We know it. Entrances Ring Announcements in WWE Games are notoriously bugged (who doesn't remember this video?). Not only that, but I couldn't help but notice that they are seriously lackluster as well, with most announcements lacking even simple introductory lines such as "and his opponent..." or "and his tag team partner...", or not having custom announcement for specific teams ("Jimmy Uso!... And!... Jey Uso!... The Usos! Really?)", let alone being able to handle complex announcement with multiple variables involved.
So I stopped and thought: Let's see if I can develop it correctly myself. So I took a shot at it. I started simple but then kept adding things, until I took into consideration every single possibility, even reseached for incredibly complicated real life announcements to make sure that I covered those correctly too (for example... what does the announcer say when the superstar holds a single title AND is one half of the tag champions at the same time? Or what happens when in a Trio Entrance, two out of the three superstars have their own specific tag name - like The Usos-?, etc...)
The system is divided between Match Announcement and Superstar Announcement:
- The first covers the part where the Match Type is announced. Going from the simplest "The following contest is scheduled for one fall" all the way to the most complicated stipulation, which some are not even possible in the game (even though they should if a Match Creator returns), but I still covered them for completeness purposes. Title matches are covered, with up to 2 titles on the line, and there are some extra options as well.
- The second system covers everything that comes after that, so the announcement of the Superstars or Teams. Simply select the settings of the current entity that is being announced and watch the program do its magic. Here all the options and variables accounted for, they all impact and change the announcement:
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- Gender: Male or Female
- Entrance Type: Single, Tag and Trio entrances
- Is the announcement for a Match or a Promo?
- Is this the first entrant, or any opponents/partners were announced before?
- If any were announced before, was it an individual or a team?
- If any were announced before, will there be more opponents / partners to be announced after? (if yes, for example this turns "and his opponent" into "and introducing his opponents, first..." because there are more opponents to be announced after this entity)
- Is the entrant the challenger (in a Title Match)?
- Does this entrant have Weight or Hometown announced? (to cover cases where they don't, for example HBK never has his weight announced, Kane never has his hometown announced)
- Managers: Accompanied by one or multiple managers?
- Stable Name: Is/are the entrant part of a Stable that has a Team Announcement? Does it have a special preset name? (like "Jimmy and Jey, The Usos!")
- Championship: Do the Superstar/s hold any Title? (support for up to 2 Titles announced)
- Team Championship: If Team, does the Team hold any title (support for up to 2 Team Titles announced)
- If Trio and have a Tag Title, are they all champions (Freebird Rules) or not?
Here is the link: https://www.thesmackdownhotel.com/wwe-games-ring-announcement-system
Of course, this is all text-based, but it's developed with audio in mind, the same programming logic would apply for physical audio lines. The lines are programmed in a way so that each piece could be recorded separately and then pieced together.
Even the most convulted impossible of possibilities is covered (say, a Team Entrance where the Team holds two Tag Titles and both members also hold a Single Title at the same time? Check), because we are talking about player-choice, not real life, so anything can happen and every option needs to be covered.
Please note that the Superstar Names (as well as hometown and weight) are just for example purposes, so they are fixed. The selectable titles are just a few for example purposes as well.
I am positive the system is as comprehensive and as foolproof as possible from every angle, so... I challenge you to "break it". You shouldn't be able to, and every combination should return the expected result.
TLDR: Since Ring Announcements are notoriously bugged in WWE Games, I challenged myself to program a fully working system. The system is divided between Match Announcement and Superstar Announcement and covers every possibility and more. Here is the link: https://www.thesmackdownhotel.com/wwe-games-ring-announcement-system
I hope you enjoy this little program (not so little... it ended up being over 1300 lines of code) and I look forward to your feedback :)
Thanks!
- Andy
