I’m having trouble deciding on whether I like Fight Night Round 4 or if I want to smash the disk into tiny pieces and eat it. My brother, as I understand it, is feeling similarly though his outlet for game frustration is controller breaking, rather than disk eating.
I will need more time with the game to completely (read: even a tiny bit) assess it, as I have yet to enjoy career mode. I’ve only experienced match upon match of Mike Tyson, at the hands of my brother, beating the holy living shit out of me, as Ali, Frazier, and just about anyone else. The only match, so far, for Tyson seems to be George Foreman, a lumbering mass of hulking devastation to Tyson’s Wolverine-like offense. Tyson’s dominance, regardless of whose hands the other controller is in and which boxer they’re using, is evidence of Fight Night Round 4’s over-emphasis on character stats. Or perhaps I just suck at the game.
The gameplay has been simplified. Where prior installment Round 3 elected to make your fighter’s status as opaque and vague as possible, striving for a more realistic simulation, EA, with Round 4, chose instead to opt for more street-fighter-esque health and stamina meters. This change makes it much easier to win a fight, enabling you to spot a fighter’s weaknesses in any given round, but takes away the guesswork needed for a win in Round 3.
Likewise, there is no cut-man minigame to be found in Round 4, instead you earn points throughout a given round, awarded for skill and precision in punching, and spend these points to heal your boxer in-between rounds. As such, it’s less challenging to keep your boxer in the fight, but this change also wears down the fourth wall a little.
My verdict, for now, is that Fight Night Round 4 is fast and fun but not as much a thinking man’s boxing game, if there is such a thing, as Round 3.
Tags: boxing, fight night, fighting, Video Games, xbox 360
Personally, I’m more curious about the Ghostbusters game.
I haven’t had the chance to sit down and play it very much, yet. I’ll post something when I do.