Now it's up to you to counter in real time, so the gameplay action is much more realistically paced." And since you no longer have to let go of guard, we don't have to do the video game-thing of slowing your opponent down to clue you into throwing a punch. "Now I can punch from the guard, and if I time the block correctly, I can get in a bigger counter shot. "This just offers another strategy aspect and enables you to fight like Winky Wright, picking your shots," adds Hayes. Depending on my boxer's reflex rating, he will move his hands to pickoff punches with varying levels of success depending on the types of punches being thrown and his current level of stamina."Īnd since there is no longer a directional mechanic involved in blocking (you no longer have to choose high or low), the right analog stick and/or the buttons are still available for punching, enabling gamers to hold down the right trigger to block, flick the stick to throw a punch, then go right back to blocking. The other option I have is to just hold down the block button to cover up. If I respond in enough time, my boxer will put his hands in the right position and block the punch. "My reflexes come into play when I see a punch coming or when I think a punch is coming and I pull the right trigger to block. "I call it that because there are two types of reflexes involved: mine and my boxer's," explains Hayes. There is a new blocking mechanic called Reflexive Blocking.
One of the biggest changes to the franchise is the way blocking is handled. Until then, I was able to get my hands on the game and box a round against another journalist, and I have to say, the graphics are not only stunning in their bloody-boxer glory, but the gameplay has been enhanced and fine-tuned with some much-needed tweaks to the control scheme making the gameplay feel much smoother and more intuitive than years past. "It's up to us, and as long as our boxers are cool with it, we can take the story where it needs to go."Īnd it's a story EA will reveal more about in the coming months as "Fight Night Champion" isn't scheduled to be released until March. 'Fight Night' has never had an M-rating, EA Sports has never had an M-rated game, so we're in a unique position of being one of the only sports games to be able to do it because we don't need to run anything by David Stern or whoever. "I've been working on the mode for over a year now and I'm still excited about it. "I think people will be surprised, but I also think they're going to be excited," adds Hayes. And if we weren't going to water it down, it had to be mature."Ī move that Hayes knows will shock a lot of consumers. But the catalyst for it all was that we wanted a new Champion mode, and we didn't want to sugarcoat it at all. "Then some of the ancillary benefits were, great, now we can finally do real damage in gameplay. So we laid out our vision for Champion mode and we said, if we do this, there's no way this can be T. if you're going to tell a story about boxing, it's not going to be, 'Hey, I just got an e-mail from your rival and he's really upset.' There are a lot of fighters who we drew inspiration from, and they've been through some real mature experiences. Being an unlicensed sports product and being in the world of boxing where there is a lot of stuff going on. Not topless mature themes, but it's gritty. "Essentially what we wanted to do with Champion mode necessitated this being an M-rated game," explains producer Brian Hayes. Then between rounds, it didn't take long for my cut-man in the corner to drop F-bomb after F-bomb, even referring to my white opponent as a "cracker."
There he was, boxing in prison, hands wrapped but no gloves, ring surrounded by other prisoners cheering and shouting (no visible shanking), while dressed in their orange jumpers.
That's right, prison (and it has nothing to do with Mike Tyson being in the game).īut when I sat down to view a clip of the new Champion story mode last week at an EA media event, that's exactly where I found the game's lead character. What I didn't expect was the game to start out in prison. When I heard "Fight Night Champion" was going to be EA Sports' first M-rated video game, I figured they were just going to play up the blood and gore factor of the sport. 'Fight Night Champion': To the penitentiary and beyond
#Fight night champion characters upgrade#
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