It's already 3 August 1998, and it's only been about a week since ZAGE's "July wave" hit the market. The release date was 27 July 1998, and the reactions were already loud. Three big titles dropped together—WWF SmackDown, Crash Bandicoot: Cortex Strikes Back, and Final Fantasy 7—and all three were making waves. But WWF SmackDown was the most chaotic of them all, because it wasn't just a "good game." It was the kind of game people couldn't stop talking about because of how absurd it is.
At first, when players bought it, they expected a solid wrestling game—something faithful to WWF, something that feels like the TV show with good entrances and decent movesets. They expected fun, sure, but the kind of fun that lasts one weekend.
They did not expect it to become ridiculously addictive.
Because the moment people started exploring the menus, they realized the game was packed with modes. It wasn't just "one match and done." It was like ZAGE had built a wrestling playground where every button led to more madness.
Of course, all the real WWF match types were there too. Tag Team match, Handicap match, Royal Rumble match, Tournament match—everything people recognized from WWF television. And these weren't shallow versions either. The tag rules felt responsive, the Rumble had real crowd energy, and tournament mode actually made players feel like they were climbing a ladder of fame.
But what players didn't expect… were the match types that didn't even exist in WWF.
Not yet.
And the other matches were borderline absurd—like Zaboru was daring the players to break the game on purpose.
There was a mode called Hell In the Cell. Two wrestlers trapped in a huge cage, forced to fight like animals. Players could escape the cell, climb the cell, and even throw the opponent down—watching them fall in a way that made everyone in the living room scream and laughter. And of course, ZAGE made it worse: Hell in the Cell also had Tag Team. Four wrestlers. Two teams. One cage. The moment someone got thrown off the roof, the room became pure chaos.
Then there was the Money in the Bank Ladder Match. It started simple—climb a ladder, grab a briefcase. But the briefcase was filled with money, and that idea alone made players act like greedy goblins. People were pushing, dragging, throwing chairs, knocking ladders over at the worst moments. Friends betrayed each other mid-match. Everyone shouted. It was ridiculous entertainment, the kind that made even non-wrestling fans laugh.
Next was TLC—Tables, Ladders, and Chairs. The ring was filled with weapons like a disaster warehouse. Players could improvise new tricks: ladder setups, chair-assisted finishers, table crashes that looked brutal and hilarious at the same time. It felt like every match could turn into a different story depending on how crazy the player wanted to be.
And then… Buried Alive.
The mode that made people stop and say, "Wait, they actually put this in the game?"
You didn't just pin the opponent. You dragged them to a coffin, stuffed them inside, and buried them. The win condition felt so dramatic it was almost like a horror movie, and players loved it because it was so extreme—so different from "normal wrestling."
There were even a few extra oddball matches sprinkled in—hardcore street fights, sudden-death rules, and special gimmick matches that felt like ZAGE was testing ideas in a game laboratory. Every mode felt like something you'd talk about afterward.
All of these modes sounded exciting even for real WWF, and Zaboru knew it. Since Zaboru owned some rights in WWF, he decided to let Vince McMahon copy the best modes into real WWF television. That delighted Vince McMahon so much it was almost embarrassing.
Because the moment WWF: SmackDown released, WWF ratings surged. A huge number of ZAGE gamers—people who normally didn't watch wrestling—suddenly became curious. They wanted to see "Hell in the Cell" in real life. They wanted to know if "Money in the Bank" could happen on TV. They wanted to see tables and ladders in a real ring. And that curiosity turned into viewership.
In the WWF offices, Vince McMahon was grinning like a villain. "Heheheh… selling some of my company to Zaboru is one of the best decisions in my life!"
He wasn't joking.
Zaboru casually came out with brilliant match ideas like it was nothing, and then—like a mad genius—he even let WWF use them in real matches. That didn't just help the game.
It made the WWF name rise even more.
The overall game itself was genuinely impressive. The graphics looked sharp for the ZEPS 3 consoles, the arenas felt alive, and the animations were smooth enough so make players impressed. Each superstar—Hulk Hogan, Bret Hart, Ultimate Warrior, and the rest—had their signature moves and entrance mannerisms captured correctly, and that alone made WWF fans feel respected. People loved seeing the little details: how a wrestler taunted, how they ran the ropes, how a finisher looked different depending on the body type, and how the crowd reacted when a big name stepped into the ring. It didn't just feel like "wrestling themed." It felt like WWF.
