EA has been keeping quiet on the release date for its anticipated interpretation of MMA as a sports video game, but now we finally have a release date for the game. And, in a brilliant stroke of genius, they’ve made Bruce Lee a pre-order bonus.
First off the release date. It appears as though EA Sports UFC will be released on June 17 in the US. We’re still waiting to hear from EA on the Australian release date, but we expect something very similar.
At all times EA had promised that EA Sports UFC would release in Spring (in the Northern Hemisphere) and this is pushing things (Spring officially ends on June 21)! Still, great to get a solid date.
As for Bruce Lee, he is roundly described as the first mixed-martial artist, because of his passion for adding techniques from all different types of fighting arts into his own repertoire. Primarily known for his Kung-Fu, Bruce Lee also studied boxing and Jiu Jitsu. He was also obsessed with trying to learn how to fight on the ground, and studied with famed Judo practitioner Gene Lebell. Having Bruce Lee in this game is a masterstroke. Wonder what weight class he fights in? 135? 125? Definitely one of the lighter classes for sure.
Also: I really like this cover art. Subtle. Clean. Purty. And if Jon Jones gets through Glover Texiera (and he probably will) his next fight will actually be against secondary cover star Alexander Gustafson. Great timing.
Via NeoGAF
Comments
24 responses to “EA Sports UFC Gets A Release Date (And Bruce Lee As Pre-Order DLC)”
I personally think the idea of putting Bruce Lee in a modern UFC game is a bit silly, but at the same time this might be the first UFC game I actually decide to buy.
I think it’s awesome. I’ve been drunk arguing with a mate for YEARS about how Bruce Lee would go in an MMA match.
“Brrooock Lesnrrrrr hits the double leg and it’s fucking over!”
“No way maannnnnn, Lee will use a one inch punch”.
“That bullshit doesn’t work! You’re stupid!”
Repeat on a one hour loop.
Ah the one inch punch. Always great for a demonstration. We see it used all the time at gradings and demonstrations etc. But no, it would be zero use in an mma fight, you’d have to stand there, get your stance correct, ask your opponent to stand apart from you while you grounded yourself properly… yoiks lol.
I kind of wish they had of gotten Bruce Lee’s image AND Chuck Norris’s image for this game, for the fact Norris was a tournament fighter in his day too, that would’ve been a pairing in this game to end all other fighting games 😀
The problem there is that while historically Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris is a really fun match-up, the Chuck Norris meme is completely played out, and it’s probably a lot harder to license his likeness since he’s still alive.
I’m not even referencing that Chuck Norris meme. In the 70s Norris was one of the best Tournament fighters in the world. There’s a story, even Norris talked about it in an interview that I can’t find atm, where Norris said he and Lee had a great friendship and would always joke about who was better. He was world champion at one stage and Lee wanted to ‘kill’ the world champion on film. So they did that. On the set of the film, one day they locked themselves in a room and actually fought it out until one of them won. But neither of them revealed who won. Lee took it to his grave unfortunately and Chuck, out of respect won’t let anyone know the outcome either. If that story is absolutely true, which I don’t honestly have any reason to doubt it given the two mens respectable nature, I think that’s pretty cool.
(btw @foggy I did reply, it’s awaiting authorisation *sigh*)
I’m aware of all that, I’m just saying that Chuck Norris’ marketability has come and gone with the rise, fall, and cringe factor of the Chuck Norris meme.
Absolutely and you’re right, but I think if they marketed it correctly, and didn’t pander to the whole ‘meme’ sensation (ugh I hate those Norris jokes) it could’ve worked pretty well. But if we ended up with Kareem Abdul Jabar in there… eep. lol
So in your mind is it an actual skill?
Is it hard to do and does it have any practical application whatsoever?
I honestly don’t have any knowledge of that kind of technique so I’ve always found it interesting.
Is it taught through Karate?
If you ever get a decent boxing coach to teach you a jab they’ll often set themselves into an optimal position for a thrown jab and ask you to walk forward into the extended hand. Basically the lesson is that if your feet, shoulders and back are all in the correct alignment you can push REALLY hard into the guys fist and he’s not going anywhere. The correct stance makes it like trying to push over a house and if he lurches forward into you even just an inch it’s going to push you back.
From the footage I’ve seen the 1 inch punch doesn’t use any of those similar techniques (those used in actual combat sports), so I always thought it was probably bullshit. That said, I’ve never spoken to anyone who’s actually been hit by one…. Maybe it’s because they’re all dead!
There’s no grand secret, it’s not mystical etc. It’s got as much to do with centering your stance, lowering your body weight etc as it does the point of impact. Usually in Kyokoshin we either stand in Migi Sanchin Dachi stance to prepare, (hourglass stance, right foot slightly forward, lowering our bodyweight).
Now, check this out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=en2nM-7XIe4
What you saw in Lee’s video is a practical demonstration is likely to happen say, in a bar, club etc where someone else, a male, is ‘dicksizing’ to another male. Standing in front, straight legs, inhaled, chest puffed out etc. In Lee’s demonstration video, the man falls back into a chair, this isn’t exaggerated solely because of the mans stance. Try it. He’s standing very upright, he would’ve been very winded, he had no lowering of his stance or bodyweight.
When you get to the ‘six inch punch’ Lee can then put some power behind his punch for two reasons, he gets twisting at his waist, and distance in his punch to ‘wind’ it up. The six inch punch is more or less a ‘jab’ with force behind it.
