After a break for E3, Loot Ninja’s Battle of Wits is back. This week, myself and Steve discuss the ramifications of the recent release of UFC 2009 Undisputed on the boxing genre. The fighting landscape has changed and MMA has taken over. Can boxing recover in the video game realm? We don’t think so.
Boxing games are very fun. From Punch Out to Evander Holyfield’s Real Deal Boxing to the Fight Night series, I’ve had a great time boxing with a controller in my hands through the years. Fight Night Round 3 had a permanent place in my Xbox 360 for a little over two months. Now, UFC 2009 Undisputed has taken hold in the same way. While both myself and Steve played the hell out of Fight Night Round 3 and played the demo for Round 4, neither of us have made the purchase for that exact reason. The MMA genre brings further depth to fighting games that can’t be had elsewhere.
The additional fighting styles (Muai Thai, Kickboxing, Wresting, Brazilian Ju Jitsu, Judo, etc.) add a depth that can’t be matched in boxing. If you were so inclined, you could play UFC Undisputed as a straight boxing title (as MMA fights have that potential), and it stands up on its own two feet. The variety of play makes for a well rounded game with near infinite replay value. As Steve put it, “the entire game is not counter punching and blocking.” While Fight Night Round 4 added variety to the boxers, you still have a smaller number of fighter archetypes as compared to UFC 2009 Undisputed, where you have various types of striking for each fighter combined with numerous types of clinch and ground games.
Now, this isn’t to say that that UFC 2009 Undisputed is a perfect game, but it does enough right to make both of us not even consider buying a boxing game. Further fleshing out the MMA genre, EA looks to jump into the fight next year with licenses for some of the world’s most dangerous fighters, including Fedor Emelianenko. You can bet that THQ already has a sequel in the works for the UFC that further fleshes out the career mode and enhances the gameplay.
Can boxing games turn the corner and come back to the top? Sure, it’s possible. But first, boxing must become the dominant fighting discipline in real life. It will take a truly electric boxer to come along and draw attention for that to happen, like another young Mike Tyson or Muhammad Ali. Unless that occurs, both myself and Steve believe that MMA will continue to flourish in both real life and video games.
i dunno man. people still like baseball after football came out and made baseball the most boring awful shit on TV. I think people will still like boxing enough to buy a game. i mean, people by baseball games and that shit is awful.
For me UFC09 is a great game but there are problems. Sometimes I will get knocked out out of nowhere and just randomly mashing the stick around on the ground seems to work for some of my friends.
I feel that UFC is a great game but sometimes it seems like it’s actually easier to play vs. Fight Night.
A typical comment by a typical zuffa zombie.
The sport is called MMA, and the only thing zuffa has made irrelevant is legitimacy in MMA.
yeah i think boxing can be on top like the other games. I am interested in boxing which is a manly games and it need more stamina to fight against the opponent. Having two players is interesting we can show our skill with friends but for me when I played I only play with computer that is also in easy mode as I am new to boxing games. Absolutely boxing can be recover from video game realm by making the games more attractive and it should have special features which the player will like.