Meatsauce Madness isn’t a game that would have normally been on my radar to rush to buy and review. But as a lifelong wrestling fan, any time a wrestling (related) game arrives they always catch my attention. This one was no different, and although it isn’t strictly a wrestling game, the concept behind it made the die-hard wrestling fan that I am laugh.
Ever since the artist formally known as Virgil appeared on AEW Dynamite in 2019 I’d become aware that Soul Train Jones was a big fan of the restaurant Olive Garden, their breadsticks and their meatsauce. Maybe this is a long running thing, or maybe it’s something that was referenced on AEW and became a meme so Virgil ran with it in hopes of catching a sponsorship deal. Either way, someone out there decided that the combination of Virgil and Olive Garden would make a compelling prospect as a mobile video game and here we are today.
Olive Garden isn’t officially involved with this product, but Soul Train Jones is the main character in this wacky game that plays off his meatsauce obsession to the point that the meatsauce is in the title and not even the name Virgil or Soul Train Jones is.
But full disclosure time…I saw on twitter that Virgil was getting his own mobile game and I replied to the tweet saying that I would review it on the site. I thought it seemed a funny idea, but then seeing that the game was the princely cost of £1.99 I decided to pass as I was also about to get the free to download AEW General Manager mobile game.
Than a few days passed and I saw that I had a DM in my messages from Virgil himself asking if I’d downloaded the game yet. I hadn’t, but as I had said I’d review the game I wasn’t going to let Wrestling Superstar Virgil down. So here we are now.
For clarity, despite Virgil reaching out I will still give this game my honest review without letting the background story to my downloading it altering my opinion. I still had to pay the £2 to buy the game, and although that’s a fun story, I’m sure all you reading it will want to know is if the game is value for money!
The game sees Virgil in various settings continuously running right whilst trying to avoid baddies and pick up collectibles like cash, guitars, meatballs and breadsticks.
You can make Virgil jump and double jump, and there are even miniature wrestling rings (for some reason) that can be used as trampolines to allow to you triple jump. Virgil of course wasn’t especially known as a high flyer in wrestling, but in addition to this he can also do Super Mario style wall kick jumps where he can parkour his way up and over high walls.
Beyond the he can also do a tornado clothesline as an attack to take out enemies. This attack is activated with a swipe and is a little tricky to pull off when the control to jump is a tap. I would have preferred is the left half of the screen had been reserved for attack and the right for jump, but this isn’t the end of the world.
The enemies in the levels range from wrestling fans and waiters to meatsauce based monsters. It’s a strange mix of weird logic and Virgil references. Clearly the wrestling convention setting is in reference to Virgil being a regular of the wrestling convention circuit, but why Virgil would be beating up the fans is anyone’s guess. Also if he loves the meatsauce so much why are the bosses variations of the food he loves?
The graphics are well done if not spectacular, but I can’t help but feel this started development as another game and somewhere along the line they managed to secure Virgil. There are various items to pick up including meatballs and breadsticks which give Virgil energy back, but for some reason finding an electric guitar gives the biggest boost. And the main pick up you’ll want to get is cold hard cash. This arguably ties into his time working with the Million Dollar Man. Who knows? The randomness of the game is a big part of the appeal.
The game requires you to earn a lot of cash to unlock new stages and this makes it quite grindy, and whilst you can buy some power ups, there are also mini games including a slot machine and most enjoyably a mini game where you smash a car Street Fighter 2 style….for some reason.
The music in the game gets pretty old pretty fast, and from what I could tell there are no instances of Virgil lending his voice for voice overs of any kinds.
Conclusion
OK, so is this game any good? It’s ok, but there’s a million other similar games available on iOS and many of them are free. Still, that said, this is a cheap and cheerful game for a few hours distraction across a few sessions of play. Definitely a game for Virgil super fans, but almost certainly a game everyone else can skip if you’re not a wrestling fan.
You can find the game on the Apple App Store Here. For more wrestling content check out the Wrestling Section of the site and for more gaming reviews head over to the Gaming Section of the Site.
