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AEW: Fight Forever gets June release date

The first official game based on All Elite Wrestling has gone from 'Wait Forever' to 'wait almost over.'

Ozzie Mejia

May 22, 2023 9:40 AM

THQ Nordic

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The ongoing story of AEW: Fight Forever has had more ups and downs than an average episode of AEW Dynamite. The game was announced all the way back during the COVID-19 pandemic when the promotion was arguably peaking in popularity. It is now three years later, the company's hot streak has somewhat dissipated, and the game is still in development. Some have thrown around jokes, calling it "AEW: Wait Forever" or noting that it's one of the first non-Valve games to have a Valve Time release schedule. On Monday, however, THQ Nordic and AEW announced that AEW: Fight Forever is just about ready and will, in fact, be out before the end of June.

"We wanted to develop an arcade experience that was fun, easy to pick up and play, but difficult to master," AEW superstar Kenny Omega said in a video released on Monday. "We believe that AEW with our partners at Yuke's have created just that experience."

First announced all the way back in November 2020, AEW: Fight Forever made some early appearances at events like Gamescom and Tokyo Game Show. However, there have been concerns regarding a relatively low amount of gameplay footage shown over the past three years, as well as a startling lack of information regarding game modes, the character roster, and the mechanics, just to name a few items. The sudden release date announcement may have fans shifting from pondering why the game's development is taking so long to wondering if the final product is being rushed out?

For its part, THQ Nordic has addressed a few of these worries by sending out a flood of new information to go along with Monday's video release. The publisher reiterated its commitment to a retro-style arcade experience and has issued a full list of game modes. In addition to offline and online single and tag team matches, expect to get into 3-ways, 4-ways, Ladder Matches, Casino Battle Royales, Falls Count Anywhere matches, Unsanctioned Lights Out matches, Exploding Barbed Wire Death Matches (that will hopefully end better than the last one AEW had), a full Career Mode, and various customization modes. THQ is promising players will be able to customize wrestlers, move sets, entrances, teams, and arenas.

What will the final product for the first title based on All Elite Wrestling look like? Players won't have to wait too much longer. The game is set to release on PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch on Thursday, June 29.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?