WWE Smackdown VS Raw (2005) ROYAL RUMBLE MATCH

The year was 2004.....it was where everything really did fully change and the whole next generation era was now in full affect and had taken over as people like Goldberg, Stone Cold Steve Austin Brock Lesnar and The Rock was all done with WWE and wrestling all together....until 3 of them made their in ring returns in years to come... but it was never to be the same ever again....Goldberg yes he was at that point where it was right to hang it up, or relax for a while...stone cold's in ring career was already over but after wrestlemania 20, there was to be no more weekly appearances of him...but I guess he deserved his break... The Rock....really it was a semi retirement sort of thing at at 32, it was a huge deal and was a very hard pill to swallow (and still is) He still had a lot left in the tank and part time matches or not, who knows what could've happened...maybe a few ppv matches against randy orton or 1 big match at wrestlemania 21... But hollywood happened....and then there's Brock Lesnar... the next big thing....This was also a very hard pill to swallow but he was due a break and you can't blame him when the wwe schedule is extremely tough and painful and it wore him down massively. If wwe wasn't on the road 24/7, just maybe we could've seen something interesting like a draft back to raw to bury triple H or make his return to smackdown halfway through the year and set up a JBL feud or something...But NO, wwe had to ruin it. to add insult to injury, instead of beating goldberg at mania, they made him lose as a way to tell him to fuck himself. They could of at least done that then had him announce that he would take time off on the smackdown after mania or write him off for a few months. But no, you can't have perfect story telling, says vinne o'mac.

And because of all of this, the first ever SD vs Raw game had a really shit roster...But as it was the first of a new series, the gameplay and features did kick it off to a great start and the first time, the camera would make its debut facing the crowd and not the stage. Despite all of these new features and online mode, the game really was SD HCTP V2.0 with a modified engine and slightly better gameplay.

The Royal Rumble match was one of the newest gameplay features whereas this time, you had to do more than just throw your opponent over the top rope the simple way, you had to make his metre run out before eliminating him. you can do this by pushing any button to run it down, or beat him up until you can throw him out with ease. this version would only last once as it would slightly change in the next game. Its a good but not good but an OK feature and it changes it all up which is a good thing. And at least we still have the stage view (even though it still points down)