Just in time for the holiday season of 1997, WCW would once again take the fight around the world with WCW vs. nWo: World Tour. Man Breeze had now become the AKI Corporation and while their last WCW effort was basically a rushed localization job of an already 8 month old game, this game would be built ground up with WCW in mind and with much more proper roster representation and likeness than what was found in the earlier title. In addition of fighting the world, WCW had bigger fish to fry within their own promotion fighting the nWo.

One of the biggest setbacks with the previous game was the restricted multiplayer settings and lack of tag team and battle royal action. To properly implement this, the decision was made to port the engine over to the Nintendo 64 which had a much stronger reputation for its multiplayer action and capabilities. The entire engine was fine tuned to showcase better graphics, more onscreen characters, more moves per characters and better controls to the point where it wasn't just a mere upgrade, it was revolutionary within the wrestling game genre and would set the standard for all to come after it.

The licensed WCW roster is now vastly increased with 2 factions dedicated solely to the talents of World Championship Wrestling and New World Order. Hulk Hogan, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Sting, Lex Luger, Ric Flair, Rey Mysterio Jr, The Giant and even big boss himself Eric Bischoff, the real president of WCW and on screen bad guy can all be found within the roster of World Tour. In addition you still have the fictional cast based on worldwide talents, drawing mostly from the smaller promotions in Japan like Frontier Martial Arts Wrestling (DOA in World Tour) and Michinoku Pro (IU in World Tour). Hayabusa would now be known as Hannibal, Great Sasuke returned as the Black Ninja as seen in 'The World and Jinsen Shinsaki, a Japanese wrestler who competed in rival promotion WWF as Hakushi, appears near unaltered in appearance as Shaolin. All 4 factions have 1 secret character each to unlock, with all of them being native WCW talent. WCW unlocks Diamond Dallas Page, nWo unlocks Macho Man Randy Savage, Dead or Alive unlocks Wrath and Independent Union unlocks Glacier, a wrestler based on Mortal Kombat's Sub-Zero though this connection is severely downplayed as Midway threatened to sue over the similarities.

The controls are now altered and tailor made for the unique N64 controller. The basic layout of attack and grapple remain the same but things are greatly simplified to keep the flow and pace more even. Striking is done with the B button and is now, like the grapple, pressure sensitive which means if you tap the button, the strike is a light one to intercept your opponents approach and holding it down will make you perform a strong strike. The light strikes are still depend on distance to determine what kind of strike you do, but the strong strikes remain the same close range or far apart, with there being 2 different strikes depending if you hold down a direction on the d-pad or stand still. There are also an increased number of running strikes and even running strikes on downed opponents now. Grapples are reserved the A button and has gone through some changes as well. Still pressure sensitive, grappling now initiates a hold where the player can transition into either 6 different light grapples or 6 strong grapples through using a combination of the A or B button along with the D-Pad when in a hold, and there is no more need to stun the opponent. Most C buttons have one unique action each with up-C acting as tag in your partner/enter/exit the ring, right-C as focus shift and down-C making your wrestler run the ropes or send the opponent running if in a grapple state. You also climb the turnbuckles by running into them. The analog stick is only used for taunting and activating the finisher, and finishers are performed by hard grappling your opponent while in the special state and flicking the analog stick. The defense mechanisms are simplified further by giving striking and grapple an individual defense each with R blocking strikes and L evading grapples as well as being used as the pin button on a downed nemesis. Both these can turn into counter attacks if timed correctly. Once you find yourself performed a move on or locked in a submission however, the name of the game is button mash and tons of it. Pin falls and submissions can also be broken if the victims's body touches the ropes.

The amount of match options is far greater with the most important addition being tag team and battle royal action, which allows for up to 4 players simultaneously. There is plenty of glorious fun to be had with friends as AKI really put great emphasis on team work, allowing double grapples and moves to be done to dish out extra damage. For older fans who remember the Road Warriors, they've even included the possibility of one lifting the opponent onto the shoulders by pressing the up-C from behind and your partner is free to run to the turnbuckle and perform a diving attack onto the high-seated victim. You can also press the L button while holding from behind to look the foe's arms behind his back and allowing your partner a free shot at his helpless face, though be quick or else that punch will land right in the face of your own partner. The battle royal pits 4 men against each other for some chaotic action, and unlike other games like Fire Pro where focus was based on the closest danger, you have full control over your focus by simply pressing the right-C to change at your own desire. There's also the return of leagues and tournaments, as well as a special mode called WCW vs. nWo which acts as 5 on 5 singles elimination tournament. While not extensively diverse, they still help to draw out the replay value of the game.

