WWE 2K26 Devs on Core Changes, Cutting Last-Gen, Knowing The Island Wouldn’t “Wow” Year 1, and More

A new year means a new WWE 2K game, and I recently made the trip to WWE Headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut, to go hands-on with WWE 2K26 (read more about that here). As has become tradition, I also sat down with longtime WWE 2K series creative director Lynell Jinks and gameplay producer Bryan Williams to take the current temperature of the series.

We delved into a lot of topics, including WWE 2K26’s changes to the series’ core stamina and reversal mechanics, the game’s massive 400 slot roster, added match types, new “Ringside Pass” approach to DLC, why Visual Concepts knew The Island wouldn’t wow everyone last year, the challenges of developing a new game every year in only nine months, the difficulty of bringing back nostalgic features from the past, and more. Scroll on for the full interview.

Grappling with Reversal Spam

In press releases, it was mentioned that you updated the stamina and reversal mechanics for WWE 2K26, although I didn’t notice a big change while I was playing. That may be a “me” issue. There’s a good chance I just didn’t catch on to the changes. Can you describe how stamina and reversals have been updated this year?

Bryan Williams: Yeah, absolutely. Honestly, the fact that you didn’t see it front and center is a good thing, because we wanted it to be kind of a subtle change and you might have seen it and not even noticed. So basically, what we did this year as a way to mitigate constant spamming of reversals, especially when you're playing with skilled opponents, we tied the ability to reverse moves with a character’s stamina, which is indicated above their head with a little yellow [circle].

Oh, okay, I did see that.

BW: It’s also on the character HUD. Like, a gold bar around the Vitality meter. And so the more reversals that you do, the more stamina you're consuming to where, once you have completely exhausted yourself, you will enter a “Winded” state, which is represented by the Stamina meter turning purple.

I did notice the meter turning purple and didn’t know why. Okay, this is all starting to come together for me here.

BW: Once it's purple, you're now on cooldown. You can no longer reverse during that period of time until the purple depletes, and then you're back up to your full stamina. We wanted to give players the ability to gauge and control the best times to reverse. Maybe it's, like, I'm going to eat this light attack, because I'm going to save up my stamina because [my opponent has] a finisher ready or a signature. I'm on the lookout to reverse that, rather than some of these other moves. So, it gives you more decision-making moment to moment.

Lynell Jinks: Yeah, there’s definitely more strategy to playing defense now, right?

BW: And it's not too punishing. [You’re not] going to be there for an extended period of time. Maybe you'll eat one or two attacks before you're able to reverse again. […] Once you're in that state, you don't feel completely nerfed as far as what you can do. It lasts just long enough.

Have you changed the timing or on-screen indicators for reversals at all?

BW: The windows themselves? No, that is what it was.

New WWE 2K26 Match Types

Let’s focus a bit more on specific match types. I liked how the I Quit match minigame changes based on how much damage you’ve received to specific body parts. I wouldn’t mind if that system was used for submissions in all match types.

LJ: That's good to hear. It took a while for us to dial that in. We tried a few different things. The concept was always there, but the actual implementation of it, and the understanding, took a while. I would say, almost to the very last minute [laughs].

BW: I'm glad you picked up on it, how the green wedges indicate the limbs of your opponent's body, which is something different than we’ve done before.

Yeah, going in, I was wondering, “How is an I Quit match going to be different from a standard Submission match?”

BW: The thing with the submission match is that, depending on the submission you have applied, [you’re] usually targeting one or two body parts. You work that body part enough, and you're going to get that submission. But in an I Quit match, you're dealing with someone's full physical being. We wanted it to be that you really had to spend time working over your opponent. So having those wedges represent the arms, the torso, the head, the legs, made all the sense to us. No, you can't just work the arm and be satisfied. You really got to put a total beatdown on your opponent to force him into that verbal submission.

For the Inferno match, I got lit up more than I lit any opponents on fire. What are the different ways to light somebody on fire?

LJ: The whole purpose of the match is to eliminate someone by lighting them on fire. Once you enter the “Inferno” state, when the meter reaches full max, right? Once you're there, you basically initiate the mini game to throw them out of the ring into the fire.

I noticed you don’t actually see anybody get lit on fire. Just the loser getting the fire extinguisher afterward. Is that due to a content restriction?

