Tech Blog

It's been nearly ten years since the ear-chomping pugilist " Iron " Mike Tyson has appeared in a video game but he's back and looking badder than ever . Of course I'm talking about Fight Night Round 4 , the latest game in EA's venerable franchise and the reigning champion of the boxing genre .

Since the game is hitting Future Shop store shelves today I thought there is no better time than now to give everyone here at the Tech Blog a good overview of what you can expect in the game . I'm trying a new format this time so hopefully you like the presentation .

What is it ?

The Fight Night series is EA's evolution of the Knockout Kings boxing games that debuted back 1998 on the PSone . The last game in the series , Fight Night Round 3 , a game developed by EA Chicago , was released in early 2006 on various platforms including Xbox 360 , Xbox , PSP , PS2 , and later , the PS3 . In late 2007 , EA Chicago shut its doors for good due to its lack of profitability and not meeting company standards , and as a result , the Fight Night series shifted over to EA Canada based out of Burnaby , Vancouver . The biggest selling feature of the game , and the one many boxing fans are excited about , is that Fight Night Round 4 is the first boxing game in history that pits legendary former heavyweights Mike Tyson and Muhammad Ali against one another .

What have I seen ?

I've been following the story of Fight Night Round 4 closely since EA announced the game back on May 7 , 2008 . Since then , I've been following the announcements of the game , watched most of the trailers , and a little over two weeks ago I downloaded the demo for the Xbox 360 . I've probably put in about four hours of gameplay time into the demo ( yes , I know that's a heck of a lot Ricky Hatton and Manny Pacquiao fighting ).

What's new in the game ?

Quite a bit , actually . The game is completely new and built from the ground up with a new gameplay physics engine . What this means for fans of the series is much more dynamic gameplay and a much deeper and more immersive experience . The all-new physics-based animation system allows your boxer to perform a much wider array of punches , blocks and ring movements . You now have the ability to perform glancing punches , knockout blows , missed punches and for the first time ever , rough and tumble inside - fighting . This is much more dynamic than in Fight Night Round 3 which had the inability for fighters to actually get close to each other ( there was this noticable " invisible wall " that prevented you from bulling in for some inside- fighting .) What that in effect did was rob fighters like Mike Tyson , who's forte is weaving in and hammering his opponents close to the body , from acting out their natural boxing style .

Even more impressive is how the game handles height and reach differentials . Whereas in Fight Night Round 3 , it didn't matter how tall you were , or how long your reach was , your boxer always fought the same . This all changes dramatically in Fight Night Round 4 where height and reach not only matter , but completely dictate your strategies based on the fighter's specific attributes . For example , Ali is much taller than Tyson and has much longer reach . Ali's natural fighting style is to stay far away from his opponent and pepper them with straight jabs and hooks . Conversely , if you're a ball of muscle like Tyson , you want to bull your way in and pound your opponents body and head with inside uppercuts and hooks .

The other interesting gameplay enhancement the physics engine provides is true-to-life glancing blows with realistic results . If you're far away from your opponent and lunge at them with a quick jab your blow can hit flush in the face , or in chin , or even in the temple and can knock out your opponent instantly . If you're opponent blocks , your glove can glance right off your opponent's gloves , leaving you much more open and vulnerable to counter punches .

All of the visuals in the game are driven by this new engine and it's quite satisfying to play and watch . It's the first boxing game I've seen that has realistic muscle flexes when you swing , glove deformation when you land a strike , and very convincing body reverberations as the blow ripples through your opponent's muscle .

What modes does the game have ?

The game demo I played contained the following modes :

( note : modes with an asterisk beside them were disabled in the demo I played )

Fight Now - your basic quick play mode where 1 or 2 players players can duke it out to see who's king of the ring

Legacy Mode * - an immersive career mode featuring 8 weight divisions , multiple championship titles , divisional ranking , and pound for pound ratings

Create Boxer * - allows you to create your own custom-made boxer . You can modify features such as weight , height , reach , wardrobe , and eye / hair / skin colour . You can also upload your photograph using EA's online website and import it onto your character .

Online World Championship Mode * - an online mode that lets you create a boxer and move up the rankings , fight for the world title , and extend your reign against other users around the world

The game also features a Boxer Gallery that lets you browse statistics on the 45 licensed boxers in the game and a Fight Night Store which I assume means there will be downloadable content made available for the game .

What do I think of the game ?

From what I've played thus far , I'm pretty impressed with the breadth of the game and it's clearly the most ambitious boxing game to date . I've always been more of a fan of arcade boxers , such as Punch Out!! , however that's mainly because I've found previous boxing games to be a little too mechanical . In comparison , Fight Night Round 4 feels more organic and deep . The fresh coat of paint creates virtually realistic visuals ( even moreso than Fight Night Round 3 ) and is almost startling to watch . The new physics engine feels almost like how you imagine fighting in real life to be and seems to approximate boxing quite well . The way height and reach comes into play differentiates boxer styles quite a bit and adds to both the learning curve , and replayability .

What do other critics think of the game ?
I always find it use to read at least a few reviews of a game before shelling out my hard earned cash , and the best site out there I find is Metacritic . It aggregates the review scores of reputable gaming websites and gives game titles an overall industry-consenus score percentage . I had a look at the PS3 version and it's currently averaging a 90 % average -- which is quite good . I whipped up this nifty chart to summarize the review scores of well known gaming websites :

Any final thoughts ?

It's great to see EA Canada's ambition with this game . If you're a boxing fan I can't see you going wrong with this game -- especially if you enjoyed Fight Night Round 3 . There is enough * new * in this game to view this game as a completely fresh experience . This isn't like the NHL or Madden series that seems to be stuck in this incremental annual update mode with little substantial upgrades . Fight Night Round 4 plays very different from previous versions and has enough nuances and depth to test the mettle of even the most seasoned boxing fan . Plus , with " Iron " Mike Tyson and " The Greatest " Muhammad Ali both in the game , you at least get to directly control quite possibly the most epic versus match in boxing history .

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Note : Since I talked so much about the new physics engine I thought some of might be interested in checking out a tech demo of it in action . So , here you are :

Physics Engine Trailer ( via GameTrailers ):