But. The one inch punch is *useless* in a fight. It is really only a demonstration punch. I’m sure there’s probably people out there who miraculously used it, but damn they’d have to be good. Here’s a demonstration video of Bruce using it against a plank: (Please don’t get into ‘the plank split vertically! It’s fake! I can currently break 2 boards, around half a dozen tiles, have done at a few gradings. It does depend on the grain of the board a lot as to how the board will break. Yes, it hurts afterwards. A lot if you do it ‘wrong’.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=oRf49fMVOLE
Anyhow, the best way to get informed about this? Don’t watch youtube videos, don’t sit around debating with your mate, get out there and join a karate dojo, an MMA gym, any martial arts organisation and see for yourself 🙂 They all know about it, they all love trying things like this to either prove or dispel them and they’ve all got their own opinions on them. Give it a try.
Have a great day!
Cheers man, that’s a really good summary.
I’ve been training BJJ the last five years but I don’t know anything about Karate because they don’t teach it at my gym (we have Muay Thai, boxing and judo coaches), so I’m always interested in this kind of thing and particularly to see how it can be applied practically.
Some stuff is obviously VERY difficult to get to work against a trained opponent but then you watch a guy like Lyoto Machida and the way he uses Karate in combination with judo, sumo and BJJ and it’s just beautiful to watch.
It’s a kick in the teeth for the memory of Bruce Lee. This whole “Father of mixed martial arts” nonsense is just something organisations like the UFC use to sell their brand and now using to ship games.
When asked if he was the father of mixed martial arts, Dana White made a big deal about how he was and how he would endorse the MMA. But when they asked Shannon Lee the same question she said, “No, of course not. MMA is still bound by rules and limitation, that’s the very thing he spoke out against”
Limited? Limited by what? The inability to kill your opponent?
Because I don’t see how he’d be anti-MMA because it has a rule set which provides some level of protection to the fighters.
MMA is a more free form of martial arts than anything Bruce Lee ever participated in.
He wasn’t a crazy beatnik as far as I can tell. While he considered martial arts to be a form of expression I don’t think he was completely against ANY sort of rules which would stop people being killed. Many of the fighters today share common lineages with Bruce, I’d be absolutely shocked if he was against the sport.
The guys family has sold his likeness to ship alcohol FFS, I really struggle to see how adding him as a character in a martial arts game is a “kick in the teeth”. Honestly I think that quote from his daughter is just stupid.
Have to agree. I personally groaned when I saw that alcohol ad. Lee was staunchly against drinking alcohol. Not primarily for it’s health benefits, but mainly surprisingly because Linda Lee Caldwell wrote in her 1978 memoir, Bruce Lee: The Only Man I Knew, that “the actor abstained from alcohol after a bout of drinking that temporarily estranged him from his family. Either way that’s incidental. Like I said when I saw it, I realised they’re really not above making a buck on his image now… 🙁 Wonder how long til they sell Brandons image to bird stores…
“for its anticipated interpretation of MMA as a sports video game”
Forgetting about the MMA game they had already released?
That was THQ not EA.
http://www.ea.com/au/mma
My lack of research is bad and I should feel bad.
I think we’re all trying to forget that travesty…
The THQ mma games set the bar pretty damned high. EA’s got a lot to live up to here.
I’m prefering this cover:
http://i.imgur.com/vTUzZd0.jpg
man, mma games are hilarious at best. this is going to be great.
Aaaand they got me
I’m with you on that.
I’m really curious how they will handle Bruce Lee. So much of his fighting abilities are shrouded in mystery. We know that he won a boxing tournament, we know that he could demonstrate incredible ability in Kung Fu, we know that he trained with Gene Lebell in Judo and Wrestling. Some claim he had influence on BJJ as one of his top students trained with the Gracies. I’ve read accounts that in some real fights he has used his one-inch punch and it has been effective. Unfortunately, as far as I know we don’t have any footage of him in a real fight, he avoided tournaments as he gained prominence and his other fights have various accounts over what really happened. He was pretty small, but insanely fit – I don’t know what you can conclude from that.
Precisely.
I’m hoping they don’t fudge his stats and techniques to make him a properly rounded fighter.
Give him sick speed, cardio and an whole bunch of flashy karate style strikes.
I’m hoping he sits somewhere around the 135-145lbs mark so I can fight against him in standup battles with Barao or Aldo.
Wonder if it’ll be like the Game of Death movie and have a cardboard cutout of Bruce Lee’s head floating over a modelled fighter?
Wow people know so little its a shame, Fighters would challenge Bruce lee all over the world, and they all would end up running away from Bruce lee during the fight haha, bruce lee knows ways to kill opponents with 1 strike, the one inch punch was a display to show how he can transfer all his energy from his body into his hand, go look at the people he trained, the things they have said about him he use to fly over their heads and they would always think it was a bird passing by lol his speed and strength is unmatched he was literally untouchable, his strength was in his mind, his mind made his body what it is, because he wanted his body to listen to his mind, its hilarious how people think these new generation fighters stand a chance against a true legend like Bruce even Chuck Norris the strongest man in America at the time was his friends and respected his ability these are just trained fighters who go to bang heads, as for Bruce he was not just a fighter but a genius, honestly it wouldn’t be fun to watch anyone face Bruce lee, because the fight would end so fast. That being said I love that Bruce lee is added in the mix I would also like to see Fedor emelianenko and Brock Lesnar because im not sure if Brock is in it or not, also Ken shamrock would be nice, thank you.