The War Games match is hailed for its illustrious history of bringing some of the greatest matches of all time. The World Championship Wrestling (WCW) team based cage bout was as popular as it was stupidly insane, with the 91/92 editions being considered among the best matches WCW ever produced in its decade surpassing lifespan. The last official War Games match took place in 1998 and now, nearly 20 years later, is being revived by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE).
But what exactly is a War Games match? Oh boy, buckle up and start praying cause it’s a complete car crash of a match, with more rules and needless complication than the English language. The no-holds-barred match takes place inside two regular wrestling rings encompassed in one giant cage. Between two teams, usually with four or more members, two men start in the ring and after five minutes the referee flips a coin to decide which team will have the next entrant. Teams then alternate entrants every two minutes, however, the match cannot end until both teams have fully joined the fray. Once every participant has officially entered the match, it’s now an all-out brawl until one participant submits, surrenders or is rendered unconscious, thus costing their entire team the match. There are no pin falls, no disqualifications, no count-outs, no eliminations and no escape.
Regardless of its seemingly needless complication, the appeal and enjoyment come from just how much mayhem comes from this one train wreck of a match. It’s dangerous, it’s bloody and there’s a lot of craziness happening all at once. It’s not perfect, but as history shows, it’s more than capable of producing a classic.
The War Games match has been within grasp of a return for years as WWE have owned the rights to it and everything WCW-related since purchasing the company in 2001. In 2013, a DVD was released entitled ‘War Games: WCWs Most Notorious Matches’, and the 1992 match is featured in the “Greatest Matches of All Time” collection on their streaming service, the WWE Network. Despite this, WWE’s resurrection of the match will likely be most fans first exposure to the stipulation, given that it’s the first original War Games match to be produced by WWE.
NXT General Manager William Regal announced that the match will take place on November 18th in Houston, Texas, at the now named Pay-Per-View event; NXT Takeover: War Games. With a full Pay-Per-View event being billed around and named after a single match, it shows WWE’s fate in the success of the returning stipulation. The bout will see NXT Tag Team Champions Eric Young, Alexander Wolfe and Killian Dain of ‘Sanity’ take on the newly introduced, hottest act on the show, ‘The Undisputed Era’ consisting of Adam Cole, Kyle O’Reilly and Bobby Fish, and The Authors of Pain (Akam and Rezar) with Roderick Strong in the first ever three team War Games match.
It’s not yet known if this will a be title match. Though the number of participants is still roughly the same, the first three teams War Games match, especially three with such varying styles, will inevitably be beautifully chaotic.
Daniel Troy