BW: Well, yeah, our rating is Teen. I'm not sure that constitutes actually seeing the full body on fire. So, you know, we allude to it.

But going back to your previous question, this is the second time that the Inferno match has been in our franchise. And for me, what separates this version and makes it that much better is the ability to exit the ring. You can leave the ring and fill up the ring with weapons, or the new thumbtacks, or tables. And we’re talking about other ways to win […] once you hit Inferno, you can do the default way of eliminating by trying to force [opponents] out through the ropes, or into the corners, but if you’re clever, you get a table in the ring, set that bad boy up, light it on fire, and put the opponent through it.

Oh, okay, that counts as a win?

BW: Yeah. We also have a fireball Payback, which we introduced a couple of years back. And if you're in there with a character such as Aleister Black, who has fireballs as one of his default Paybacks, once you reach the Inferno state, you're able to throw a fireball in your opponent's face and win that way. So, there are some clever bits about it. But the coolest thing is being able to leave the ring and add weapons, which we were never able to do previously.

Letting Players Tell Their Own Stories

You’ve also added new start-of-match actions, and some of them have obvious gameplay benefits, but for others, it’s not as clear. Is there some sort of benefit to all of them?

BW: Those are largely there for the storytelling of a match. Like, for the player who has the story of a match imagined in their head. If it's two friends going out there, you’ve got the handshake, although even then you have the option to do a cheap shot.

LJ: Yeah, even doing a stare down to recreate iconic moments, like the Rock staring Hogan down at ‘Mania, right? It's a way for us to breathe that storytelling and drama into regular matches without having to go through a pre-canned Showcase cutscene or something you only experience in Universe or MyRise. This happens in Exhibition. They happen in regular matches, and you feel like, “Oh, I feel like I can author my own story” by choosing one of these actions and seeing how that plays out. They can be gameplay interactions that can start the match off in a different way, or maybe you’re just “Yep, I wanted a cool moment to break things up,” right?

I do get the sense you’re focused on bringing more roleplaying to WWE 2K, even in the Exhibition matches. Would you say that’s accurate?

LJ: For sure. And you also have the rival reactions now. When you go into the game options, you enable reactions, you'll get Universe-style cut scenes within Exhibition. So, like we were talking about, being able to tell your story or breathing the pro wrestling drama aspect into a fighting game, right? I would say we do a really good job of telling stories and breathing drama into specific modes in our game, like MyRise, Showcase, Universe, but in Exhibition it was missing. We knew that. And so, these are ways we're injecting those opportunities to tell stories within the Exhibition without the intimidation factor of, “Oh, I gotta go set up Universe or go to Showcase or MyRise to experience ‘pro wrestling’ drama”.

BW: And the rivalries develop. It makes the decisions and the outcomes of your exhibition matches count. The game remembers, and your allies and rivalries form based on that.

I appreciated some of the new weapons and other plunder that’s been added. The shopping cart in particular feels like it must have been a lot of work, given how you can put opponents in it and push them around…

LJ:  You wouldn't believe how hard it is to simulate how hard it actually is in real life to move a shopping cart around with somebody in it [laughs].

BW: God bless our engineers and our animators for the work that they did on that, because we all knew it was gonna be worth the effort.

LJ: It was a lot of work.

BW: This is one of the things that Lynell has always been a big fan of. Looking back at some of the older games in the franchise, where you had these elements… vehicles and being able to put your opponents in things, and he was, like, “We’ve got to get back to that. It's okay to reintroduce some of these kinds of out-there weapons, objects, and vehicles.” This is just the start with the shopping cart. This is something we want to push even further in the future.

It’s interesting that you’re looking back at those earlier games for inspiration, but it sounds like even relatively small things like the shopping cart aren’t always easy. How do you balance satisfying that fan nostalgia with the demands of modern game development?

LJ: We look at a lot of the older games that people have a strong affinity for and there's that nostalgia factor that keeps itching, right? You're, like, “Man, it's not scratching that itch. These new games are just missing something that the old games had,” and we're aware of that, and we're trying our damnedest to breathe that stuff back into modern-day games. But also, gaming has evolved, and I think we’re trying to touch on that with The Island, with the Ringside Pass, with MyFaction. We want to make sure that all the choices we make as developers lead to fans having fun again in our game while also being rewarded for playing.

