The C-Verse 2022 Predictions thread

[azzak]

2 minutes ago, MightyDavidson said:

Why bother updating it if there weren't going to be major changes?

I wish I knew the answer, truth be told I'm sorely disappointed. So many of the gameplay features that have been added or changed are 10/10 for me, but that just makes the stagnant 'progress' of the C-Verse even more disappointing for me. I wish this had been outsourced ahead of the AI generating, which I won't get into here. I'd certainly have applied!

[Meta]

Going to need an "Improved Cverse 2022" mod after seeing the lack of game world evolution tbh. The only reason I downloaded the demo was to see how things had moved on!

[MightyDavidson]

30 minutes ago, Meta said:

Going to need an "Improved Cverse 2022" mod after seeing the lack of game world evolution tbh. The only reason I downloaded the demo was to see how things had moved on!

A mod that puts OLLIE back in the game, perchance?

[Untouchable]

Honestly it is pretty disappointing how little change there was. I guess in two years there couldn't be that much change but it seems like the only change there was is that OLLIE died.

[boxofwhispers]

The C-Verse evolution is really underwhelming, especially in terms of women's wrestling and considering how invested many people are with the universe. However, I'm seeing it as a bit of a relief. I've spent the last four years perfecting my 2020 version of the C-Verse. I've integrated women's divisions to nearly every promotion, along with multiple promotions of my own invention and companies from mods that have been released over the past few years (thanks again azzak). And after a quick look at the 2022 database, I'm pleased to say I don't think it's going to take very long to add the 2022 changes to my database.

[MightyDavidson]

7 minutes ago, Untouchable said:

Honestly it is pretty disappointing how little change there was. I guess in two years there couldn't be that much change but it seems like the only change there was is that OLLIE died.

In my opinion, if he wasn't going to make any changes to the game setting he shouldn't have bothered with the "update."

[hollywoodshinebox]

44 minutes ago, boxofwhispers said:

The C-Verse evolution is really underwhelming, especially in terms of women's wrestling and considering how invested many people are with the universe. However, I'm seeing it as a bit of a relief. I've spent the last four years perfecting my 2020 version of the C-Verse. I've integrated women's divisions to nearly every promotion, along with multiple promotions of my own invention and companies from mods that have been released over the past few years (thanks again azzak). And after a quick look at the 2022 database, I'm pleased to say I don't think it's going to take very long to add the 2022 changes to my database.

I'm going to hold on buying the game until your mod comes out. It really changes a lot of the landscape having a lot of the workers you added over the years and the pop you reworked into the whole world.

I never played the default db and now I understand why. There isn't a wrestler free agent that has 40 pop anywhere, it's weird. You want to create a female division and it's literally impossible. Fuyuko Higa for example even in Japan is complete obscure.

[AlanMaths677]

I said it in the reaction thread but yeah the default CVerse is super underwhelming. Not much of a change in two years at all and two years is still a long time to change things. 

The big problem is just the stagnation. Barely anything interesting has happened outside of the Jerry Eisen's secret children. And Ollie pretty much won the promotion close sweepstakes. Like with USPW, they're just again the big promotion with a lot of money. They don't have much vulnerability. How about something like it's WWE 2019 where the promotion is just stagnant and making a ton of money with a bunch of unhappy wrestlers and a stale main event scene. How about some backstage politics surfacing. Just feels like again nothing interesting is happening there.

I'm an SWF guy so I am a bit biased but I just find it off that Jerry and Eric run the promotion completely the same as their father. They signed Rocky Golden for 2020 and they're just again booking the same way but with Rocky as the face instead of Jack. They also are reluctant to push smaller guys so those guys are in the same positions as before. Reading through the bios, the only big change I feel is Primus Allen rising and heels making tag teams because they had nothing else going on. (Emma Chase leaving the business hurt though lol). But yeah, kind of generic and it feels they have no real identity. 

I gotta read through TCW still but looking at the world everyone is pretty much in the same position. No movement at all with maybe PSW being the promotion that can take the next step. But the set up for the game just feels lifeless in all honesty. 

I hate to be negative but many people were looking forward to the new CVerse and I'm right there with you on feeling excited for pretty much nothing in the world. I know the mod makers here will make is something great but this pretty much confirms I'll move my CVerse 2018 Alt save from 2020 as a DB to here and just edit it heavily so it could be playable. I told Lavelluk before but Alt CVerse is likely just my personal CVerse Canon from 2016 going forward now lol. 

[AlanMaths677]

2 hours ago, MightyDavidson said:

In my opinion, if he wasn't going to make any changes to the game setting he shouldn't have bothered with the "update."

