The Most Bizarre Fan-Made Pro Wrestlers From WWE 2K16

With the release of WWE 2K17 today, we decided to delve one last time back into WWE 2K16’s Community Creations and try to gain a sense of the madness we’ve seen this last year.

With the addition of many create-a-superstar features that were bizarrely removed the year previous, and with the adoption of photograph and face scanning technology, 2K16 saw more adventurous creations from the alarmingly dedicated community creators of the internet.

If you’re a fair-weather community creator, then you’re likely to be outmatched by the plethora of incredibly skilled and patient creators out there. We have the face scanning app. It is in Kefin’s favourites folder, yet curiously has only been opened once. And we (kind of) know how to create our very own superstars. That doesn’t cut it. The most dedicated WWE 2K fans spend countless hours crafting bizarre original creations. They make loving renditions of beloved pop culture figures. They also, for some reason, try to make versions of superstars that are identical to the versions already included in the game.

It is, however, not our job to judge, but to bow down in awe, and oftentimes terror, at the most bizarre community creations of the last 12 months in WWE 2K16.

Political Figures

Everyone loves a political punching bag! One of our first stops is at the various incarnations of the UK and USA’s most beloved/despised political figures.

Living in England and currently stressing along with the rest of the country about Brexit, it is only natural that we started with our former Prime Minister, David Cameron, so we could watch him get beaten up by Triple H. As you can see, his child snatcher-like villainy is perfectly encapsulated here in CAW form, right down to his pouty mouth and non-existent eyes. We may no longer have him in our parliament, but he can live on forever in our custom Universe mode.

Fans of left-leaning, corduroy-wearing, allotment-owning Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn will be disappointed to know that no one has yet stepped up to the plate of making him this year. Except Jo, of course, who spent well over two hours patiently crafting every little detail to his kind and gentle face. Unfortunately, Jeremy was lost to the ether through an “unfortunate game crash”. Does the lack of CAW Jeremy indicate some intrinsic BBC bias, stowed away within a WWE licensed product? Or is the true culprit deputy leader Tom Watson (well known super video game nerd) taking them down on his lunch break?

Of all the politicians we’ve found, Barack Obama has the most suspiciously perfect CAW. Whoever spent their precious spare time adding a look of “kind but powerful” to his eyes has done an excellent job, matching the standard of detail usually only found with WWE-made Superstars.

Donald Trump’s likeness has been captured as best as it can, although the limitations of 2K16 restrict what can be done to accurately portray the un-humanness of his general appearance.

A search for Hillary Clinton is somewhat sparse, with several results for Bill Clinton coming before her. Sadly, a search for “Zodiac Killer” did not yield any Ted Cruz results.

Political Monsters

It wouldn’t be a community creation hub if we didn’t find some terrifying iterations of politicians as interpreted by wrestling fans. When searching for “Hillary Clinton” you’ll find that you have to travel several pages before spotting her, and even then you have to use your imagination somewhat.

Here we have possibly the angriest community creation in the entire of 2K16. The level of detail is admirable, and the creator has even managed to capture the hard-to-spot forehead dollar sign which Clinton tries to hide with makeup.

Also added to her outfit is a “Bill’s balls” pocket on her jacket and “Hillary for Prison” written on the back. For reasons unknown, the mystery creator has also deemed it necessary to give her a black eye, and several facial scars.

A version of Trump with a giant, swollen balloon-head is available if you simply can’t get enough of his pouty anus-mouth. What do you mean, “that sounds like regular Trump”?

Actual Monsters

Early on in our create-a-wrestler adventure we made the mistake of using the search term “Nightmare”. Nothing increases the immersion of a wrestling game like wrestling against a creature you have legitimate concerns will come through the screen and eat all your skin. Most of these characters in our headcanon have the ability to morph into things a la Tim Curry in It, so the game never really ends. After the controller has been put down and the console switched off, we will often hear these characters offering us a balloon through various drains and sewer coverings. “We all float” eh? SIGN ME UP!

Here’s a horrifying creation a wrestling fan decided to spend hours of their precious time making:

It is wearing ruff-sleeves and a WWE referee T-shirt. Our theory: This thing lives in Vince McMahon’s basement and is used as a deterrent for wrestlers leaving shows early. There’s a good reason we didn’t see Tyler Breeze for weeks after he insulted the Chairman, and that reason is that he was hiding under his bedcovers from this thing.

“NightmareVersion7” is a similar horrorshow, albeit a wackier one. Think of a slimmer Dr Robotnik if he had a considerable forehead growth and a child exploding from his stomach.

Hollywood Royalty

WWE 2K16’s pre-order bonus was a playable Arnold Schwarzenegger. We can probably blame that for community creators going celebrity-crazy.

First off we have Nicolas Cage, an essential starter-type for any budding creator. As far as similarities go, the fan version definitely looks like Nic Cage, although he’s lacking an essential gimmick weapon of the Declaration of Independence. As a wrestler, his matches vary wildly in quality, and many fans can’t quite decide if he’s a great wrestler or a terrible one. We just don’t know.

