Paradise, NV, USA – With more than 106,000 fans attending across two nights at the Allegiant Stadium, WrestleMania 42 once again delivered WWE’s signature combination of sport, entertainment and spectacle. Behind the action, a Hippotizer Media Server system from Green Hippo, an ACT Entertainment brand, provided the visual engine for a production that took audiences from a Mad Max-inspired world on Night One to a sleek, modern aesthetic on Night Two.

Photo Credit: © WWE

WrestleMania 42, held in Paradise, Nevada, featured an extensive network of LED canvases across the stadium, with Hippotizer handling content for the ring posts and skirt, trusses, barricade, over-ring trons, ramp, entranceway and stadium ribbon boards, alongside additional displays and content feeds. The system was delivered by Upstaging, with WWE Media Server Programmer Chris Keene working alongside Project Manager Tony Thompson and the wider technical team.

“WrestleMania is now a two-night event, and this year there was a bit of a juxtaposition between the two nights,” says Keene. “For the most part, we take over the screens with custom pre-produced graphics during entrances, and then the TV truck takes over some screens during matches to show live camera feeds. Video is an integral element in our world. It is constantly featured.”

Visuals support everything from wrestler entrances and sponsor messaging to set transformations and championship announcements. Hippotizer MX Series supported a combination of custom pre-produced graphics, live camera feeds and IMAG, with the screens changing roles throughout the show.

The scale of the system demanded a similarly robust technical infrastructure. The Hippotizer network comprised eight Hippotizer MX Series Kasai Media Servers, alongside six Hippotizer Boreal+ MK2 Media Servers. The Kasai MX Media Servers drove a range of high-resolution canvases, including the 7,272 x 864-pixel over-ring trons, the 6,080 x 128-pixel stadium VOMs and the 13,856 x 448-pixel lower ribbon boards, while the Boreal+ MK2 Media Servers also supported the entranceway, ramp, barricade and other LED elements throughout the venue.

For Thompson, the compact Kasai MX Media Servers have proved their value through a combination of performance and reliability.

“We have been using them for over a year,” says Thompson. “There were no demos – we just bought them. The performance you get out of such a small package with the Hippotizer Kasai MX Series Media Server is impressive.”

Keene continues: “As always at WrestleMania, one of the biggest challenges we face is ingesting all of the content and syncing it across the network. We are either downloading, encoding or syncing constantly for days. The Hippotizers are tanks and keep going.”

That confidence was particularly important during live production, where the team could be required to make last-minute changes or prepare surprise entrances on spare machines during the show. All of the Hippotizer Media Servers were controlled via a grandMA3 console, with the technical team also using output monitoring and carefully managed workflows to maintain control of the many moving parts.

“The whole show is riding on these machines, and their performance and reliability is never something we doubt,” Keene continues. “The reliability Hippotizer brings equals confidence, and that means the world in these situations.”

Bob Bonniol, Chief Innovation Officer at ACT Entertainment, comments: “We’re thrilled to hear about the success of the Hippotizer system at WrestleMania. This reflects the ‘Tier ZERO’ philosophy and performance standard at Green Hippo and tvONE, which we use to describe the most critical, no-fail environments that our technology is designed for. Tier ZERO equals mission-critical, one-shot environments where failure is not an option.”

One of the event’s standout visual moments came during Cody Rhodes’ entrance, which transformed the set into a cave inspired by Batman’s iconic lair. The sequence brought together multiple screens with precisely timed clips, all synchronized to audio from Hippotizer.

“It was really cool and tied all of the screens together in precisely timed clips that all had to sync together with audio,” says Keene. “The sync was great across all the machines, and it all looked and sounded great.

“To have so many moving parts that we’re all trying to manage, and not have to worry about the media servers, is invaluable. That wouldn’t happen without Green Hippo and Upstaging. They are wonderful partners.”