Frequently Asked Questions

Promotion Wars is a text-based wrestling booking simulator game for Windows, created by me, Adam Jennings.  You can read more here.

Only one person has ever worked on the game itself, Adam Jennings (me!). I also run the website, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and YouTube.

I'm grateful to have Frank Fiott keeping the wrestlers and promotions up-to-date with his regular stats updates. Follow Frank on Twitter @FrankFiott!

This page runs through the changes made for the initial release of the 21st Anniversary Edition, on 7th October 2021:

What was new in the 21st Anniversary Edition? (pwremastered.com) 

You can see a running log of every change made since that here.

Promotion Wars is currently only available for Windows, however an Android version is likely in the future. IOS/Mac versions are possible further down the line.

Promotion Wars can currently be played on a Mac using Parallels. Note that it's been confirmed as working this way using Windows 10 on the Mac, while using XP doesn't work.

If you have a ChromeBook and want to play Promotion Wars on it, there's an article here which shows how it can be done.

Yes! The Remastered Era is an ongoing process where new things will be added to the game every few months. I read all suggestions made, so if there's things you'd like to see, post them at the PW Arena! 

Promotion Wars has always been coded in Visual Basic 6. 

The 21st Anniversary Edition still contains some original code from the year 2000!

There's no catch. There's no ads. There's nothing you have to pay for while playing the game. You simply get the whole game, to keep forever, free!

Why? Promotion Wars has been a personal project of mine for over 20 years. My goal isn't to make a living from it, but to simply make it the best it can be and achieve my vision. 

I do this in my spare time, as a hobby. I want the game to be enjoyed by as many people as possible. I enjoy the complete creative independence I have, free from a company dictating how the game should be or when new versions should be released. There are no adverts, no in-game purchases, no up-front costs. You get the full game, to keep and play forever, completely free of charge. If you'd like to give something back, there's a page which helps shows you some ways you can support the game.

TEW is a premium product, costing $35, that has been continually developed for almost 20 years. As a result, it's far more in-depth and complex. That being said, some people prefer a simpler, more accessible, pick-up-and-play kind of game - and Promotion Wars is the perfect alternative for that. 

This page shows you a step-by-step guide if you've downloaded the Full Install:

 How To Install | Promotion Wars (pwremastered.com) 

This page shows you a step-by-step if you've downloaded the Basic Download:

 Basic Download | Promotion Wars (pwremastered.com) 

Your browser / Windows Defender can be overly-cautious when a download contains executable (exe) files and is not well known. Executable files are the standard file type for installation programs and Windows applications, but can be malicious if from a website you don't know. See this page on how you can override this issue and download the files successfully.  Since I registered the website and files with Microsoft in 2023, the game seems to download without any issues the majority of the time.

It's a good idea to tell Windows Defender / your antivirus to trust the installer file before you do the install. This helps to ensure an error-free installation.

Installation files can be used by malicious people for bad things, so your security software tries to keep you safe. Unfortunately that can mean some totally innocent files, like this one, get blocked as a precaution.

The Promotion Wars installer is 100% safe and every download on the site is tested by Norton Internet Security before being uploaded.

If the installer file does get flagged up as a potential hazard, this can prevent the necessary system files from being installed. It is recommended that you extract the installer file out of the zip file that it downloads in, then tell your Windows Defender or Anti-virus software to trust the file. Run the install after doing this, and the installation will be fine. 

See this page on how to override your browser / Windows Defender when it blocks the download, and help to register the download as safe.

If your Windows Defender / Anti-Virus is still preventing the game from installing correctly, you can manually install the game using a simple 3-step guide here. 

In the current version of the game, all of these things do happen. However, they happen automatically, based on the feuds that you create.

In future updates, you'll be given more control over these, so you can decide what happens and when.

Draw Value

This is star power. A draw value in the high 90's indicates a big star such as John Cena / Roman Reigns etc. A high draw value wrestler is well known to a large audience and would sell thousands of tickets to a show. Conversely, an independent worker who is not known widely, may have a draw value in the 20's. Not to be confused with overness - e.g. an independent wrestler popular with a small group of hardcore fans, but relatively unknown on a wider scale, would not have a high draw value. Consider how the wrestler would do if they were to join WWE today - would they be considered a main eventer?

