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WWF No Mercy is a professional wrestling video game released in 2000 on the Nintendo 64 console and published by THQ. It is based on the World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment annual pay-per-view event of the same name. No Mercy is the follow-up to 1999's WWF WrestleMania 2000. There were plans to release a sequel, WWF Backlash. Nintendo was just about to wrap up the Nintendo 64 console, and so, Backlash was cancelled.

Gameplay
The Dudley Boyz perform the "Dudley Death Drop" on X-Pac
The Dudley Boyz perform the "Dudley Death Drop" on X-Pac

Some of the features included in WrestleMania 2000 were removed from No Mercy. First, wrestlers' entrances were cut short to showing the wrestler only appear on the stage/entrance ramp, and players never see wrestlers actually enter the ring (despite early screen shots showing full ring entrances). The belt options were also changed; rather than creating a belt from scratch, players now have to complete a story mode to win a title. While this added an extra challenge to the game, fans felt that they had been robbed of a unique and well-liked option from WrestleMania 2000 (The Create-A-Belt option would return in WWE WrestleMania X8). However, the 'official' WWF belts that replaced user-created ones can still be wagered in Exhibition matches and pay-per-view events. Additionally, there is noticeable slow down when four wrestlers are on the screen at once, something not present in WrestleMania 2000.

However, No Mercy features a much more extensive Create-a-Wrestler mode with, among other changes, more moves, better-organized clothing options (No Mercy utilizes descriptive categories and titles for each clothing item, whereas WrestleMania 2000 simply numbers items) and the ability to create female wrestlers, which is all but impossible in WrestleMania 2000. Each wrestler in the game has 4 different ring attires that could be independently edited, and each attire can be completely changed including name, height and weight, body parts and music, technically allowing 4 different wrestlers per slot; although, they must share a common moveset. Several of the game's unlockable wrestlers used this feature, such as Taka Michinoku who has his partner Funaki in 2 attire slots. The graphics also were improved significantly over the game's predecessor, and various match types made their debuts in Nintendo 64 wrestling games, including ladder matches and special referee matches. The game also marked the first time on the system in a WWF game that players could fight backstage.

The story mode is very extensive and much improved over WrestleMania's career mode. Each WWF title features a unique story. For the WWF Championship, players can choose any wrestler to reenact the classic feud between Mankind and Triple H that dominated the WWF in early to mid 2000. Other angles include Stone Cold Steve Austin's feud and The Rock's temporary alliance with Vince McMahon. After winning a title, the player can replay the story mode and defend the newly-acquired belt in a variety of new storylines. Also, unlike future wrestling games, players are allowed to fight for and defend any championship in the exhibition mode.

What gives the story mode so much depth is its branching storylines that develop based on the outcomes of the player's matches. In WrestleMania 2000, if the player is to lost a match in the career mode, the game only allows the player to retry the match, rather than adjusting the storyline accordingly. No Mercy's story mode is considered revolutionary in wrestling video games for offering branching storylines based on the outcomes of matches. The player has to actually play through each story several times and lose matches in order to achieve a 100% completion rating.

Another notable feature that was added to the game is the "SmackDown! Mall." With money earned from winning matches in story mode and playing the Survival mode, players can purchase unlockable characters, clothing, wrestling moves, props, tattoos, weapons, and venues. Characters are extremely expensive and some of them can be unlocked at much less effort by defeating them in special matches in the story mode. The addition of this feature greatly increases the game's replay value.

A notable twist in the WWF Championship story mode is the lack of The Big Show, who at the time was working at Ohio Valley Wrestling trying to lose weight. He was replaced with Steven Richards, the leader of Right to Censor. On an interesting note, although Big Show is not in the game, his face, attire, taunts, and moves are included in the game. However, a cheat device is necessary to unlock his face.

[edit] Japanese attributes

Several moves that are highly dangerous and/or unorthodox in terms of American professional wrestling were included in No Mercy. These were developed for the Virtual Pro Wrestling series, AKI's Japanese counterpart to its American wrestling games, and kept for No Mercy as bonus moves. Some of them were included in previous titles, and newer additions are purchased through SmackDown Mall!. This includes the Orange Crush, Russian neckdrop, Tiger Suplex '85, Burning Hammer, Hangman's DDT, Dragonrana, poison mist, and various striking combinations.