WrestleMania XL: Why WWE 2K24 Is Your ticket To The Event’s Storied History

LET’S get down to brass tacks right away. WrestleMania, for the uninitiated, is the flagship event of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), and is widely regarded as the Super Bowl of professional wrestling. Also it takes place this weekend.

Since its inception in 1985, WrestleMania has grown into an annual global phenomenon, drawing fans from all over the world. It is a spectacle that combines high-octane matches, celebrity appearances, live music performances, and storytelling at its finest, all culminating in a multi-hour extravaganza.

The brainchild of alleged sex-trafficker (among a rash of other charges) and former WWE chairman Vince McMahon, the inaugural WrestleMania took place on March 31, 1985, at Madison Square Garden in New York City. A total of 19,121 people were in attendance. The 40th edition of WrestleMania is set to take place on Saturday and Sunday at Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field with over 60,000 expected to be in the audience on each night. And that’s not even the biggest turnout they’ve ever had.

Featuring Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson stepping away from the boardroom — he’s on the board of directors of TKO that owns the WWE — to antagonise fan favourite Cody Rhodes, WrestleMania XL is one of the most hyped editions of the event in history.

It’s the last word of that sentence we’re here to discuss.

Aside from veritable mines of statistics, one of the most interesting aspects of sport are the various stories that weave matches together, and bring people together. For instance, football fans will quickly cast their minds back to the 1986 World Cup in Mexico (or Diego Maradona’s World Cup, if you prefer) as a classic tournament rich with narrative. For cricket fans, it quite likely will be the 1983 World Cup in England (or Kapil’s Devils’ World Cup, if you prefer).

It’s the rich tapestry of interconnected narratives that makes sport so exciting and something you can relive time and again.

Pro-wrestling has the advantage of having storylines that are written in advance (as opposed to those that emerge organically in regular sports), which lends to them a greater dramatic and theatrical quotient. This also gives these stories an air of predictability, in that you know that if something major is going to happen, it will happen at WrestleMania.

This is the phenomenon videogame developer Visual Concepts seeks to capture with its latest game WWE 2K24 (published by 2K) that features a showcase of 21 of the best matches from WrestleManias over the past 40 years.

The mode is one of many at your disposal when you load up the game, but the Showcase of the Immortals, as it is known, is the one we’re going to dissect.

Boasting a heady mix of technical masterclasses, battles of behemoths, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it clashes between acrobats and much more, the Showcase of the Immortals is best described as an interactive documentary. Popular WWE commentator (and former grappler who retired after suffering one too many concussions) Corey Graves is the master of ceremonies for the showcase, and introduces each match with a rich dose of lore and backstory to situate you, the player, within the context of the bout.

From that point on, it’s a back-and-forth of the game making you play the match the way it happened all those years ago, and letting you watch archival footage of the real match. It’s a nice trip down memory lane and one that will appeal to longtime fans of the WWE. The icing on the cake for pro-wrestling history buffs is that the certain in-game objectives require you to replicate a move or set of moves exactly as they occurred in the real match. This can be taxing for casual fans, but for those with a predilection for reliving history, it truly is like going back in time.

Along the way, you’ll run into such memorable characters as Yokozuna, The Undertaker, Becky Lynch, Bret Hart, Charlotte Flair, Shawn Michaels, Bianca Belair, Ricky ‘The Dragon’ Steamboat and more. You’ll find a great variety of matches too: A ladder match, a three-way match, the very bizarre Firefly Fun House match, some classic headline-grabbing bouts and some historical ones.

And if you feel you could’ve done a better job booking the matches, storylines and shows, there’s an all-encompassing sandbox type mode known as ‘Universe’ that lets you call all the shots. This will take a bit of time to wrap your head around, but once you get the hang of it, you’ll sink hours into becoming a top-drawer fantasy booker. Veterans of the series should get the hang of the controls and gameplay mechanics quickly enough.

And for newbies, the learning curve is gentle enough and aided by a very comprehensive tutorial section. As an added incentive, WWE 2K24 is one of the most complete and fun-to-play wrestling games in years. So no matter whether your capacity for sports entertainment is that of a thimble or a bucket, you are in for a good time.

In roughly 72 hours, WrestleMania XL will have come and gone. And if you’re looking for yet another way (apart from WWE 2K24) to scratch that pro-wrestling itch, why not check out the other side of the industry? The side that’s not glitz, glamour and stadia filled with over half a lakh spectators.

Released some time last year, the Netflix docuseries Wrestlers dives into the raw intensity of Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW), a renowned training ground for aspiring stars aiming for the pinnacle of professional wrestling. The show intertwines personal drama with high-stakes action, following a diverse group of trainees and veterans who confront their inner demons and rivalries while striving for a coveted spot on the main roster. Amidst bone-crunching matches and theatrical showdowns, the series exposes the sacrifices made for fame and the relentless pursuit of excellence in the OVW arena, where every slam and cheer resonates with the dreams of its impassioned combatants. It’s a must-watch.

WrestleMania XL can be streamed live on SonyLiv on April 7 and 8 at 5.30 am IST. WWE 2K24 is available now on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X and Series S, Microsoft Windows.