you can still pick up weapons and utilize the environment to gain an edge.

The controls have also been “refined for the modern era”, while the plot sees the Lee brothers working together to battle “powerful foes from their past” (which seemingly include Roper and Abobo). Arc System Works staff with experience in fighting games are supervising the development, which Yuke’s is leading.

Double Dragon Revive launches in 2025 for Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PS4, PS5, and PC. Stay tuned for more details and gameplay in the coming months.

Starting June 4, three new games will be available to subscribers to free in the form of Dotemu’s acclaimed beat ’em up Streets of Rage 4, Yuke’s and THQ Nordic’s wrestling game AEW: Fight Forever, and Purple Lamp and THQ Nordic’s 3D platformer SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake.

All three games will be available to subscribers of all three tiers – PS Plus Essential, Extra, and Premium – starting June 4. Meanwhile, EA Sports FC 24, which was on offer in May as well, will remain available to subscribers for free into much of June as well- until June 18, to be specific.

That, of course, means that subscribers have until June 3 to redeem last month’s games.

Alongside the release of Swerve to the Beach, AEW: Fight Forever has also gotten a new free DLC, titled Freebie 4 da Fans. The free DLC brings with it 10 new in-ring attires and 5 new music tracks that players can enjoy in the game. The free DLC, while out now on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, will be coming to Nintendo Switch tomorrow.

AEW: Fight Forever – Swerve to the Beach is available as a standalone DLC priced at $9.99, or as part of the game’s third Season Pass, priced at $16.99. Season Pass 3 of AEW: Fight Forever will feature a new beach-side ring, 3 new wrestlers, 33 new move-sets, 42 new skins and attire options, and 11 new music tracks.

AEW: Fight Forever – Swerve to the Beach is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.

The DLC, dubbed Dynamite Featuring The Acclaimed, is the first of three planned DLCs part of the game’s second season pass, and is out now on all platforms except for the Nintendo Switch. On its own, Dynamite Featuring The Acclaimed is priced at $11.99. The entire second season pass is also available, priced at $59.99.

Since its release earlier this year, AEW: Fight Forever has gone through a host of content releases as part of its first season pass. Content part of the season pass include the FTR: Revival Pack, the Limitless Bunny Bundle, and the Hookhausen: Very Handsome, Very Evil Pack.

AEW: Fight Forever is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, check out our review.

The Stadium Stampede mode will be available to all AEW: Fight Forever for free, and will pit players playing as their favourite pro-wrestlers against 29 other players. The match type will take place in a large football stadium, and will feature multiple different areas with wide variety in available weapons and types of zones to wrestle in.

Players can eliminate each other by performing wrestling moves to wear their opponents down, with the match ending when there’s only one wrestler standing. Stadium Stampede will also feature other battle royale gameplay conventions, including a shrinking playing field.

The match type is based on a real match type performed twice during the life of All Elite Wrestling shows, with a third one coming up at an upcoming event.

AEW: Fight Forever is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch. For more details about the game, check out our review.

BREAKING NEWS: #AEWFightForever players will be available to download and play STADIUM STAMPEDE BATTLE ROYALE MODE within the next 24 HOURS! pic.twitter.com/HxHXSLJX1L

— AEW Games (@AEWGames) August 23, 2023

The the short teaser is light on details, it does give us quite a look at the battle royale game mode, titled Stadium Stampede. The game mode will have players join a match taking place in a large football stadium with 29 other players.

Players can eliminate each other by performing wrestling moves and wearing their opponents down, until there is only one wrestler standing. The game mode also makes use of other battle royale genre conventions, like a shrinking playing field, as well as seemingly-randomised weapon placement.

The Stadium Stampede mode is named after a similar match type that has taken place in AEW shows. However, the original matches involved two teams wrestling around the stadium, rather than a 30-wrestler free-for-all.

AEW: Fight Forever is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch. For more details, check out our review.

Rival upstart company All Elite Wrestling popped up in 2019 to offer some competition to WWE in pro-wrestling, and the company seems keen to do the same in the video game space as well. After spending around four years in development, AEW: Fight Forever is finally here, and much like AEW’s shows, the game also hopes to offer a true alternative to WWE’s games. Where the much larger WWE games tend to feature higher fidelity graphics and gameplay that sometimes gets quite close to realism, AEW: Fight Forever instead has opted for a stylized visual style, and fast, arcade-y gameplay. How well did this risk pay off?

Let’s get the most obvious thing out of the way. AEW: Fight Forever isn’t the most high-fidelity wrestling game out there. Even if you compare it to some of the WWE games from the mid-2010s, AEW’s outing looks more like it would be a late-era PS2 or an early PS3 release. This is largely due to the fact that developer Yuke’s has foregone photorealistic models for the game’s roster, and has instead gone for a more exaggerated look for all of the game’s wrestlers. While it may make the game look rather low-end from the outset, the art style the studio decided to go with adds quite a bit to the fast-paced arcade-like gameplay of AEW: Fight Forever.

"The art style the studio decided to go with adds quite a bit to the fast-paced arcade-like gameplay of AEW: Fight Forever."

However, the gameplay in AEW: Fight Forever might just be some of the finest pro-wrestling gameplay since the old days of playing WWE Smackdown: Here Comes the Pain back on the PS2. The game manages to have an incredibly simple control scheme that doesn’t take more than five minutes to figure out, but the options it allows in strike combos, grappling, and reversals go a long way in adding a lot of depth to the title’s frantic matches. With little more than a button each for punches, kicks, grapples, running, and reversals, AEW: Fight Forever is able to present an incredibly easy-to-understand control scheme that slowly opens up the more you start experimenting with pressing different buttons in different situations.

