War Games is one of the most popular gimmick matches in wrestling history, with a number of iterations that produced great matches. It was an annual staple for WCW for quite some time, and it’s little wonder that other promotions strived to make the match their own, between Impact Wrestling’s Lethal Lockdown, AEW’s Blood and Guts, and other variations on stages including MLW, CZW, and a variety of indies.
Related: The Real-Life Origins Of WCW's Best Gimmick Match EverWWE made headlines when it launched its own version of War Games in NXT, and now they’re doing it all over again on the main roster, with Triple H bringing the gimmick to Survivor Series. Despite how well received War Games has been in general, it hasn’t been above some lackluster iterations. The worst of all came in 2000 when a complete corruption of the rules and presentation nearly killed the gimmick.
The Appeal Of War Games
War Games is one of the few gimmick matches—particularly for its original heyday in the late 1980s and early 1990s--that had its own distinctive look before any performers even made their entrances. The duel ring setup offered a constant reminder that the match was on its way as a special attraction, and the cage typically hanging overhead offered a nice combination of a literal and metaphorical sense of the spectacle hanging overhead for wrestlers and fans alike in the main event.
The structure of War Games offered staggered entrances that tapped into a similar ethos to the Royal Rumble with reasons for excitement as the match went on. The cage itself promised brutality and the way in which the gimmick often lent itself to heels taking a numbers advantage organically added drama to the mix, just as babyfaces entering to even the odds had a similar feel to a hot tag. All of these dynamics, featured in a match that typically only occurred once a year set up one of WCW’s more eagerly anticipated annual highlights.
The Rule Changes For WCW War Games 2000
Vince Russo infamously had his share of bad ideas during his time in WCW. War Games 2000 featured the sub-title Russo’s Revenge, which unfortunately represented what fans got with rule changes, overbooking, and messy execution that aired live on Nitro. First, things grew needlessly complicated with the announced competitors from the face team having to win qualifying matches earlier in the night, and the heel team arbitrarily adding a member in the flow of the match. Special rules also dictated that, as tag teams, Kronik and The Harris Brothers entered the match as units, thus throwing off the numbers and flow of the match.
More problematic than any of the factors listed above was that, rather than the submit or surrender rules traditionally associated with the match, or even pin falls which were introduced to the gimmick in 1998, this match was essentially contested under ladder match rules, all about retrieving a prize from a great height. Foregoing the double ring, double cage set up, the bout instead occurred in the three-tiered cage popularized in WCW in that era, with a goal of someone climbing up to the top cage. The winner had to make it down to and out of the bottom cage with the belt to actually win, though.
All of these differences made the match War Games in name, but not much like what fans had come to expect from this signature gimmick match.
The Execution Of WCW War Games 2000
In addition to changes to the structure and rules of War Games in 2000, the execution itself was all over the place. That included Ernest Miller losing his spot in the match earlier in the night, only to enter anyway, only to promptly get dispatched of by Kevin Nash. Nash also played a key role in a nonsensical spot in which he seemed to turn on his heel teammates, before revealing he was just kidding and carrying on as normal.
Related: 10 Worst WarGames Matches In WCW & WWE History, RankedIt was Booker T who would retrieve the title from the top cage and Goldberg who would wind up almost making it out as the new champion. However, in the end, Bret Hart—who did not participate in the match officially—slammed the cage door on Goldberg’s head to set up Nash to win, anticlimactically retaining the title. Nash had his share of regrettable moments in WCW; this one became a forgotten questionable choice around his character.
In addition to all the overbooking that made this match nearly impossible to follow on any logical level, it also suffered from a fundamental flaw that it made little to no sense for two teams to do battle with the prize of only one man walking out world champion. The heels were, at least in theory, collaborating to help Nash, but the face team in particular was set on a complicated course of fighting the cast of villains while also having to look out for their own title ambitions.
Many fans lamented that WWE took so long to book a War Games match. After all, once the company owned WCW’s intellectual property, it felt natural to capitalize on a beloved gimmick. Looking back, WWE may have made the shrewdest decision to recognize the gimmick needed time to cool off and become subject to nostalgia before making its return. NXT was an ideal platform to relaunch the concept between a relatively hardcore fan base for the then-black and gold brand, combined with a highly skilled talent pool at the time. With most of those matches well received and Triple H now in charge of WWE creative at large, it only makes sense to bring it to the main roster now, a full twenty-two years after the Russo’s Revenge version of the match threatened to ruin War Games once and for all.