Going through out a decent amount of bios are unchanged from 2020. Now I have to imagine writing bios is one of the most monotonous things to do with a mod so I kind of get it. But maybe Adam would've just been better served keeping the Default in 2020 with just a couple of changes and maybe new workers. Idk.

[AT-67]

I don't want to sound too negative here, as I really like the features in the new game. But I think Adam should have just carried over the 2020 database if he was only going to make minor changes to the game world. It's very hard if you've played Cornellverse before to feel immersed in this database and believe that so little has changed (especially when the wrestling industry in real life has moved so fast in recent years). Everything in the opening summary on starting the game is literally all true for 2020, except for the closure of OLLIE and the opening of a new Indian promotion.  

The slow pace of evolution has been an issue for a while now, but here it's particularly stark. For example, it's hard to believe that Black Canvas Grappling once an exciting startup with some of the most talented youngsters in Japan has retained all of its still insane talent (now in their 30s) and is still a small regional company that hasn't been a dent on the top two who've had an ageing main event problem for ages. The description of the (no longer fresh) EXODUS2010 also tells us that they're still 'really starting to make waves in Japan' 12 years later but apparently to no effect. Great wrestlers who have long been touted as rising stars - and usually rise to the main event in player games - are still midcarders e.g. KC Glenn/Helikaon, who was always presented as CV's AJ Styles/Will Ospreay about to explode as Burning Hammer's new Junior Heavyweight star. The lack of development of women's wrestling is also disappointing (especially as the only sole-women's wrestling promotion since 2020, QAW is still 'Tiny', and only one of the big three American promotions have a women's division). And Burning Hammer still has NEO-X, NEO-Prime, The Golden Army, and Senmatsu-gun all going after 5 years (am trying to imagine what it would have been like for nWo Hollywood and nWo Wolfpac to fight each other for 5 years with the same personnel all in place...)

Edited July 28 by AT-67

[ColossusPT]

44 minutes ago, AT-67 said:

I don't want to sound too negative here, as I really like the features in the new game. But I think Adam should have just carried over the 2020 database if he was only going to make minor changes to the game world. It's very hard if you've played Cornellverse before to feel immersed in this database and believe that so little has changed (especially when the wrestling industry in real life has moved so fast in recent years). Everything in the opening summary on starting the game is literally all true for 2020, except for the closure of OLLIE and the opening of a new Indian promotion.  

The slow pace of evolution has been an issue for a while now, but here it's particularly stark. For example, it's hard to believe that Black Canvas Grappling once an exciting startup with some of the most talented youngsters in Japan has retained all of its still insane talent (now in their 30s) and is still a small regional company that hasn't been a dent on the top two who've had an ageing main event problem for ages. The description of the (no longer fresh) EXODUS2010 also tells us that they're still 'really starting to make waves in Japan' 12 years later but apparently to no effect. Great wrestlers who have long been touted as rising stars - and usually rise to the main event in player games - are still midcarders e.g. KC Glenn/Helikaon, who was always presented as CV's AJ Styles/Will Ospreay about to explode as Burning Hammer's new Junior Heavyweight star. The lack of development of women's wrestling is also disappointing (especially as the only sole-women's wrestling promotion since 2020, QAW is still 'Tiny', and only one of the big three American promotions have a women's division). And Burning Hammer still has NEO-X, NEO-Prime, The Golden Army, and Senmatsu-gun all going after 5 years (am trying to imagine what it would have been like for nWo Hollywood and nWo Wolfpac to fight each other for 5 years with the same personnel all in place...)

To be fair, this one does seem apropriate. NJPW still has LiJ, Bullet Club, CHAOS, HoT. I totally agree with the rest

[JrSquared]

Wrestleworld has been out for 18 months and had no impact on popularity on the indy scene. That was kinda disappointing. Feel like there was decent turnover in USPW, solid additions to TCW, and a lot added to CWA. A common thing people do is "only sign unemployed workers" and I feel like its the same batch as 2020 minus Diaz/Dreadnought. 

I will say the newer characters that have been added to the game look to be solid additions. 

[ZonaCidal]

I was thinking if there was a way to spice up the new Cornellverse database or if anyone has plans of their own. Laveluk has done that with his 2018 and 2022 mods but what about someone doing this for the default mod. Wonder if Laveluk can make a mod based off 2020 turmoil. Especially with COVID hitting, it would have rocked one of the major companies (PGHW or TCW or SWF), etc.. 