Learning to Live with Another Battle Pass

You mentioned the Ringside Pass, which has generated some debate…

LJ: For a lot of people, the Ringside Pass is polarizing. It’s, like, “Man, they're just adding different ways to unlock content.” Like, no, we're asking you to play the game too. You earn RXP by playing different modes, or getting a four star match, or whatever. It's just a different currency that we're asking you to collect to get the things you want.

BW: You're getting XP just from playing all aspects of the game. So whether you're a diehard MyGM guy or Universe person, everything you're doing in that mode, you're just accumulating XP. I don't think there's anything in the game you do where you’re not [getting XP]. So yeah, we've heard some grumblings, and I get it. It's different, it's a different thing. But, you know, different does not equal going back. And I think when people get their hands on WWE 2K26, they'll realize that whatever they thought it was, like, “Oh, this isn't bad at all. I can't believe I was so upset about this.”

I guess the question people have is if there’s a benefit to the battle pass approach compared to the in-game unlocks + traditional DLC approach of the past?

LJ: The main thing that we're asking people to do is, at least for the free tiers, is just play the game and then feel rewarded. We’ve given you something to chase; there's a purpose, rather than a lot of matches not mattering. It's like, no, everything matters now. Everything you do can be part of chasing a tier and unlocking something special. Yeah, there's a traditional DLC model that everyone is used to that's still there. We're not taking that away from anybody. But, hey, all those rewards that were locked behind a mode that you probably weren't interested in… let’s just say if you weren’t a MyFaction fan or you weren’t an Island fan, but you like the rewards, you can still earn some of those things now by just playing whatever you want.

Okay, so it’s more of a general XP you’re earning across all modes now, instead of specific unlocks for each mode.

LJ: Yeah. We know that every mode might not be your cup of tea.

Birthing a Game in Nine Months

On the topic of different ways to play, it does seem like you’re really spreading the new features across the modes this year.

LJ: Every mode in our game has a huge, loud fan base that we're trying to please. And every year we hear it, “This is gonna be a copy and paste.” Like, we never copy. There's so much that goes into our, I always say, our nine-month development cycle.

Only nine months?

LJ: Everyone thinks it's a year, but no, we have a couple months to plan what we're gonna do, lock that down, and then nine months from there, we’ve got to submit to first party, Microsoft, Sony, to make sure that we have enough time to tune the game and everything is right by the time it hits consumers hands and so that's not a lot of time with a huge roster that just grows year over year over year. And anytime we cut anyone, due to whatever reason, it’s, like, “Argh, we can’t believe you guys cut…” and sometimes it’s out of our hands. But hey, there's 400 characters. And also the community, the community creations, our users, the things that they're able to create are amazing, amazing. You're seeing superstars that we don't have the rights to show up on day one, and they look phenomenal. On par with what we’re doing.

Speaking of community creations, I didn’t get to delve into the create-a-wrestler much. Can we expect some new features there?

LJ: Yeah, we’ve brought body morphing back. And going back to our discussion about why some features fall by the wayside and us trying to bring them back, the reason why we took it out was not because we hate people. We had to take it out because it was buggy as hell, right? It created some of the worst bugs that we've ever had in a game in [WWE] 2K20, and we're like, until we figure this thing out, we need to remove it, because it's destroying the user experience. Yeah, some people are really good at it, but it's creating a ton of issues that are making the game look bad and it's creating a bad experience for the user. And so now we brought it back and it's more powerful than ever. If you want to create something that looks funky or like a monster, go ahead, but if you want to create something that's realistic that we weren't able to with our preset body types, now you're able to.

Letting Go of Last-Gen

This year, you’ve finally left the last-gen systems, the PS4 and Xbox One, behind. Has that opened up some new possibilities for the series?

LJ: One of the benefits of not having to support the old gen systems anymore is, of course, lighting and shadowing have made huge improvements, but the biggest thing I would say for us, because it has gameplay implications, is the picture-in-picture window for Royal Rumble. Sounds so small and simple. Why hasn't that been in the game? Well, because we couldn't render a different window at a different perspective in real time. And now you can. You see entrant 20’s coming, you see them running down the ramp, and it looks freaking awesome.

