Fight Night Round 3

"Wins on points but not a knockout."

Fight Night is the latest instalment of the successful Fight Night series and also the series debut on the PSP. The other EA Titles on the PSP have all been successful games but will Fight Night join them?

Graphics

Fight Night offers impressive graphics. When you see the greats like Ali or modern day stars like Hopkins they are all well animated and every boxer's main features are there.

The boxers are not the only detailed feature. The crowd all looks lifelike and you can see their cheers and boos as the fight progresses. This impresses me as many games do not put to much detail into the crowd but Fight Night is different and the game does look very much like a televised boxing match at times.

Your boxer's pain is also showed well. If you aim a lot of punches to the right side of a boxers head then bruises show and later cuts. In extreme cases you can even see the boxers eye swell due to the damage. This can be seen very well at the end of the rounds when the coach and cutman comes in and the camera focuses on the boxers head. If you have dealt of received punishment then you see it her.

The camera angles are all intelligent and well thought out. It is angled slightly upwards so you are looking up the boxer which is useful for when aiming at the body or looking for dodges.

While Fight Night's graphics are not as impressive as some titles on the PSP they do the job well and a little more. There are some minor jumps but this is largely nitpicking and is not a problem and does not affect the actual gameplay.

Sound

I will divide the sound section into two sections in order to review it clearer. These sections are - Soundtrack and Game Sound.

Soundtrack

The soundtrack for any game is difficult to review as it is largely down to taste. If you like Rap or Hip Hop etc then you will like the soundtrack a lot and there is a good selection of songs from a variety of well known artists. If you do not like these genres then you wont like the soundtrack and there is no function to use your own music which would have prevented this.

Game Sound

Fight Night offers a range of ingame sound and it works well but there are some problems.

When you are fighting you can hear the swish as you punches pass through the air on thee way to their target, the thud of a powerful haymaker hitting a chin or the swish as you skilfully dodge out of the way of a punch. All the actual fight effects are very impressive and help to give a television style tot eh game. You can hear the crowds reaction clearly as they cheer for their favourites and their boos when something unsporting occurs like a low blow.

The one problem I have with the sound is the commentary. It is not very varied so if you repeat the same punch in a round for example you will hear exactly the same commentary. The commentary also lacks the detail which is possible as can be seen on the other EA titles on the PSP. Bar the odd comment about a boxer's status the commentator does not much else and it is annoying as the other titles do commentary far better than this.

Gameplay

Fight Night for the PSP offers different gameplay to the console versions because the game has been made specifically for the console as opposed to a lazy port as some series have suffered from. The noticeable lack of a second analogue stick means features like total punch control are missing but fight night makes up for this with intelligent controls that work well.

Hooks and straights are all performed but the symbol keys, movement by the analog stick, basic blocking with the R key and dodging with the L key. The d-pad allows you to perform special moves such as taunts, low blows, grabs or special punches. The controls do not take to long to learn and after a few fights you will have the controls mastered. The Haymaker is slightly harder to perform but after a bit of practise they are easy to perform.

Learning combos and ring technique is simple through the tutorials and sparring mode so making your techniques rock solid is simple and if you put the time in here you will see the obvious result when you fight.

The major problem I have with the game is that while you can put the time in practising the sparring mode the Ai is a real letdown in the ring. If I only throw left hooks for example the Ai fails to adapt and will continue its normal blocking so fights can be made to easy. Adjusting the game's difficulty or when in career mode you rise the ranks you would think would adjust this but instead of improving the Ai's in ring intelligence your punches do less damage and your opponents do more. This is sloppy and it could have easily been improved.

One of the features I do like is the cutman feature. At the end of a round you become the cutman and get time to help clean cuts and reduce swelling which if left untreated could lead to a fight cancellation. To do this you fist select either cuts or bruises and then by moving the analog stick in time with a slider the cuts and swelling is reduced. If you do not want to do this then you can simply choose to skip this feature and it is done for you but after a few goes you will get far more effective then the automatic skip.

Fight Night boasts a good career mode which gives you two options. You can either create a new boxer and start their career from scratch or you can take a great like Ali and change his career. The create a boxer feature is fairly detailed and you can create a wide variety of different boxers of all shapes and sizes. When your boxer has been created you then begin as an amateur and work your way up the ranks till you go pro and later bid for the world titles in your chosen weight. The career mode is in depth and allows you to change weight classes and unify belts and also compete for other titles given to you for performing certain feats such as reducing the opponents accuracy or increasing your own. As you compete you sign all your own contracts for example managers and cutmen and also fights giving you a lot of control over your boxer's career.

Unfortunately the game does not have minigames in order to raise your boxer's stats. Instead it is done automatically with certain modifiers such as your manager's style and also how aggression you set it - higher aggression gives bigger risks but also bigger rewards and the reverse for lower.

The career mode works very well and is well designed for portable play. When you on the move you are able to make all your adjustments to your boxer with the fights taking slightly longer. The brilliant career mode helps cover the disappointments with Ai as it has been well designed and well thought out.

Fight Night's other major mode is the challenge mode. This has three major sections - repeat history, change history and my history. Repeat and change history allows you to step in at the key moment in famous fights such as Ali versus Frazier and Taylor versus Hopkins and either repeat the result or change boxing history. My history allows you to partake in challenges which test your career boxer's ability. For example you may have to last 3 rounds without a knockout or try to knockout a boxer famed for blocking. This mode is challenging and the difficulty is well set so the fights get harder as you move on.

Lifespan

Fight Night has a lot to keep you interested and should keep you busy for a while. He career mode takes a lot of time to complete and the challenge of holding the belts takes a while. You have a variety of weghtclasses to choose from or move to and also a lot of unlockables which you can obtain as you move through the career.

Challenge mode takes a lot of time as well but is better played in bitesize chunks as opposed to working your way through it. Fight Night plays a lot like this, it's a good game for chunks and plying every now and then as opposed to always playing it.
There are the two main multiplayer modes, - adhoc and infrastructure but to play infrastructure you need to register with the EA servers. I have not tried either mode so I can not review them.

Fight Night will last a while and you will get your moneys worth but it is best played in small chunks and so naturally the game increases in length.

Quick Review

Graphics: 9
Sound: 8
Gameplay: 8
Lifespan: 8

Fight Night has been well designed for the PSP. It has been cleverly designed to offer short chunks of gaming and it is best played like this. Fight Night is a solid title and is a good game for a collection but it suffers from a variety of errors which seem as cut corners and it is these flaws that, despite the game being very good, stops the game from being a knockout title and so a must have for the console. I would recommend this game if you are looking for well deigned portable gaming but it is not a must have. The last thing to say is thank you for reading this review and I hope it was helpful.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/08/06