The old AKI/THQ wrestling games were THAT big.
Each game improved on the mechanics and features of the last, and No Mercy still boasts one of the most complex story modes, with branching storylines depending on whether matches are won or lost it's widely considered the greatest professional wrestling game ever. nWo World Tour, WCW/nWo Revenge, WWF WrestleMania 2000, and WWF No Mercy.
WWF War Zone and its sequel, WWF Attitude, are famous for introducing the CAW mode to American audiences.
The series has a hardcore following amongst its fans, many of which reside on the Fire Pro Forums (which also has subforums for other non- Fire Pro wrestling games).Fire Pro's Gaiden Game, Blazing Tornado, also had a limited American arcade release, but no home release (unlike in Japan, where it was ported to the Sega Saturn). To date, only three games under the Fire Pro line have made it to the United States: Fire Pro Wrestling Advance and its sequel (both for the Game Boy Advance), and the currently-last game in the series, Fire Pro Wrestling Returns for the PlayStation 2. Each game also boasts hundreds upon hundreds of wrestlers, most of them Captain Ersatzes for real-life wrestlers. It still boasts the most extensive CAW mode in the industry, which is saying a lot, given that its 2D, sprite-based style makes animating the various selectable costumes far more difficult than simply swapping out textures. The mostly-Japan-only Fire Pro Wrestling series is one of the major innovators of the genre, having introduced such staples as the Create-A-Wrestler mode (in Super Fire Pro Wrestling X Premium, for the Super Famicom) and the Story mode (in Fire Pro Wrestling G for PlayStation 1).Tecmo World Wrestling, which introduced Tecmo's trademark cinema scenes into the action.Tag Team Pro Wrestling, which would be utterly forgotten if it weren't for the fact that Strong Bad from Homestar Runner is named after the opposing team in the game.Some people take this to the next step, creating their own "Wrestling federations" by recording their caws off the TV screens in matches or backstage segments. These are often supplemented with other creative modes, such as Create-An-Entrance, Create-A-Taunt, etc.
A game with a suitably extensive CAW mode can have numerous fan sites spring up around it, each of which gives diagrams and formulas on how to create various characters, including wrestlers from other federations, characters from movies and TV shows, etc.
However, one of the more interesting developments in the genre has been the advent of Create-A-Wrestler (CAW) modes, which allow a player to make a custom character, designing his build, attire, strengths, weaknesses, and moveset from scratch. Later games added Cut Scene entrances, to mimic pro wrestling's elaborate entrances, as well as commentary tracks and crowd noise (which, depending on the game, can actually affect the match, as a wrestler may receive a power boost while the crowd is chanting his name), and various Gimmick Matches to change up the gameplay. Early wrestling games generally just simulated the matches, and not the general presentation of wrestling.