What spurred the decision to drop last-gen for WWE 2K26? Why now?

LJ: Some of the decisions are kind of made for us. When you look at what our core audience is playing? What platform are they playing on? And is it worth the amount of effort to support these older consoles when the majority of our users are playing on the new consoles? And also, there’s a climate change about what people's expectations are for current-gen graphics. And again, it's a nine-month cycle, and we don't have the resources and time to invest in supporting two different systems that are working on two different engines. If we get rid of this because of these limiting factors, we can invest in this instead and improve the graphics or improve our tech.

What are some of the things you may anticipate doing in future years now that last-gen is finally in the rearview mirror?

LJ: One of our last big barriers is figuring out, could we ever increase our playable superstars from eight to ten or twelve or whatever? I would say the improvements that we've been able to make this year, as far as collision, like dynamic interactions with ledges and slamming someone on the steps, our ragdoll physics – all those things have an impact on CPU and even GPU in some cases. Thumbtacks, that has an impact on GPU, right? So, like, these are all things the newer-gen consoles let us do. Not only do they have an impact visually, but they also have an impact from a gameplay standpoint.

I think we're scratching the surface on those things. We have a large, huge list of things that we want to try. And like I said, games are evolving so fast. And like I said, the industry is evolving too and seeing what other games are doing, it's interesting. And I feel like, even borrowing inspiration from WWE or even the older games, right? Like, hey, maybe it's time that we start looking at some of these older features that people used to like back in the day, and maybe now can we do it in an efficient way on these next-gen consoles and also make it look pretty? So, there's never a shortage of ideas.

BW: The thing about the nostalgia for some of the older games, like Smackdown! Here Comes the Pain or a Smackdown vs. Raw 2007, we see all that. But anytime we bring something back, to Lynell’s point… I was there, working on some of those games, and there was still some jank. Like with the motorcycle in 2009 [laughs]. People remember that something was there or that they could do something, but I think they also kind of forget that it didn't look all that great. They just enjoyed the fact that it was there.

LJ: There’s a huge disconnect from quality back then…

…to what people expect now.

BW: Yeah. It’s 2026. So, when we do bring these features back, or just elements of those older games, we want to bring those things back in a way that meets the quality expectations that, not just our fans, but fans of games in general, have for this hardware that we're working with. And so, all those things come together to where it's, yeah, we're bringing it back, not just for nostalgia's sake. We're doing it because we know it's gonna be fun, and we know we can now make it look good, feel good, sound good at the same time.

How has the Nintendo Switch 2 been to work with? Is it fitting in with the other current-gen systems?

LJ: It is. And we know that that audience is a little different, and so we introduced a different way to play that game, with a single Joy-Con, where it's more like casual, more fun, and the jury's out, right? If we feel like there's a bigger audience for that on the other consoles, maybe that's something that we adopt, as far as having a more accessible mode. But like, we look at that console, we're like, hey, let's try to have parity as much as possible. But we know that the audience is a little different.

BW: We were just talking about the last-gen consoles, and yeah, we dropped them, but we also picked up Nintendo, which we're glad to have back. I mean, Nintendo, they need a good wrestling game too.

I guess if you’d kept last-gen, you would have been juggling three balls.

LJ: Yeah, and we do a mobile game too!

Moving on to MyRise, I only got a small taste, but it does seem a bit more grounded in WWE 2K26. I felt like last year’s MyRise was kind of disconnected from actual WWE programming. I like how this one started off with the Raw after WrestleMania, which is, of course, a big date on WWE fans’ calendars. Was bringing things back down to earth a goal this year?

LJ: Every year, we try to come up with a different idea, and we try to listen to the fans as much as possible, right? Within reason. And we know some people love the fantasy stuff, some people love the dark stuff, some people love the humor. Some people love it to be just grounded in WWE, right? And so the good thing about it is that every year we get a new crack at it and a chance to do something different.

BW: And that just speaks to pro wrestling fans in general. I've got friends who can't stand the comedy stuff in any wrestling, but then I've got friends, that’s their favorite part of the show. And so, just balancing all those different flavors together. I mean, I think Sean and his team, the MyRise team, do a great job.

