WWE SmackDown

WWE SmackDown, also known as Thursday Night SmackDown, simply known as SmackDown is a sports entertainment television program that debuted on August 26, 1999. Prior to September 1, 2005, SmackDown! was broadcast on Thursday nights; from September 9, 2005 to January 9, 2015, it was broadcast on Friday nights. The show returned to Thursday nights on January 15, 2015.SmackDown! originally debuted in the United States on the UPN television network on April 29, 1999, but after the merger of UPN and the WB, SmackDown! began airing on The CW in September 2006. The show remained on the CW network for two years until it was moved to MyNetworkTV in October 2008.SmackDown moved to Syfy on October 1, 2010 and remained there until December 31, 2015. A week later, on January 7, 2016, SmackDown moved to its sister channel, USA Network. It complements WWE Raw as the second of WWE's two main weekly programs. Since its first episode, WWE SmackDown! has been broadcast from 162 different arenas, in 147 cities and towns, in seven different nations (the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Iraq in 2006 and 2007 for specials Tribute to the Troops, Japan in 2005, Italy in 2007 and Mexico in 2011). Due to time differences, SmackDown! premieres a few hours earlier in Ireland and the United Kingdom and a day earlier in Australia, Canada, Singapore and Philippines than the United States, except for live episodes. For international broadcast listings, see below. The show celebrated its 15th anniversary on October 10, 2014.

WWE 2K

WWE 2K is a series of professional wrestling video games currently developed by Visual Concepts and Yuke's and published by 2K Sports. The games in the series are based on the professional wrestling promotion WWE and feature professional wrestling match types, storylines, and playable characters based on WWE programming.

The series was originally named SmackDown! after WWE's SmackDown television program. The first release in the series was WWF SmackDown! in March 2000, which, along with subsequent titles, remained exclusive to Sony's PlayStation consoles. After the brand extension, the series was retitled SmackDown vs. Raw in 2004 to indicate the Raw brand was also featured. Within a few years, the series had expanded to a yearly release cycle for various seventh-generation consoles as well as mobile devices. Yuke's had also released the games in Japan under the name Exciting Pro Wrestling. However, after SmackDown! vs. Raw 2006, THQ took over as the Japanese publisher and the Japanese releases adopted the western name. The series was later renamed simply WWE for its 2012 and 2013 iterations.

WWF SmackDown! (video game)

WWF SmackDown! (also called Exciting Pro Wrestling in Japan) is a professional wrestling video game released for the PlayStation console by THQ and developed by Yuke's Future Media Creators. It is the first game from the video game series, WWF SmackDown! (later renamed WWE SmackDown vs. Raw, after that simply WWE, now WWE 2K) based on the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) professional wrestling promotion. This game was succeeded by WWF SmackDown! 2: Know Your Role.

SmackDown! was the first WWF game on the PlayStation to be published by THQ, taking over from the previous publisher Acclaim Entertainment.

Gameplay

The story mode contains two main parts, first with the Pre-Season, but after ten in-game years of playing the Pre-Season, players are allowed to skip it. However, the season mode is nearly impossible to complete. By playing and advancing in the season modes players gain rewards such as unlockables or attires, but instead of unlocking new characters, players unlock new body parts to put on new creations, to play as that "unlocked" character. Once players build a creation, they must fight in a Pre-Season year to build their skills and make their alliances. Once players finish the Pre-Season, they can never replay it, and friends and foes for a creation are set in stone. The story mode contains no voice-overs, instead the characters meet each other backstage with mouths that move to no voice. The game also lacks play-by-play color commentary.