The attention to detail was unrivaled at the time and gives you full control of the whole match. Every piece of the ring can be used to your advantage, spring boarding off the ropes, multiple turnbuckle moves, high flying dives from the corners, strikes and grapples on the apron and suicidal dives onto outside opponents with all these features being easily performed by pressing A while in the proper position to performed the intended action. If both wrestlers try to grab each other at the same time, a test of strength will go down with the winner being the faster button masher. Outside the ring, all moves will take double damage and you can throw your opponent into the railings, ring and even steel post corner which will make a gong noise. If that's not violent enough for you, press up-C near the railing will grab you a foreign object likes chairs or bats to beat your opponent senseless. The game must not have been evaluated properly by the ESRB because if one goes into options and enables a feature called "Realism", you enable bloodshed. There's actually plenty of the red stuff to be drawn from the wrestlers despite having a rating of K-A, the equivalent to today's E rating. A relatively hidden feature is the fact that you can tear off the masks of the disguised wrestlers by using certain characters with a face stretch submission, marking the very first time you could do this in a wrestling game, and the first time you could see the face of the likes of Rey Mysterio Jr. The faces behind the masks are generic faces and not based on the real faces of the wrestlers however. This will also trigger an instant special for those who lost their mask. Another hidden feature is the ability to steal the finisher of your opponent by pressing A and B at the same time while grappled with a Special state. Each wrestler have 4 attires each, changeable by pressing the C button at the select screen.

Speaking of details, the animation is absolutely fantastic this time around with every move being computer animated rather than motion captures. This allows the weight and impact of all moves to be as devastating as possible and giving all the finishers and high risk moves a truly fatal look, compared to the other games and even games today that solely rely on motion capturing which gives the game a constant feeling of déjà vu and staleness. The dynamic camera system is really put to use with zooms and interesting angles giving you a clear look at the move and the damage it puts on the victim, and it can even spin around the wrestlers when performing holding suplexes, which gives it a really cool and impressive look. A truly revolutionary aspect is the damage system this game features. Still relying on the tried and true Spirit meter, you now also accumulate damage to specific body parts, required to make the opponent submit or go down faster. When playing as Ric Flair for example and locking on the figure four leg lock after damaging the legs to the point that your opponent is limping and holding his legs, a submit is pretty much a definite. This allows for some psychology and proper building of matches as players are required to do logical damage to the man they are fighting to properly take him out.

The roster isn't as big as 'The World', but someone decided to have a lot more fun with the fictional cast this time around, giving them all elaborate back stories which are quite over the top even for wrestling standards. These could be found in the official guide released by Prima. The most famous and absolutely amazing story found here is the one belonging to Saladin, a wrestler based on the likeness of Abdullah The Butcher. In the guide, it states that Saladin was once Afghanistan's top secret agent but refused an order to assassinate Mikhail Gorbachev. Once banished from his country, he decided to use his combat skills in the wrestling ring. It's clear, never ever mess with Saladin, the man is a trained assassin. This guide also features some truly atrocious writing with Hulk Hogan's finisher being termed the Top Rope Stinky Leg Drop.

The graphics were also given a major facelift by jumping over to the N64. The models are much more well rounded and proportionally correct, with greater detail to their bodies and attire. The overall art style is a cartoon likeness with the animators drawing over the real faces to capture the look of the wrestler, though in some cases the faces definitely look off, and there is something quite strange seeing a man with the biggest smile on his face while being stretched to oblivion since the faces do not change depending on state. Most of the game's biggest faults can be attributed to the graphics because the game has some issues with the collision detection. Everything has been given a transition animation to keep the flow consistent which gives the game a great look, but the problem is that these animations makes you invincible. Getting up, climbing or performing a move, striking or grappling will simply not connect. There is a ton of clipping going on and body parts while go through each other easier than people walk through Patrick Swayzee in Ghost, especially if the body sizes differs greatly between the combatants. Another issue is also the height difference, or rather the lack of one which results in 7.2 The Giant being just as tall (or short) and 5.3 Rey Mysterio Jr which takes some of the impact of the giant wrestlers away. The crowd is also as cheap as they come, as they are represented as a colored mess with two frames of animation. The presentation is also lacking a bit of the American road traveling show feel with no entrances, no entrance themes or famous locales.

Graphical issues aside, this game was absolutely breathtaking when it came out. Not only was it by far the greatest wrestling game ever made at the time, but it was also one of the few multiplayer fighting games that actually worked and felt evenly balanced. The rather simple controls and open play field allowed all to get properly accustomed to the style of the action. It's probably not an overstatement to say that this game was responsible for dragging in a whole slew of new wrestling fans just through the fun they had with the video game with their friends.