2K is up to its 2K-ish tricks again. For years now, WWE 2K's Season Pass earned you all the DLC that was coming throughout the year. Its first break with that was releasing DLC tying Nikki Bella and Goldberg to its NBA 2K City-inspired Island Mode. I know I haven't touched The Island since my initial impressions of WWE 2K25, and those additions didn't encourage me to. I guess nobody else wanted to either, because the Retirement Tour DLC is just straight up $15.
For that $15, you get Brock Lesnar, two new versions of John Cena, and Ron Cena, which is R-Truth in John Cena gear, five new Cena cosmetics, and 15,000 VC. This would feel like a ripoff even if we had nothing to compare it to. But take the last real DLC we got from the Season Pass, the Attitude Era Pack. We got five beloved superstars from the classic days when more than a few of us got in trouble at school for telling someone to "suck it."
Most of the WWE 2K25 DLC packs are like this. Even the one I didn't want at all, the Dunks and Destruction Pack, won me over with the sheer silliness of having Jalen Brunson and Tyrese Halliburton in a WWE ring. Shaquille O' Neal has actually wrestled before, so his inclusion even made sense. Yes, it's basically an NBA 2K asset swap, but the designers leaned into the ridiculousness and gave us something I enjoyed.
In contrast, the Farewell Tour DLC just feels like a cash grab. At almost $20, it's nearly half what the full game cost at launch. By the way, WWE 2K25 is now free to stream on PlayStation Plus. This and the Goldberg/Nikki Bella DLC set bad precedents. Those of us who bought the Season Pass did so thinking we'd get all the future DLC for the game, as we have in years past.
And lest we forget, we got shorted one of the wrestlers we were sold in the first DLC. The "celebrity guest" we had been promised got yanked out, with us eventually getting El Grande Americano, who could/should have been in the game anyway.
Last year, WWE 2K punted a whole DLC by filling it with Pat McAfee and the staff of his talk show, one of whom felt compelled to insult wrestlers and their fans. That's two years in a row that we got pro athletes no one asked for instead of wrestlers we love. That's already bad customer service, but now we're getting charged extra for characters that should have been in a season pass.
2K has already turned its NBA franchise into something that resembles a casino more than a video game. Now its corporate greed is threatening to ruin the best wrestling sim on the market. The only people who will be happy if it continues down this road are stockholders.