The Island is a Work in Progress

Last year, The Island was a big focus, and I think it’s fair to say the reaction to it was mixed. At least that’s what the vibe online was. I don’t know what kind of engagement you guys saw with it. What are you bringing to it in WWE 2K26 that might change that response?

LJ: We knew [The Island] wasn't going to wow everyone in its first year, because the expectation that NBA 2K had set with The City was really high. And they had, like, seven to ten years to craft what it is now. We're starting at level one here. There's no way that we're matching what they can do. But they set a good target for us to chase, right? I think the main thing for us was like, let's just get it out there. Let's see what people say. We know where we need to improve, where we're falling short.

Fair enough. I definitely didn’t think The City, or I guess it was just The Neighborhood to start, would last long term when NBA 2K first rolled it out.

LJ: We're like, okay, let's focus on community, right? Let's focus on teaming up. With the MyTag, where you can team up with one of your friends and go through towers and earn a championship belt on the leaderboards. Adding that competitive aspect and that community to it. And the first thing we ask you to do when you join the island this year is to choose a faction. Okay, now I have an allegiance to this faction, and when I play through these towers, I'm earning more faction points towards my faction, and so you get that sense of community, and that's what we're trying to build with this online world. It's almost like an MMO, right? And I would say there's some really good progression elements that we've added to this year's mode, but also there's some cool things that haven't been seen or announced yet that we're adding, not only from a ringside pass standpoint, from a gameplay standpoint, that is gonna kind of… set things on fire.

BW: And, I mean, for those who stayed with The Island in WWE 2K25, by the time we released that final boss fight match with Roman Reigns, that was a testament to the team's ability to just commit to this idea of The Island. I look back at what The Island was when we released 2K25, then where we left it after all the post-launch content was done, and it’s, wow, this thing really populated itself.

LJ: And I would say, from a storytelling standpoint, there's a huge visual upgrade to how we tell stories within The Island. There are actual cut scenes and models that are talking, rather than the two portraits, which was all we could do [in WWE 2K25]. It’s, like, “Oh wait, this is like the rest of the game now.” It doesn't feel like we cut corners. And it’s not like we thought, “Yeah, this is the coolest way to do this.” It was the only thing that we could get off the ground in the first year. It's not what we wanted, but it's the only thing we could do.

What’s in a 400 Slot Roster?

So, there are 400 superstars in WWE 2K26. That’s a lot! I’m not sure if I can even name 400 wrestlers, and I’ve watched a lot of wrestling!

LJ: [Laughs] Imagine having to work on the movesets for all of them? And the attire?

BW: I don’t have to imagine! [Laughs].

How are you getting to that number? Are you counting a lot of alternate versions of wrestlers? How deep are the cuts going?

BW: Well, first of all, you have MyRise, The Island… those two modes alone have their own cast of characters.

So, some of those WWE 2K original characters are being included in the total number?

BW: Yeah. And like, with MyFaction, there are the different versions of superstars. Like the retro CM Punk or, like, Dusty Rhodes with the polka dot attire. But even just a base roster, it's almost like we have this collection of action figures that we take out.

LJ: Speaking of action figures, we still have the Mattel partnership! And then we have some other cool partnerships that we're going to announce and debut at a later date. So, yes, we're taking care of the simulation part. You know, that's home base for us. But that doesn't mean that we can't explore what we’re talking about with The Island and the fiction and the fun, and bring some of that nostalgia from the older games. We're bringing some of that back, and we're bringing it back in a big way.

BW: And we’ve got AAA talent now. Let’s not forget about them.

Yeah, I guess WWE’s sphere keeps growing, so the sandbox you guys can play in keeps growing too.

LJ: We can’t play with everything, not everything, but they allow us to do a lot, right? Which leads to our huge roster.

BW: It’s amazing how it blows up each year.

500 roster slots next year?

LJ: Oh God, don’t say that.

Sorry, I know you guys don’t need any extra work. Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions again this year.

LJ: Nice to talk to you again.

BW: It’s always a pleasure!

Need to know more? You can check out my hands-on impressions of WWE 2K26 here. WWE 2K26 hits PC, Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and Switch 2 on March 13, unless you buy one of the game’s three special editions, in which case, you’ll be able to play a week early on March 6.

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