My ideas is to have Jay Chord pull a Cody Rhodes and leave TCW for the independents / Japan to prove himself right before 2017 or right after 2020. Greg Gauge and Matthew Keith formed a tag team ala The Young Bucks, get some exposure with TCW but leave to bet on themselves in Japan. Mighty Mo leaves TCW ala Bobby Lashley since he's unhappy with the kind of push he's receiving. I was thinking Mikey Lau would do the same as his size is holding him back  in SWF from getting the main event title. Thinking of Spencer Spade doing the same but it looks like he's getting a push in this installment.

Then add some create a wrestlers, maybe to fill in the slack when you make changes to guys like Jay Chord jumping earlier, someone got to be champions in their place. . Form an All Elite Wrestling type promotion to challenge for the number two spot against TCW and SWF. etc.. Maybe Jerry Eisen is the guy behind it since of his bad press that came out leading to a fall out with Eric and the board. The James Diaz, Joffy Laine of the world join it and become the MJF, Wardlow, Orange Cassidy of this new rising promotion.  A Pro Wrestling Noah type promotion rise from the ashes in Japan or maybe Mexico. Lucha Noah. 

Edited July 28 by ZonaCidal

[ColossusPT]

18 minutes ago, ZonaCidal said:

I was thinking if there was a way to spice up the new Cornellverse database or if anyone has plans of their own. Laveluk has done that with his 2018 and 2022 mods but what about someone doing this for the default mod. Wonder if Laveluk can make a mod based off 2020 turmoil. Especially with COVID hitting, it would have rocked one of the major companies (PGHW or TCW or SWF), etc.. 

My ideas is to have Jay Chord pull a Cody Rhodes and leave TCW for the independents / Japan to prove himself right before 2017 or right after 2020. Greg Gauge and Matthew Keith formed a tag team ala The Young Bucks, get some exposure with TCW but leave to bet on themselves in Japan. Mighty Mo leaves TCW ala Bobby Lashley since he's unhappy with the kind of push he's receiving. I was thinking Mikey Lau would do the same as his size is holding him back  in SWF from getting the main event title. Thinking of Spencer Spade doing the same but it looks like he's getting a push in this installment.

Then add some create a wrestlers, maybe to fill in the slack when you make changes to guys like Jay Chord jumping earlier, someone got to be champions in their place. . Form an All Elite Wrestling type promotion to challenge for the number two spot against TCW and SWF. etc.. Maybe Jerry Eisen is the guy behind it since of his bad press that came out leading to a fall out with Eric and the board. The James Diaz, Joffy Laine of the world join it and become the MJF, Wardlow, Orange Cassidy of this new rising promotion.  A Pro Wrestling Noah type promotion rise from the ashes in Japan or maybe Mexico. Lucha Noah. 

The thing with AEW is that you can't really replicate it on the CVerse. The wrestling business at the top is too healthy for it to be an option, you don't have people just bored of 20 years of a promotion just dominating. In your example, Mo would probably just leave for USPW and their riches, Mikey Lau would probably go to TCW, Spade would get a big money contract with USPW. Now, if for example TCW were to close, then yeah, I can see that. But you have your "big names" company, your classic "WWE" company and a company more focused on workrate and throwback style

[Meta]

8 hours ago, MightyDavidson said:

A mod that puts OLLIE back in the game, perchance?

As long as the changes make sense or are entertaining I wouldn't really mind, my problem's more with lack of roster movement or new characters, especially when it shouldn't be too painful to draw up as many new characters or promotions as you feel like by getting stuff like ChatGPT to do the heavy lifting.

[Dawn]

5 hours ago, AT-67 said:

I don't want to sound too negative here, as I really like the features in the new game. But I think Adam should have just carried over the 2020 database if he was only going to make minor changes to the game world. It's very hard if you've played Cornellverse before to feel immersed in this database and believe that so little has changed (especially when the wrestling industry in real life has moved so fast in recent years). Everything in the opening summary on starting the game is literally all true for 2020, except for the closure of OLLIE and the opening of a new Indian promotion.  

The slow pace of evolution has been an issue for a while now, but here it's particularly stark. For example, it's hard to believe that Black Canvas Grappling once an exciting startup with some of the most talented youngsters in Japan has retained all of its still insane talent (now in their 30s) and is still a small regional company that hasn't been a dent on the top two who've had an ageing main event problem for ages. The description of the (no longer fresh) EXODUS2010 also tells us that they're still 'really starting to make waves in Japan' 12 years later but apparently to no effect. Great wrestlers who have long been touted as rising stars - and usually rise to the main event in player games - are still midcarders e.g. KC Glenn/Helikaon, who was always presented as CV's AJ Styles/Will Ospreay about to explode as Burning Hammer's new Junior Heavyweight star. The lack of development of women's wrestling is also disappointing (especially as the only sole-women's wrestling promotion since 2020, QAW is still 'Tiny', and only one of the big three American promotions have a women's division). And Burning Hammer still has NEO-X, NEO-Prime, The Golden Army, and Senmatsu-gun all going after 5 years (am trying to imagine what it would have been like for nWo Hollywood and nWo Wolfpac to fight each other for 5 years with the same personnel all in place...)