Ability

This is their ability to execute a high quality wrestling match. Wrestlers with high ability ratings will get the best match ratings.

Hardcore

This is how well the wrestler performs in hardcore-style matches involving weapons.

Yes! All three stats change - up and down - during the course of a game. 

Draw value changes depending on your booking, so it is possible to develop top stars from complete unknowns. High momentum leads to increased Draw Value.

Ability and Hardcore stats grow while wrestlers are young and improving. They slowly decrease as the wrestlers get older. This happens automatically.

Currently these have limited use in the game, but that will change drastically as the game develops through 2023.

At the moment, the top champions in top promotions increase their title's value if they have good charisma. Wrestlers with good charisma also increase in Draw Value faster.

Placing a manager with someone can help them to gain Draw Value if the manager has good Mic Skills.

In Promotion Wars, the game rewards you with TV deals when you have been performing consistently well for a long period of time. TV deals mean more money, and bigger name wrestlers will want to sign with you.

From having no TV at all, you first progress to a Basic Streaming deal.

From a Basic Streaming deal, you progress to a Premium Streaming deal.

Finally, from a Premium Streaming deal you progress to a National TV deal. 

At that point, you are no longer considered an indie and you will have the weekly viewership of your TV show reported to you.

On the Weekly Shows screen, you will see a progress bar showing you how far you are away from achieving your next goal. It will also tell you what that goal is, and how to progress towards it.

In addition to gaining TV deals, you can also gain Pay-Per-View, which allows you to make more money from your Big Shows and find out how many people order them.

The game currently has a fixed size which cannot be changed.

There is currently no Auto-Booker feature in Promotion Wars, however there may well be one as the game develops further.

You cannot delete or switch off shows, however, from the Prepare For Collision Edition onwards (June 2023), extra shows are not automatically added to your schedule. Instead, you unlock them, and add them to your schedule if and when you wish.

A Data Pack is a folder containing wrestlers, promotions and images. You will need at least one Data Pack in order to start a new game. All Data Packs are free to download. 

The Data Packs page on this site contains a small number of Data Packs to get you started.

There are many more Data Packs on the PW Arena for you to download and play for free, including regular stats updates, so you can always play with recent Real World data.

There is a simple step-by-step guide here.

It's as easy as extracting the zip file into your Data Packs folder. You then select the Data Pack from within the game by clicking on Change while on the New tab, selecting the one you want and clicking Use This Data Pack.

Yes, anybody can! Just download the Data Pack Editor - it's free and has everything you need to create whatever you want. You can then share them with other players at the PW Arena.

The game download on the Download Promotion Wars page will always be the latest version, including the latest fix and all the fixes before it.

If you already have Promotion Wars: 21st Anniversary Edition installed and want to update it to the latest fix, choose the Basic Download. This will unzip a folder containing the latest version of the game, including all fixes. You can then delete your old game folder, but remember to keep your old Saved Games folder and Data Packs folder. See the other questions for how to keep your saved games and Data Packs when you upgrade.

Before you delete your old game folder, just move the folders named Saved Games and Data Packs somewhere safe, e.g your Desktop. When you get the new version of the game, just move those two folders into your new Promotion Wars - 21st Anniversary Edition folder.

You can watch a video showing the step-by-step here:

Promotion Wars on YouTube

To get all the wrestler images, promotion logos etc that your saved game used, you need the Data Pack that was used for that save. If you follow the steps described above, you'll always have them.

I've made a page on this site dedicated to doing all of the above:

See How To Customise Your Game for full details on all of these things.

It's as simple as putting image files into folders of the Data Pack!

The Data Pack Editor creates and edits the starter data used for new games. 

It does not alter a saved game.

I strongly advise against manually editing saved games, as this often leads to game errors or the game not working as it should.

In the future there may be a Saved Game Editor created for the 21st Anniversary Edition, which will allow safe editing of saved games.

I strongly advise against manually editing the Promotion Wars data files, as this often leads to game errors or the game not working as it should. I recommend using the Data Pack Editor wherever possible, to edit the game.

