Fight Night Round 4, which could be the biggest sports game of 2009 thus far is currently scheduled for release this July. Round 4 will be the series’ second installment for next-gen consoles, specifically the Xbox 360 and PS3. However, if you’re either a fan of the Fight Night games or even boxing in general, know that there’s much more in store to look forward to in this latest installment.
Electronic Arts’ Vancouver studio have been working on the game for some time now, and it shows. People were blown away by Round 3’s attention to detail, and 4 raises the bar once again. While 3 functioned at a crisp 30 frames per second, 4 is running at 60, making it the smoothest boxing game in creation at the time of this writing.
Having said that, the frame rate well complements the game’s detailed graphics, and in turn the graphics well complement the game’s outstanding physics. As boxers exert their entire bodies with each punch, their muscles flex and sparkling sweat can spotted flinging through the air. Not only that, but many kinds of lifelike physical interaction have been incorporated: boxers arms can become tangled in one another’s in struggles, and punches have an impact on specific areas of the opponents body; whereas in most fighting games when you punch your opponent in the head and their entire torso shakes.
As for the controls, a couple changes have made to the overall scheme, but they’re very slight. For example, there’s less emphasis this time around on overpowered haymakers, and more on hooks and jabs. So in order to perform a haymaker the player executes a hook while at the same time holding the right controller trigger. Blocking has also been redefined as well, since this time around punches aren’t restricted to four areas, blocking has in turn been simplified to two options: high and low. And finally, while in Round 3 it was possible to keep parrying until your opponent lost all his energy and was open for attack, in Round 4 you can only parry so much before the hits start coming through; especially depending on who has the most energy.
EA has also reworked the career mode and the result appears to be much more immersive and satisfying than in past games. Though it can be said in the case of any sequel, it’s worth saying here that Fight Night Round 4 has the great potential to be better than any game before it in the series’ past.
