WWE Raw tries to bring a legit, playable wrestling game onto PC, but in the end it just falls flat on it's face.
There's about three modes in the game - Exhibition, Title Match, and King of the Ring. Not forgetting the traditional Create-A-Wrestler, included in pretty much every installment of the WWE games franchise. Exhibition is your standard quick match fare, of course - there aren't a lot of match types in the game. For example, there's no Hell in a Cell, Steel Cage, Ladder, or Tables match or anything of that sort. Just one on one, tag, triple threat and fatal-4-way. Rather disappointing, to be perfectly honest. Title Match sees you playing matches to work up the ranks to earn a shot at a WWE title of your choice. The worst thing about this mode is that it has no actual content - just about 6 or 7 matches, then your title shot, and then, bam, you're done, and you unlock a secret character. That's it. You're expected to play through all of the title paths to unlock all the characters to bring some sort of life into the game and keep you playing it, but it is disinteresting. Very little to see here. There's also King of the Ring, but this has no content either, and is just your standard pick and play your own tournament. Create-A-Wrestler has no notable improvements - in fact, it looks like it's been stripped down from previous WWE releases on the Nintendo 64 and Playstation like No Mercy and SmackDown!.
The gameplay tries to bring a up-to-date, next-generation (at the time it was) fighting and grappling system, but it's confusing and tedious. There's only about five buttons in the game and this makes it extremely tedious trying to see all the grapples and moves you can do, but there is few. It seems to me that the developers could have put a lot more effort into the grappling system. I've seen worse grappling systems, but they could have done a lot better.
You may have noticed this is a rather short review, and that's because there isn't actually much to review, and this is the game's main problem - lack of content. The developers haven't included a real mode to get people to want to play the game, and this is Raw's downfall. It doesn't help the game has a mediocre grappling system and controls. But credit is given where it is due - the graphics are good, I enjoyed the background soundtrack, and there is a nice 'double feature' which shows a highlight of a signature move or finisher after you do it. But these little touches do not save WWE Raw from leaving a bad taste in my mouth - an effort was put in, but not a large amount and it doesn't seem to be very effective. This game should have got a lot higher, but it really didn't live up to standards and I'm afraid the game is just bargain bin fodder - WWE Raw gets a 4.5 out of 10.