And then the game surprised everyone again with a strong storyline mode centered around a custom-created character. Players could create their own superstar from scratch—look, body type, ring gear, and most importantly, moves. There were plenty of custom moves available, and players could build a full move set that actually matched the personality they wanted: a technical wrestler with submissions, a powerhouse who throws people like furniture, or a flashy high-flyer who risks everything for the crowd pop. The story itself was also surprisingly good, because it wasn't one straight path. It had multiple routes and branching choices: you could become a righteous hero, a dirty villain, or something in between, and the rivalries changed depending on your behavior, your match results, and the way you treated other wrestlers backstage.
The main rival was Roman Rhodes—muscular, blond, and built like a walking provocation. The best part was how the game wrote him as your mirror. If the player chose the righteous route, Roman became the villain who cheated, mocked, and tried to steal your spotlight. If the player chose the villain path, Roman turned into the heroic face who stood against you and refused to bow. That dynamic made players unexpectedly attached to him, because Roman didn't feel like a random boss—he felt like the story's other main character, the one person always standing in your way, always daring you to prove what kind of superstar you really were.
Zabo-man also became one of the playable characters in the game—complete with his signature black helmet with the "Z" on the forehead and his long black coat. Zabo-man had only appeared once in real WWF, back when Zaboru showed up wearing the outfit, and it became one of those unforgettable moments WWF fans still talked about. Ever since then, viewers had been begging to see Zabo-man return on TV, so having him included here felt like a perfect surprise and entirely hype.
Then there was the Fantasy Route—an extra match set that felt like ZAGE suddenly stopped pretending this was "just" a wrestling game and turned it into a full crossover circus. To unlock it, players had to buy it from the in-game shop for a ridiculous price: 99,999,999 WWF Points. Those points could only be earned by playing normal matches and grinding through Career Mode, so anyone who unlocked the Fantasy Route had basically proven one thing—they were addicted. They played so much that the game didn't just become a wrestling title anymore; it became their daily chaos machine.
And once it was unlocked, the roster exploded. Instead of only WWF superstars, players could jump into matches featuring ZAGE IP characters like Mario, Charizard, Sonic, Robo-Cop, Donkey Kong, and even Kinnikuman. And because ZAGE now owned Shonen Jump as well, the lineup felt like it had no limits.
The result was pure chaos. The game became weird in the best way—like a fever dream you couldn't stop playing. Kids who didn't even care about wrestling suddenly bought SmackDown just because they wanted to see "Mario vs Sonic" inside a ring, or Charizard throwing a chair like it was nothing. Meanwhile, hardcore WWF fans who should've hated it… ended up laughing and loving it anyway, because it was so unexpected and so ridiculously fun.
And ZAGE didn't treat the Fantasy Route as a lazy joke. The entrances had their own flair, the animations were exaggerated, and the match rules were tuned so the characters still felt like wrestling "stars" instead of random skins. Some fantasy fighters were fast and slippery, some were heavy powerhouses, and some had absurd signature moves that made the room scream—like a dramatic finisher that felt halfway between a wrestling move and a video game special attack.
Even crazier, there was a dedicated edit section just for Fantasy superstars. Players could customize them in ways that were borderline illegal for reality: mixing bodies and heads, swapping styles, changing proportions, and creating nightmare combinations like a Robo-Cop body with Mario's head, or Robo-Cop's head on Pikachu's body. It was pure chaos and bizarre comedy, but players loved it—because the normal edit mode was already detailed, and the Fantasy editor pushed it into something else entirely.
This created countless abominations, and players ended up turning it into a party game on its own—friends gathering just to compare who could make the most cursed superstar in history. Someone would proudly present a Charizard body with Hulk Hogan's head and then scream when it actually worked in a match, complete with entrance music and taunts. Another would show off SpongeBob with a Mega Man blaster hand, doing a ridiculous finisher that looked so wrong it made everyone choke on their snacks. And then there were the truly unholy combinations—Usagi in a Sailor Moon body with Luigi's head, or a Donkey Kong torso on a spider-man, or a Robo-Cop frame wearing sparkly idol gear like it was perfectly normal.
The best part was how seriously people treated these creations. They gave them names. They invented fake backstories. They argued about which one was "canon." They made brackets and mini instant tournaments just to see whose monstrosity would win the night. Even players who didn't care about career mode ended up sinking hours into the editor, laughing until their stomachs hurt, because every new match revealed some fresh nightmare animation that somehow made the whole thing funnier.
It was pure chaos and endless laughter—people playing with insane custom characters like they were toys, and realizing that SmackDown wasn't just a wrestling game anymore. It was a factory for memories.
It didn't feel like "a bonus feature." It felt like a completely different game hidden inside SmackDown—one that turned the living room into a laughing battlefield every time someone loaded it up.
The game was very successful and from here ZAGE is starting their WWF games era.
To be continue
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AN : I love WWE game mods so much , so I made something like this lol. For me this kind of ridiculous mode is quite needed in any sports game. What do you think?