Being a HUGE wrestling fan, I enjoy all types of sports entertainment, whether it be WWE... umm... WWE... and... err... WWE! Ah yes! There's also Backyard Wrestling! Violent, insane, and ultimately genocidal, these kings of hardcore bludgeon themselves all for the love of the "sport." It's the kind of over-the-top wanton destruction that would make for a great videogame and it almost did with Eidos' first Backyward Wrestling. Now the famous publisher and developer Paradox Development are back with a sequel, and while There Goes the Neighborhood has some bright spots, it ultimately fails to please, which makes it a solid rental or a steal once it's sold at a bargain price.

There Goes the Neighborhood features several improvements over its predecessor. For starters, there are a lot more wrestlers to choose from. Many of them are familiar faces from the first game (Insane Clown Posse, Masked Horn Dog), but there are a lot of new comers including New Jack, the Sand Man, Tera Patrick (yowza) and a host of others. Each has their own signature special moves and recorded voices, and the character models are highly detailed so they all look like their real life counterparts.

In addition to the characters, there's also a more varied selection of environments such as a restaurant, miniature golf course, trailer park, backyard, and a swimming pool (and more) and they all feature numerous weapons to beat your opponents with. Cinderblocks, a chain saw, a weed whacker, flower pots, splintered wood, propane tanks, car doors, golf clubs, barbed-wire bats, and trash cans are but a few of the many deadly tools you'll have at your disposal, but new to this game is environmental damage; certain places in the levels where you can inflict serious damage as well as embarrass your opponent. For example, in a backyard environment there's a car parked on the top left of the screen, and if you whip your opponent into it an animation will play of your wrestler slamming his/her foe's head onto the trunk, opening it, and then repeatedly bringing it down across the back of their neck. These animations are absolutely brutal and a lot of fun to watch, and they really add an extra dimension to the gameplay.

Speaking of gameplay, if I had an issue with the first game, it was that the AI was at times invincible. It was hard even getting a punch in without getting clobbered. This time things are more balanced so matches run smoother. The computer will still go on a tear from time to time, but you'll have more of an upper hand.

Lastly, There Goes the Neighborhood has a much deeper Create-A-Wrestler so you can really craft some bizarre abominations (though it is by no means AS DEEP as in THQ's SmackDown games), and the Career Mode is a lot more enjoyable. The story behind it has to do with the Backyard Wrestlers invading a town for their next PPV, and a challenge as been issued to the locals that if one of them makes it to the final match and wins they'll receive ONE MILLION DOLLARS! It's by no means an interesting yarn but it at least puts you on a path. You'll fight in various locales attempting to complete various missions which basically means you'll try and beat challenges such as going on a win streak or throwing your opponent off a ledge two times. The whole idea is to eventually dominate all three federations that are in the game, unify the titles that you've won, and earn a spot in the last tournament.

Ok, so Eidos has thrown in all these improvements and special features...and it doesn't matter much. It doesn't matter much because this game's just as glitchy as its predecessor. I don't mind the clipping, but I do mind wrestlers throwing punches that connect even though I wasn't in the vicinity, being hit with objects while I'm on the ground even though said object clearly sailed over me by at least six feet, and getting nailed with a special move even though I clearly wasn't in range. What I mean by that is, once a wrestler pulled off their Super Mode while we were on a roof, and half way through it I fell off the roof, so in theory I should've escaped the final blow, which I did...somewhat. Even though I was ten feet below my attacker, he did a pirouette on the roof top, landed on it and somehow hit me at the same time. Impossible? You betcha!

There's also not much strategy to the game. All you'll do is run around your opponent trying to punch or grab them, and once their down you'll grab a weapon and bash them with it until they wise up and realize they should take it away from you. Rinse. Repeat. That's not to say you won't have some fun doing this, because you most certainly will, but it's more like a "this needs to be returned on Saturday by noon" type of fun.

Aside from the gameplay quirks, there are some other negatives about the game that annoy me. For one, the sound is horrendous. Sometimes it disappears and all you can hear are your footsteps and the sounds of punches and kicks, and the created wrestlers all sound the same (one male and female voice). Also, the game just loads too much. It even needs to load after you've chosen a single character...before you choose the second character!

Career Mode is indeed improved, but it's by no means thrilling. You're kept in the same environments for far too long, and while it's sort of cool earning money to buy new accessories, things just get boring too quickly.

Lastly, where's the online play? Being able to battle against three or even one other opponent and trash talk would've definitely made things more appealing. True, a game doesn't have to be online playable to be a good game, but BYW2 isn't good enough to stand without it.

As far as the graphics are concerned, the game looks ok. As I previously mentioned, the character models look good, and they take damage so they'll bleed the more you hit them, though the blood doesn't look realistic at all. However, on the positive side the environments look great and it's cool breaking everything. By the end of a match there may be glass and wood all over the place and it's definitely fun exploring to see what can and cannot be smashed. The game's moves are also cool, and the Supers rival those found in EA's Def Jam series. Truly bone-crushing stuff.

I really wanted to like There Goes the Neighborhood, but each time I found myself enjoying it something stupid happened and I'd became angry. The glitches wind up hurting the game far too much, and the constant loading and low production value (even though BYW is extremely low production) damages the overall experience. Improved? Yes. Hardcore? Yes. Good game? Not really.