Ramblings of an Englishman

For the fifth time in its history AEW brought Double or Nothing to the late May bank holiday weekend. It's always nice to see AEW bring the first show it ever done back it is an interesting year on year look at how the comapny is doing. AEW feels like they want this show over and done with for a bigger summer with Collision, Forbidden Door and the huge All In at Wembley show (which I do have tickets for) with a haywire build from strong to weak to thrown togtehr. However, when I have said this before AEW have put on a solid show so let's see if that holds up. Either way a good day for wrestling with Master Wato winning New Japan's  The Buy-In First of all I have no idea if this is called a PreShow, Buy-In or Zero Hour seems everyone calls it something different. Regardless it seems they have moved to how WWE use to do it with a pannel and one match at least this gives them some different content then re-running the road to special. It's also a good use of Renee who exce...

Nintendo and Dynasty Warriors seems a match made in heaven for non canon hack and slash games for franchises. Seeing as the Legend of Zelda has had two warriors games and Fire Emblem has had one I imagine a lot are thinking what other franchises could also have this sort of spin off. To me no other franchise makes more sense than Xenoblade Chronicles. Here I want to briefly touch on what the roster could look like and how the story could look like. Playable Characters: With this being a non-canon game you can have some real fun with the roster, Hyrule Warriors and Fire Emblem Warriors took characters from the entire history of the franchise and if you just look at protagonist teams you have a lot to choose from. Breaking it down you could have all or most of the below as playable characters. Xenoblade Chronicles One: Shulk Reyn Fiora Dunban Sharla Riki Melia  Xenoblade Chronicles Two: Rex Nia Tora Morag Zeke Vandham Xenoblade Chronicles Two: Torna The Golden Country: Addam Lora Hug...

With Street Fighter 6 having an open beta and Tekken 8 releasing character trailer after character trailer it leaves one more big fighting game to announce its next installment being Mortal Kombat. Following on from 2011's Mortal Kombat 11 this next game will serve as a strong reboot following the timeline reset this may prove to be the most interesting installment for a while. We ended the story with Liu Kang the new elder God of Fire & Thunder shaping his new world choosing Kung Lao as his champion of Earthrealm as Raiden did to him previously. Outside of this we know nothing really. I wanted to use this post to breakdown a few character we can expect or in general what we can expect.  With this being a story around Liu Kang as the elder God shaping his realm we saw he was doing it with Kitana by his side in the pre DLC ending of MK11. I would imagine as confirmed as confirmed can be we will have Liu Kang, Kitana, Kung Lao & possibly Raiden all in the base roster. Looking...

If we are being honest, outside of a few bright spots it has been a struggle for New Japan since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Coming off of the win for Naito in the double gold dash any momentum gained with quickly squashed  as shows were to be done infront of no fans and a lack of any international talent coming into Japan apart from Zack Sabre Jr who had moved or was in the process of moving to Japan full time. It left the product lacking a number of talents let alone two of the bigger main event talets in Jay White & Will Ospreay it led to some interesting booking choices a rushed main event psuh for EVIL which ended with a dud world title reign to which he has never recovered. The break up of Roppongi 3K in which SHO joined EVIL's House of Tortue and all hope I hope of him being the next junior ace has gone. Even highlights such as world title runs for Kota Ibushi and Shingo Takagi were met with either the needless removal to the Intercontinental title or the looming...

Being far enough removed from Supercard of Honor I think it is time to discuss how Ring of Honor (ROH) has done since the takeover from Tony Khan. Supercard of Honor marked 1 year of shows since ROH was bought so it is a good marker on where the brand is.  To begin with interest and money into the company seems to be up. Subscriber count for ROH Honor Club is on the rise and they are posting PPV numbers on the high end of ROH records which is always good. With interest higher it shows it is a product fans are interested in. If you compare this to where ROH was prior to takeover it is night and day. Interest was at its lowest and tickets couldn't be given away it felt like a company on its last legs and it did feel that coming out of the pandemic that ROH was a company on its last legs. To go from that to being a product that is has and holds fan interest is a good sign. However, it is hard to see this constantly. With ROH being taped alongside AEW Dynamite or at Universal (which I ...

2023 is upon us and with that is the first AEW PPV of the five on the schedule in Revolution. It's one of those things where I really dislike Iron Man matches or maybe Tony Khan's priorities are elswhere but I have found the build to this very hit and miss. Some things I like but others not so much. Either way regarding the wrestling on the night for AEW PPV's always seems to have a positive impact on my thoughts by the end so maybe it will be the same this time around. Zero Hour Mark Briscoe and The Lucha Brothers (Penta El Zero Miedo and Rey Fenix) vs. Ari Daivari and The Varsity Athletes (Josh Woods and Tony Nese) The first time I have really been able to talk about it but I am glad to see Mark Briscoe is now allowed to be on AEW TV after what was a terrible tragedy for his family. I wasn't a constant ROH watcher but Jay Briscoe always was a stand out and someone that felt real. A terrible loss for wrestling. This was a fun match better then I thought. The idea of th...

 "There are two countries in Europe with professional referees, Italy & England. Not one English referee will go to the World Cup" - Arsène Wenger, 2018 Another day which has been riddled by erros not from players and managers but the highlights from the Professional Game Match Officials Limited once again getting so many decisions wrong to a baffling degree. From Brentford's offside goal standing and the VAR official 'forgot' to draw the offside line (so doing his job), West Ham's Tomáš Souček getting away with a blatant handball against Chelsea, Brighton's Pervis Estupiñán having a goal ruled out because the VAR official looked at the wrong player in the offside call and finally Mario Lemina sent off for running towards the referee. These will all be wiped off as human error and the officials given a week off before coming back no punishment at all. It continues to be a point of contention for fans that no accountability is seen from these officials,...