This usually means the installation has not been completed. 

If you're new to Promotion Wars, make sure you've downloaded the Full Install from the Downloads page. 

You should also tell your security software to trust the installation file before you run it. If you continue to have problems, tell your security software to also trust the main game exe file (what you double click to open the game).

This happens when using the editor in a country whose main language isn't English. Refer to the question in this section for how to prevent these errors.

Changing the language in Windows to English tends to avoid getting error messages in the game / editor.

Also check the Windows setting:

Administrative Language Settings > Formats 

Make sure the Format is set to English.

This can happen when your Windows language isn't set to English - see the question above regarding that, and how you can fix it easily. 

There are two main causes of this:

1) You're not using the latest version of the game. Check on the 'About' tab in the game and compare it to the version information shown on the Downloads page to see if you need to update your game.

2) You've manually edited some of the data files. This is why I strongly advise against editing files, as it is very easy to get errors like this which are difficult to resolve.

If this shows the first time you try to play, make sure that you downloaded the Full Install, not the Basic Download. The installation program puts this file on your system and registers it. If your anti-virus flagged up an error during the install, the required system files may have been blocked from installing. If that happens, you should tell your anti-virus that the installer file can be trusted, then run the installer again.

If the error shows after you've been playing the game okay, it may be that your Antivirus or Windows Defender has quarantined the file. If so, tell your Antivirus or Windows Defender to trust the file. You may then need to re-install the game, to make sure the file is where it needs to be.

You can also manually register the file, as shown here.

This can happen if you've installed the game in the Program Files folder and are not running the program as an administrator. 

When you play the game from the Program Files folder, right click on 'Promotion Wars - 21st Anniversary Edition.exe' and choose run as administrator.

Alternatively, install the game to a different folder of your laptop or PC and this shouldn't happen anymore.

Promotion Wars: 21st Anniversary Edition supports images in the formats .jpg, .gif and .bmp. If any other type of image - such as .png, .jpeg - is renamed to one of those three types, it will cause this error message. Use an image editor (or Paint) to properly save the image as a true .jpg, .gif or .bmp file. 

 This can happen if you've got the game in the Program Files folder, due to it only allowing the Administrator to create new files in that location. Simply move your game folder to somewhere else, such as the C Drive, and this problem won't occur. 

I recommend posting your error in the Bug Reporting forum at the PW Arena.

There's a page on the site here where you can download and play some older versions of the game.

Yes! Each save on Promotion Wars 1.3 consists of 2 things - a .sav file, and a folder. Both will have the same name as your saved game and will be in the same folder as the exe file you click on to open the game. 

Simply put the .sav file into the save folder, then move that save folder into the Saved Games folder of your Promotion Wars 21st Anniversary Edition folder. When you begin Promotion Wars 21st Anniversary Edition, your saved game will be there ready to play.

If you find you have no logo images etc, put the Real World Feb 2023 Data Pack in your Data Packs folder and use that for any custom images you had for your saved game.

Yes! Just move the folder containing the scenario from the Scenarios folder of Promotion Wars 1.3 into the Data Packs folder of Promotion Wars 21st Anniversary Edition. When you start a new game, click on Change button on the New tab to select your Scenario from the list. 

If you notice the game isn't showing any custom logos from your 1.3 save or Scenario, you can easily move them across:

For normal games - add the Real World Feb 2023 Data Pack to your Data Packs folder and use the Images folder within that folder for any of your custom images.

For Scenarios - look in the scenario folder within your Promotion Wars 1.3 Scenarios folder, or the Images folder of your Promotion Wars 1.3 folder. Simply move the required image files into the scenario folder contained in the Data Packs folder of Promotion Wars 21st Anniversary Edition.

You can contact me direct using the Contact Me page. I reply to every message within 24 hours where possible. 

 If you'd like to make a small financial donation, please visit this page. 

Change the language in Windows to English.

Also check the Windows setting:

Administrative Language Settings > Formats 

Make sure the Format is set to English.

If you don't do the above, you may find that your Pay-Per-Views always get zero buys, and other parts of the game may not function correctly.