You know what? I used to loathe wrestling. Now obviously that isn’t the most promising way to introduce a review on a game based on the world’s premier form of sports entertainment, but bear with me here folks. As I was saying, I used to loathe wrestling. Fully-grown (in most cases) sweaty men pushing each other around a ring whilst indulging in scripted exchanges out of it never really appealed to me until I actually sat down one day with a friend and gave the original Smackdown game a go, upon which the entertainment the WWE provides became rather more apparent.

The key word is ‘entertainment’. Wrestling never was and never will be a sport, and no one involved in it actually claims it to be. As an entertaining way of having a classic good versus evil battle with which crowds can cheer their favourites and boo the villains, wrestling is great fun. Likewise, wrestling games can now convey this testosterone-fuelled theatre rather well, the latest of which being Smackdown! Versus Raw 2006.

This year’s instalment sees developer YUKE’s trying to edge the series away from being an arcade grappler and lean it more towards being an involving fighting game. Previous incarnations of the game had seen the proficient player able to chain together move after move and whiz through various match types rather easily, so the control system has been tweaked and with it come a whole plethora of new modes and wrestlers to discover.

In total, 100 different match types are now available for the player to indulge in, ranging from the standard singles match to new additions such as a ‘Buried Alive’ match which sees you attempting to throw your opponent into a casket and close the lid, or a ‘Fulfil Your Fantasy’ match which sees participating female wrestlers attempting to strip the others down to their undies (I kid you not). If you become a little bored of partaking in these modes as the stock wrestlers that you see on the telly every weekend, the option to create your own returns and is more detailed than ever, allowing you to create yourself or a friend in fine detail and even dictate their entrance to the ring.

The mode in which the player will spend most of their time is the Season Mode, and this has been expanded to a 2-year campaign for both WWE shows, Smackdown! and Raw. The storylines written into the game all resemble ones that have been on the actual shows themselves or have been created by the fertile minds of the WWE script-writers specifically for the game, which means that you’ll actually really quite enjoy taking your chosen grappler through their career. Voice acting returns and has been improved a great deal since the previous instalment too, where various wrestlers sounded rather wooden and lifeless.

Added for the 2006 edition is the General Manager mode, which allows the player to take control of one of the two shows and pick wrestlers, titles and matches. Your overall aim is to arrange your cast according to crowd taste and have higher crowd ratings than you rival. This mode certainly promises a lot, but this year is a little shallow. Likewise, being mostly menu-based means that those of you who enjoy oiling-up and getting out there to the ring will become bored relatively quickly.

The actual wrestling itself this year has been altered too, and for the better. As I mentioned up there in the opening few paragraphs, previous versions of the game allowed well-practiced players to pull off a chain of moves in succession rather easily, which in turn meant that matches were over quickly without any real resistance from opponents. This season’s version sees a stamina bar added to proceedings, in effect meaning that players have to pace themselves more and plan their moves. This really does work and certainly gives the matches a slightly slower, more careful pacing than previous games had seen.

Apart from that, the game feels relatively similar to its older brothers when it comes to the grappling. Controls still feel a little loose and fluffy, making precision a tricky business at times. Performing various crowd-pleasing moves will see your Smackdown! bar fill, allowing you to perform your wrestler’s finishing move with a deft tap of the R1 button upon filling the metre completely. You get the feeling that YUKE’s are getting closer to a system that everyone is happy with gradually as the series gets older, and with the changes made this season things are certainly headed in the right direction.

Graphically, the game is a bit of a mixed bag. The wrestlers themselves are well modelled and you’ll wince when you see them getting slammed into various pieces of WWE scenery. Talking of the scenery, this has also been polished too and backstage areas now look quite good. The crowd around the ring have now been converted entirely to 3D models as opposed to the mixture of 3D and sprites that the previous games relied on.

Despite all this, collision and clipping issues continue to rear their ugly heads. Wrestlers fall through ring ropes, whilst weaponry occasionally disappears through arms and legs. Most annoying of all though is the occasional fuzziness in control that sees you unable to perform a move despite seeming to be in position. Sometimes this can be solved by a quick shuffle of your wrestler into a slightly different position, but allied to the slightly slow controls this usually leads to you losing your chance to strike.

In terms of sound, the game is pretty much where you’d expect it to be. Authentic music accompanies each wrestler to the ring, whilst skin-reddening slams, slaps and kicks are all accompanied by satisfyingly chunky sounds. The voiceovers for Season Mode are a big improvement on last year too, with each wrestler actually sounding like they can be bothered to get into character and put some emotion into proceedings.

The end product is, in total, a very entertaining package then. Even people who don’t sit down and watch wrestling on the T.V. could find some fun in Smackdown! Versus Raw 2006, with a whole range of different modes and wrestlers to try and abuse to you heart’s content. Fans of the WWE will obviously be in heaven once again, and the continued – if gradual - improvement in key areas promises much for when the series makes the move to the next generation of home consoles for 2007.