Details surrounding All Elite Wrestling's first pro wrestling video game, AEW Fight Forever, have been shared sparingly, despite a tentative release date still in 2022. What information has been shared tends to be done so accidentally through backstage interviews, livestreams, and leaks, as AEW Fight Forever had yet to secure a publisher. That changed when a leak previously hinted THQ Nordic had become involved with the project, but that had yet to be confirmed by AEW. At least, it was unconfirmed until now.
Kenny Omega is a well-known fighting game fan but missed this past weekend's CEO event due to helping with AEW's Forbidden Door PPV weekend. To make it up to CEO founder Alex Jebailey, a friend of Omega's, the injured wrestler joined a livestream in which they played Street Fighter 5. While streaming, Omega answered a variety of questions, one of which was if AEW Fight Forever had a publisher yet. Casually, Omega confirmed that AEW had indeed partnered with THQ Nordic for the game.
Unfortunately, Kenny Omega didn't elaborate on the point. It's still quite confusing why a larger announcement hasn't been made by either AEW or THQ Nordic. It would be intuitive that if THQ Nordic is publishing AEW Fight Forever, it would want to put out a press release or make a more formal reveal for the game. That hasn't happened, obviously.
One question worth asking is the full extent of THQ Nordic's relationship with AEW as publisher. It's possible that while considered AEW Fight Forever's publisher, THQ Nordic is instead providing more of a distributor role. By all accounts, AEW is self-funding its game's development, and PR is all but entirely absent, both roles a publisher usually is involved in. Needless to say, the full nature of THQ Nordic's role as AEW Fight Forever's publisher will need to be elaborated on.
THQ Nordic is a subsidiary publisher to Embracer Group and inherited the THQ branding following Embracer's acquisition of the trademark in 2014. The modern THQ Nordic houses over a dozen small game studios, including Darksiders 3 developer Gunfire Games, Destroy All Humans! developer Black Forest Games, and ELEX developer Piranha Bytes. However, THQ Nordic also publishes and distributes games for studios it doesn't own.
During the same livestream, Omega said he saw new AEW Fight Forever material as recently as this morning, perhaps hinting that news is coming before long. A THQ Nordic gaming showcase has also previously been announced for August, which could prove an opportune time to reveal the partnership. AEW Fight Forever's development is clearly moving forward, so it's just a matter of time. Fans will just have to be patient, same as they're being for Kenny Omega's return from injury.
AEW Fight Forever is currently in development.