Other Hollywood royalty we found: Steven Avery, famous for maybe not doing a murder that he was arrested for doing (we noticed he’d been given a Wyatt-esque creepy heel entrance); Mr Bean (absolutely terrifying, please don’t kidnap me in the night) and Larry David. For reasons unknown, when searching for Seinfeld, you yield five results; George Costanza, Kramer, Newman, Larry David and… a second Kramer. No Seinfeld as of yet, but we have hopes for 2K17.

Former BBC Royalty

Feel the need to beat on some nasty, vile characters but feel the Dudleyz circa 1998 are just too obvious? We’ve got you covered! Here we have the former cast of Top Gear, who we downloaded separately but made into the ultimate heel tag team. Clarkson is huge, his moves offensive and strong. Hammond is tiny but quick, and their team dynamic is actually not dissimilar to Enzo and Big Cass.

We love the attention to detail given to whoever made Clarkson and Hammond, especially nailing Jeremy’s “man covered in the skin of a slightly larger man whose skin he has stolen” look and the extra attention to detail in not making the other one who wears dumb shirts (James something).

Beloved Cartoon Characters

Wrestling games have their own healthy dose of nostalgia, but with everyone clamouring to forcibly insert cartoon characters into wrestling, we can forgive for people getting too excited and trying to run before they can walk. Especially with the many, many, many, many limitations of 2K16 CAW.

First up, everyone’s Disney favourite, Mickey Mouse!

Yes, that’s Mickey Mouse. The beauty of being a creator on 2K16 is the limitations in place for any kind of ambitious creativity. Or maybe this was intentional, who knows. Either way it’s absolutely terrifying and I never, ever want to watch Fantasia ever again.

Next we tried searching for Shrek, but alas, Shrek hasn’t been made on 2K16. Don’t worry though, because someone has made… Nicolas Cage Shrek! That’s right, a hideous meld of Nic Cage and Shrek exists, but regular Shrek does not. We can’t explain this, but let’s be honest, why would you want to? He’s beautiful, and he skips to the ring, and that’s enough for us.

As you’d expect, Minions are found in plenty on 2K16. You have to give props to the creators here. To capture a Minion’s essence is a true skill when you have to work with a humanoid template. We decided to make two of the Minions into a tag team, and their power level is 100. They’re ridiculously overpowered and currently hold the titles in our Universe mode, which subsequently ceased being fun.

The disparity in creator creativity really shows in these next few beloved cartoon characters. Here we have an ambitious blend of Archer and Bob (from Bob’s Burgers — both characters played by the wonderfully funny H. Jon Benjamin), and it makes for a surprisingly accurate representation of both characters. We don’t know how this person has manage to capture the steely blue eyes and chiselled jaw of Sterling Archer so accurately, but mega kudos.

Popular kids cartoon Adventure Time is not so lovingly rendered. Here we have an iteration of Jake the Dog (the only one we could find) which is so obviously just “some guy in a yellow dog suit” that it’s actually quite frightening. He looks like the type of person who lurks around school playgrounds or spends his time robbing newsagents.

Celebrity Chefs

With Gordon Ramsay cornering the market of the popular emotion of anger as it pertains to cooking, it only seems logical he’s one of the only chefs to get the Community Creations treatment. And while the possibilities of fantasy booking Gordon Ramsey are endless (imagine him as GM sending home the entire roster on a Monday because the show is Raw) he’s matched equally by CAW Guy Fieri, who occupies the other spectrum of loud TV chef. He’s spicy and obnoxious, kind of like a bowl of too-hot chilli draped in a loud Hawaiian shirt. The detail given to Fieri is admirable, and his entrance consists of him arriving through a corridor of actual flames.

One can only hope next year is the year that Great British Bake Off gets some love from community creations, as there are simply too many prime puns not being used (The Soggy Rock Bottom anyone?). If not, we’ll settle for a Hairy Bikers vs Hairy Dieters feud in Universe mode.

Roman Reigns

Due to his unique take on the term “popularity”, it may seem logical that if you search for Roman Reigns on community creations, Vince McMahon would call your home phone to convey his personal gratitude. Either that or the internet wrestling community will intercept the signal and come over to your house and delete your save and beat you with a sack of doorknobs. Even though Roman Reigns obviously already exists on the WWE 2K16 roster, die-hard fans who love or hate the man can’t stop themselves from creating him again and again and again. And again.

Troll Roman Reigns: Someone out there in this vast and infinite universe thought it would be really funny to put a giant trollface over Roman Reigns actual head, and they were right. Fun fact: This was Roman’s actual look when he (INSERT TIME ROMAN HEADLINED AND UPSET EVERYONE).

Finn Balor/Roman Reigns future son: We could probably have written an entire article just on weird pairings people have made of various wrestlers if they combined genes, but this one was our favourite because of how much it really doesn’t work. They even went to the effort of giving him a custom Reigns/Balor entrance.

The Spirit of Christms [sic] Roman Reigns: Because normally Roman Reigns isn’t very Christmassy at all, and one brave soul decided to change that. There is considerable rumour regarding Vince McMahon online right now he will permanently repackage Roman with this gimmick because “everyone loves Christmas god damn it”.