It’s double the fun in terms of upcoming games from Easy 8 Software, as in addition to Flicky Marble which we posted about earlier today they’re also working on a new wrestling game called Slam Mania that’s looking really cool. While Flicky Marble has been in the works for a year or so, Slam Mania goes back at least twice as long as that and is inspired by Taito’s classic arcade wrestling game Mat Mania aka Exciting Hour. The game has evolved a lot in the past two years, and this week Easy 8 shared a brand new gameplay trailer showing off the game in its current state. If you’re pretty familiar with Mat Mania then you’ll notice the similarities throughout.

Like Flicky Marble, I also have a beta build of Slam Mania on my phone at the moment, and it too is pretty damn fun. It uses a really nice swipe and tap control system that’s tricky to warm up to at first but feels solid after a bit of time. The move set is kind of limited given the vast amount of stuff that’s possible in pro wrestling, but mechanically the bouts feel tight and are satisfyingly challenging and strategic. The back and forth action is really good, and while I’d like to see more move possibilities I also don’t want the simplicity of it all to be lost. It’s a tough problem! The important thing is that the core action in Slam Mania feels really good already, so I’ll be interested to see where it ends up when it’s finally finished. No set release date for this one just yet but head over to the forum thread for some discussion and for potential beta testing of this one.