Of course, this means that the game’s stacked roster also allows for quite a bit of uniqueness in each moveset. Transitioning a simple grapple into a complicated submission hold while playing as Bryan Danielson, or putting your hands in your pockets as Orange Cassidy to trigger his Sloth Style moveset is well within character for each of these wrestlers, and the simple control system makes emulating real matches from AEW’s big shows quite intuitive. Various members of the game’s roster also have unique quirks to their moveset, allowing them to further embody their real-world equivalent. For example, the villainous MJF can pretend to grovel on the ground as a counter to an attack, quickly poking their opponent in the eyes when they’ve let their guard down.

When it comes to match types, AEW: Fight Forever offers quite a decent line-up, be it regular singles or tag-team matches, or more complicated match types like the Exploding Barbed Wire Death match or the Battle Royale match. Every match type in the game ends up having unique mechanics that can be played around with, from usable weapons in No-DQ matches, to whipping your opponents into exploding barbed wire in the aforementioned match types. The extra mechanics work well with every wrestler’s moveset, and even some weapons end up having special mechanics. For example, finding a skateboard under the ring means you can pull off sick jumps and flips. Finding a fire extinguisher lets you spray on your opponents’ face. The list goes on and on.

"Extra mechanics work well with every wrestler’s moveset, and even some weapons end up having special mechanics."

Despite the game’s mid-tier visual fidelity, AEW: Fight Forever is filled to the brim with tiny details that can bring a smile to any pro-wrestling fan. For example, get poked in the eye and your movement controls get screwed up, since your wrestler can’t see for a few seconds. Several wrestlers can pull off surprise moves from the ground, like quick roll-up pins, or a surprise power move as the start of a comeback. There are also quite a few goodies hidden in the in-game shop, which can only be unlocked by earning in-game cash by playing matches or going through the career mode.

Speaking of career mode, AEW: Fight Forever emulates the one from the classic WWF No Mercy. You pick a wrestler, either one from the game’s core roster or a custom-made one, and go through various events in a full AEW calendar year. Along the way you’ll find yourself in various feuds, sometimes over championships, and both winning and losing take you down completely separate branching paths. As you move on through big events in the career mode, you also get a look back at AEW’s real-world history, complete with real footage showcasing some of the biggest moments and matches in the company’s first few years.

Wrestling matches and taking part in mini-games also gets you skill points and money. The money can be used to buy instant quick buffs, while the skill points—usable only on custom wrestlers—can be spent to improve your wrestler’s stats and abilities. In fact, going through the career mode is the only way you can improve a custom wrestler’s capabilities, and if you want any hopes of beating Jon Moxley in a singles match with your custom wrestler on the Elite difficulty setting, you’ll want to get some skill points first. A full playthrough of the career mode also brings new items in the in-game shop that can be unlocked, like match types and minigames.

"Taking part in mini-games also gets you skill points and money."

Unfortunately, not everything is sunshine and rainbows in AEW: Fight Forever, and the game definitely has more than a couple of problems, which largely stem from it being a attempt at this sort of game in a long time. The biggest complaint I personally had is the lack of online community creations for custom creations. Modern WWE games let you share or download wrestlers, championship belts and arenas through its online features; an option that AEW: Fight Forever sorely lacks. There’s also a lack of real tag teams, with big names like FTR being absent until the first wave of DLC hits the game. Some might also find the lack of complete entrance animations a bad thing, but as someone who mostly ends up skipping them after the first couple of matches anyway, I never really saw it as much of a problem.

AEW: Fight Forever feels like a return to form for pro-wrestling games. Long mired in the depths of attempted simulation for the sake of “realism”, the genre has mostly been monopolized by a singular franchise. With the release of AEW: Fight Forever, however, we finally have a decent alternative for those among us who are more interested in the fast-paced, almost fighting game-esque gameplay of the WWE games of the past.

This game was reviewed on the PlayStation 5.

The Casino Battle Royale is AEW’s take on the WWE’s Royal Rumble matches. It revolves around wrestlers picking a card and being categorised for entry to the ring by the suit of cards they get. Wrestlers then duke it out in the ring until they’re eliminated by being thrown over the top rope. The last person standing in the match wins.

AEW: Fight Forever has seen quite a few trailers in recent times leading up to its June 29 release date. The game is slated for release on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch. It will feature various game modes, including Ladder Match and Exploding Barbed Wire, as well as other features like online co-op and an in-depth single player career mode.

The short trailers give us quick look at the three wrestlers’ movesets, showing off the diversity of the game’s roster. The trailers show fast-paced gameplay with quick aerial moves and impactful strikes for all three of the characters, culminating in the respective character hitting their opponent with a signature move—the spinning backfist for Eddie Kinston and superkicks for the Jackson brothers.

Developed by Yuke’s and published by THQ Nordic, AEW: Fight Forever is hoping to offer a fast-paced arcade-styled wrestling game on PC and consoles. Throughout the game’s development, the studio has spoken about being heavily inspired by fan-favourite wrestling games like WWF: No Mercy on the Nintendo 64.

AEW: Fight Forever recently had its release date announced. The game will be coming to PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch on June 29. The title will feature a number of game modes across single-player and multiplayer options, including a career mode and wrestler creation.