In a somewhat surprising announcement, 2K announced today that going forward it will no longer use Yuke’s as a development studio in the WWE 2K series. Instead, 2K’s in-house developer, Visual Concepts, will take over as the sole development team for the game.
In a statement, 2K told VGC, “WWE 2K20 will be developed by Visual Concepts, who have worked with Yuke’s on the development of the series since WWE 2K14.” Later in the statement, 2K said, “We thank Yuke’s for their years of partnership and are excited to see what the Visual Concepts team brings to the franchise moving forward.”
However, Yukes hasn’t been so kind in their words in recent months. Earlier this year Hiromi Furota, senior VP and producer at Yuke’s, told VGC that, “We are trying to launch a new wrestling game,” she said. “Of course, we will retain the WWE team, but we are also aware that our creators are beginning to lose sight of their passion and confidence and becoming focused only on completing assigned tasks.”
This will mark the first time in 20 years Yuke’s will no longer have a part in developing WWE games.
In a separate statement sent to VGC, Yuke’s confirmed the news and said that it plans to “continue providing support to 2K with regard to the game engine.”
At this point, there is no telling whether this is good or bad news for the WWE 2K series. However, if there is good news to be had, it’s certainly the fact that Yuke’s is making a new wrestling video game. After years of very few wrestling game options, it will be nice to see competition.
As far as the type and if the Yuke’s wrestling game will carry a license, we will have to wait until Yuke’s is ready to make the big reveal. But if AEW’s Young Bucks are to be believed, there is already an AEW wrestling game in the works. Whether this is what the new wrestling game IP is, only time will tell. I think fans of wrestling in general will be happy to see an AEW game, but also happy to see something like a New Japan Pro Wrestling game. Whatever direction Yuke’s is going in, it sounds like the studio is very passionate about what it wants to do.
If it is an AEW game, not only will the new wrestling war be on TV, it may even be on our consoles, too. I think many people are hoping for this to be the case, albeit not everyone is hoping Yuke’s is the studio making the AEW game. Regardless, playing a game with the likes of Jericho, Cody, The Young Bucks, Jon Moxley and Kenny Omega would be amazing.
Let us know what you think of this move and type of wrestling game you want to see from Yuke’s.
