I’m a massive fan of combat sports in general, especially MMA. And while I loved what THQ did with the UFC license, I always felt like the Fight Night series was a far more polished experience. So when EA announced that it had acquired the license to produce the next UFC game, I got excited. Now, as stated on EA’s Facebook page, it’s all set to finally reveal the game tomorrow — I’m assuming at the Microsoft conference.
I got excited for a couple of reasons. First, I love UFC, and I want to play a well-made game about the sport. Secondly, I’m secretly hoping for a narrative style sporting experience like the one seen in Fight Night Champion. Imagine a fully fledged UFC story experience: you start in The Ultimate Fighter, work your way to the finals. You win. Beat some contenders… then finally you get to face the final boss: a UFC super fight with undisputed wizard and time lord Anderson Silva. The stories just write themselves.
I don’t know for sure, but I can only hope that the Fight Night team has some input into the UFC game. They’ve done such a stellar job with the Fight Night series to the point where it’s neck and neck with FIFA for my favourite video games sports series.
Can’t wait to see what they’ve done with the license.
Comments
12 responses to “EA To Reveal Its New UFC Game Tomorrow”
I agree Mark. With the budget EA have I bet we do see a fully fleshed out story mode. One thing I hope to improve (and I know it’s small) is Bruce Buffer’s voice overs during his announcements. In the Yukes games it sounds like they recorded him in a tunnel about 100 metres away. I want to hear over-the-top Buffer!!
With this, FIFA, Battlefield 4 and CoD, I think Microsoft’s press conference tomorrow morning will be very interesting. They got all the big hitters.
I hope EA don’t screw this one up! The one and only thing EA have a good rep for is sporting games.
Hey Mark,
I’m with you, the possibilities are endless…. until you realise that EA will make it be Always online only because no one plays single player anymore.
Not to mention it will be $0.99 USD (or $5.99 AUD) for each new submission your character wants to learn.
Cynical I know…. but once bitten n all that by EA…. :o(
I’d love to see an Ultimate Fighter story mode with additional DLC options allowing prank minigames involving urine and buckets.
It could also have quicktime events where you press ‘X’ to burst into tears and start screaming “JUST LET ME BANG, BRO!”
it would be FANTASTIC!
It would actually be great to have an option to apply for TUF as an option while you’re fighting through the regional circuit. It could be handled similarly to the Pride fights in the THQ single player.
What I DON’T want is unbalanced training games which make it WAY easier to become a striker/ wrestler than a jiu-jitsu fighter.
Amazing.
Also Mark, can somebody SERIOUSLY tell me what I need to do to stop all my comments from being “awaiting moderation” for about 8 hours eveytime?
Not much point live blogging tomorrows announcement if comments go through 8 hours late.
That’s weird man. Emailing you now…
EA MMA is a solid base to work from, if they can use the UFC license properly and build a more interesting career mode this could be pretty special. Combat sports games need a shot in the arm, Fight Night Champion was a step in the right direction and I hope it did well enough that they continue down that path. Fighting through a ladder of contenders in between bad training games no longer cuts it for me, I’d love to see some focus given to the out of the cage elements; balancing strength vs weight cutting. the options to change weight classes maybe even fighter sponsorships and training camps. An interesting idea would be running a camp rather than controlling an individual fighter, you could tell more stories plus get to experience a variety of styles and weight classes.
Things I want:
1. Career mode with the Diaz brothers. Bong hits add +10 Chill and -10 Dana Rep.
2. Career mode with Vitor. Roid up for 15 years, then switch to TRT because your body is wrecked from long term drug abuse.
3. Mark Hunt ‘walk away’ KO animation.
4. Joe Rogan and Bruce Buffer as unlockable fighters.
EA MMA was a pretty good game and the controls were pretty good…it is a good base to start off but the Fight Night Champion engine is about two years old and needs to be refreshed…The one thing EA need to get right (other than clipping issues) is the career modes. You need a one good linear storyline (like Fight Night Champion’s storyline) and good career mode. I wonder if it will have UFC, Strikeforce rosters and PrideFC matches.
Which brings me to wondering…It’s time for another FIght Night game
I disagree somewhat on the need for a Fight Night Champion style career story.
I think MMA is such a varied sport that your path to the top needs to be more varied and have more replayability than a linear story allows for.
Call me ignorant, but to me boxing is boxing. You’re not going to learn a completely different style of fighting by switching from camp to camp- you learn to punch a guy above the waist and that’s it so they can mould the story around that.
The path of a guy who cuts his teeth on the mats at Nova Uniao in Rio is going to be a very different experience to a guy who is a Div 1 Collegiate Wrestler in the US or a kickboxer from Golden Glory in the Netherlands.
Let boxing tell the Mass Effect story, MMA should be Skyrim (but with kicks).
A story mode would be great, sick of boring career modes
KFC CLUB 4 LYFE!