I usually lock myself to SWF in the CV, and was wondering if the stagnation I felt was happening with them was not an issue in the rest of the world. Well, you have answered my question.

[MightyDavidson]

5 hours ago, AT-67 said:

I don't want to sound too negative here, as I really like the features in the new game. But I think Adam should have just carried over the 2020 database if he was only going to make minor changes to the game world. It's very hard if you've played Cornellverse before to feel immersed in this database and believe that so little has changed (especially when the wrestling industry in real life has moved so fast in recent years). Everything in the opening summary on starting the game is literally all true for 2020, except for the closure of OLLIE and the opening of a new Indian promotion.  

The slow pace of evolution has been an issue for a while now, but here it's particularly stark. For example, it's hard to believe that Black Canvas Grappling once an exciting startup with some of the most talented youngsters in Japan has retained all of its still insane talent (now in their 30s) and is still a small regional company that hasn't been a dent on the top two who've had an ageing main event problem for ages. The description of the (no longer fresh) EXODUS2010 also tells us that they're still 'really starting to make waves in Japan' 12 years later but apparently to no effect. Great wrestlers who have long been touted as rising stars - and usually rise to the main event in player games - are still midcarders e.g. KC Glenn/Helikaon, who was always presented as CV's AJ Styles/Will Ospreay about to explode as Burning Hammer's new Junior Heavyweight star. The lack of development of women's wrestling is also disappointing (especially as the only sole-women's wrestling promotion since 2020, QAW is still 'Tiny', and only one of the big three American promotions have a women's division). And Burning Hammer still has NEO-X, NEO-Prime, The Golden Army, and Senmatsu-gun all going after 5 years (am trying to imagine what it would have been like for nWo Hollywood and nWo Wolfpac to fight each other for 5 years with the same personnel all in place...)

The big issue for me is that OLLIE, the number two lucha fed in Mexico, goes under while two feds that are smaller it are apparently unphased.  It would have made sense if CILL went under, it was tiny in comparison to OLLIE after all but I'm supposed to believe that OLLIE was having such dire financial problems that they had to close but still remained the number two fed? Asking me to suspend disbelief is one thing, expecting me to throttle it till it's dead is quite another.

[Mecha Kaji]

I'm still downloading the Beta so all I'll ask is this... did Higa finally get a belt or am I going to have to right this wrong "Kobashi Kenta reign in Noah"-style again?

[ShikariFC]

It would seem like "extra c-verse workers" mods will be doing a roaring trade 

[Crym]

It's funny because some companies had huge improvements while others had virtually no change. SWF got a huge shakeup from 2016 to 2020, where they called up a lot of names and also stole Rocky Golden from TCW to be their new figurehead, they were looking very fresh. This game, they're essentially the same company as 2020, with a few changes here and there in pecking order. Rocky Golden is still the champion, 2 of the stables are identical minus one change in leadership, everyone is still roughly on the same spot on the roster except for maybe Primus Allen. 

TCW went the opposite direction. From 2016 to 2020 they were essentially the same promotion. 2 of the 3 starting champions were the same, pretty much everyone was one the same spot on the card after 4 years, and the only notable roster changes were losing Rocky Golden and some predictable retirements. 2022 feels fresh and different. Greg Gauge and T-Bone Bright got massive pushes, they called up a lot of their developmental guys like SWF in 2020, new faces with some very unexpected hires in there. 

If 4 years was too much, perhaps 2023 would've been better to see more of an actual shakeup in the game world, as the sweet spot between too short and not much changing, and too long and the world feeling too different

[Keyser2.0]

I think the DB is well balanced and stable.

I hate it. The first thing I will do with the full game is sim til 2025 throwing a lot of curveballs to create mayhem (hello Patron Jr.  reviving OLLIE, Alex DeColt not spitting venom against CWA??) and play in a chaotic scenario.

[Untouchable]

13 hours ago, ShikariFC said:

It would seem like "extra c-verse workers" mods will be doing a roaring trade 

 

I grabbed a mod for 2020 that added a number of women's wrestlers to the C-Verse. Let me tell you, it feels real weird to not have Fujiko Mushashibo, the estranged daughter of Yoshimi Mushashibo who does everything to spite her father by doing deathmatches, in the default database.

