It was only a year ago that Stephanie McMahon took to WWE airwaves and declared that the “Divas Revolution” had begun with the calling up of Sasha Banks, Charlotte and Becky Lynch, three of NXT’s “Four Horsewomen.” Since then, the trio has torn up the main roster, having an incredible triple threat match at WrestleMania 32 and helped re-brand the Divas Revolution simply as the Women’s Revolution. However, there was one glaring problem: Neither Sasha, Becky, Charlotte or their fellow Horsewoman Bayley appeared as playable characters in WWE 2K16. This is a game that featured two different versions of Arnold Schwarzenegger, yet none of the four most exciting female competitors in WWE were included.
Video game developer 2K tried to apologize to those fans rightfully upset that these women were not represented, but ended up digging themselves a bigger hole. That’s why it should come as no surprise that Charlotte, Sasha and Becky have all been announced well in advance of the game’s Oct. 11 release date. (Bayley has yet to be confirmed as a playable character, but it seems all but a given at this point.) In fact, Sasha was one of the very first wrestlers announced, alongside John Cena and the Ultimate Warrior. That’s pretty good company to keep.
Still, it wasn’t until the above gameplay footage was released that fans can finally breathe easy knowing that these women — these actual, legitimate role models for thousands of young girls worldwide — are going to be available for players to live out their video game wrestling fantasies. That might not sound like much to you, but to many, many people, it is a huge step forward in women’s wrestling as well as strong female characters in video games, two areas which society at large needs to work on improving. Let’s hope by next year, it won’t even be a question as to which WWE female superstars are represented — because they should all be there.
(And for the record, if Bayley is somehow left out of 2K17, we’ll be the first ones to create a Facebook event for an angry mob gathering outside 2K’s Bay Area office.)
