Community Review: EA Sports UFC

I’ve never played a game like this. A game that allows me to be excited and disappointed at the precise same time. I don’t even know it was possible to feel this way about a game. This is what EA Sports UFC does to me.

Because on the one hand, I always have fun playing EA Sports UFC, and not just the dull, dead-eyed joy that comes from bashing buttons and knocking out your friends in a video game — I have ‘proper’ fun. And by that I mean that EA Sports UFC does have a consistent enough range of mechanics that makes the game rewarding to play. EA Sports UFC is a decent enough fighting game.

But on that bloody other hand: a recognition that EA Sports UFC doesn’t really make sense as an MMA game. It doesn’t really represent what would happen in a real UFC match. Illogical things take place, the ground game doesn’t really make sense and there’s a real lack of subtlety in the striking game.

More specifically: transitions on the ground don’t really make sense, and are way too easy. Striking doesn’t feel like it has any proper impact, and at no point feels like striking in a real MMA match. Submissions, I think, are the one area that EA Sports UFC really manages to get right, but asides from that, it doesn’t do a great job of representing how an MMA match plays out.

But that doesn’t mean EA Sports UFC isn’t a good game, that it isn’t fun. In fact, my complaints are really the complaints of a massive MMA fan, someone who watches a lot of fights and wanted something accurate to the sport. The problem is: I represent a lot of people who want to buy and play this video game.

Still, there’s a lot for me to enjoy: the visuals are incredible, EA has done an incredible job of representing how the fighters move, look and strike. I’m still going to enjoy playing this video game, but I doubt I’ll ever shift that hollow feeling in my stomach. THAT WOULDN’T HAVE HAPPENED IN REAL LIFE!

What are your thoughts?


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