[DarK_RaideR]

13 minutes ago, Untouchable said:

 

I grabbed a mod for 2020 that added a number of women's wrestlers to the C-Verse. Let me tell you, it feels real weird to not have Fujiko Mushashibo, the estranged daughter of Yoshimi Mushashibo who does everything to spite her father by doing deathmatches, in the default database.

That'd be willr0ck's Women's Revolution mod, I had a run with her and Kajahara's granddaughter as the Warrior Queen promotion.

As a general rule, I copy the default CVerse database (using the untouched original as backup) and start importing characters into the copy for my own CVerse+ version. The aforementioned Women's Revolution mod, King Bison's TITAN factory beefcake characters, maybe some RockVerse stuff...

Let's be honest tho, we'd have found things to complain about no matter what this new version of the CVerse would look like 😅

[The Masked Orange]

I can definitely sympathise with a lot of the feelings towards the lack of dramatic change in the C-Verse this time round, but I wanted to add a couple of thoughts that have been rattling around my head since the beta dropped. This is as someone that has pretty much only played C-Verse the whole time and has unexpectedly found it to be one of the video game worlds I'm most invested in.

I've been around on these forums long enough to remember when the criticism with C-Verse changes was the opposite of what it is now - that too many exciting changes happened between the games and not enough happened in game and the dissonance put off a lot of people. But I think there's been a new philosophy with the C-Verse since at least TEW20 in that more of the drive for fun 'dynamic' things should be the stuff that happens in-game. A big part of this was the huge increase in auto-generated workers from dojos, which is a change a lot of people didn't like replacing the curated future workers. I think TEW now is closer to 'game' than 'simulator' on the spectrum in how it wants you to play it, where in the past it's been more of a simulator. I noticed over the course of TEW20 that I stopped seeing companies as stories that I was jumping into, and something closer to a 'playstyle'. To some people there's no difference between certain companies, say, SWF and USPW, in how they feel playing them and I respect that but I find myself having different needs in both promotions that I fulfill in different ways. It's fun.

From the poking around I've done I think that more companies now are set up to be a good foundation for a 'playthrough' than my memory of TEW20. My general impression from loading in to a bunch of the US companies is I have much less of an urge to 'add' to the roster than I normally do on game start. Especially since a lot of the youngsters from TEW20 are blooded now and there don't seem to be as many 'projects', which given experience mechanics was always fairly painful in TEW20. Juggernaut Jones is a good example of a guy that was a slog to get going in TEW20, him having crossed that 20 experience mark is a godsend.

So, overall, I think I'm quite happy with what I've seen of this C-Verse so far. I don't mind so much the lack of new wrestlers as I've acclimatised to scouting the auto-generated workers at this point and their skill spread already looks less erratic than last time round. That exciting beta-release rush I would have a decade ago of finding out what crazy things happened to my favourite stars and companies isn't there any more (remember when DAVE was a company you played and not just an obscure reference in a 46 year-old wrestler's bio?), but TEW20 was the first instalment where I felt I could play any company in the game and it be fun, and I think TEW9 will probably be that but better in that regard.

It's bittersweet for sure that the worldbuilding probably isn't going to be as rich going forward. Heck, stuff like this: https://greydogsoftware.com/cornellverse/profiles.html hasn't been done canonically in fifteen years as far as I'm aware. Who would've thought Jim Force would be the last of this bunch left standing? The philosophy has clearly shifted. But I do think my games, the thing I'm actually playing through with my free time, are more dynamic (though I'm assuming the relationship frequency will be tuned down before release because it's a bit bonkers right now) and that over the previous editions the game has helped me get better at telling my own stories and I think this one will be the same too.

To me he'll always be Dusty Bin and don't you dare tell me that was over a decade ago you filthy liar.

[alpha2117]

2 hours ago, DarK_RaideR said:

That'd be willr0ck's Women's Revolution mod, I had a run with her and Kajahara's granddaughter as the Warrior Queen promotion.

As a general rule, I copy the default CVerse database (using the untouched original as backup) and start importing characters into the copy for my own CVerse+ version. The aforementioned Women's Revolution mod, King Bison's TITAN factory beefcake characters, maybe some RockVerse stuff...

Let's be honest tho, we'd have found things to complain about no matter what this new version of the CVerse would look like 😅

Love Rockverse.  A lot of people contributed ideas and it resulted in Willr0cks stuff having a lot of varied flavour.  I would recommend anyone who wanted adding characters to Cverse to look at that mod 

Edited July 29 by alpha2117