If you love MMA, it’s pretty safe to assume you love a good knockout.
If you like fighting video games, that’s an even safer assumption. If
you like both MMA and video games, the knockout physics in EA Sports UFC 2—specifically in the game’s KO Mode—are sure to catch your attention. EA Sports UFC 2
officially releases on March 15, but Xbox One owners who are also
subscribers to EA Access have received an early preview of the game.
Hardcore MMA fans might remember the Spinning Wheel Kick that Edson Barboza used to destroy Terry Etim at UFC 142 in 2012. Well, imagine being able to score that type of KO 10 times a day without any real human beings losing consciousness; That’s what the EA Sports UFC 2 KO Mode offers fans.
In KO Mode, gamers go head-to-head or against the CPU in an all-out brawl where winning by KO is the only option. There’s no grappling and it takes just five solid shots to the head or body to score a KO. The fights are best-of-three contests by default, but you can change the setting to sudden death or even make it a best-of-five series. If you want to extend each round, you can increase the energy segments from five to 10.
The concept is simple, but addictive.
The game has other features, including: Ultimate Team, a career mode, online championships, an awesome event creation option (which I’ll examine more closely in later posts) and exhibition matches. All of those feature offer a more realistic take on the sport. However, for cheap thrills that’ll keep you saying: “one more fight,” the KO Mode is the feature that is likely to resonate with a larger audience.
The game’s entire 250-plus fighter roster is available to use in KO Mode and each is rendered with extraordinary detail. To put it plain, EA Sports UFC 2 has the best player models in the history of sports video games. Believe me, that’s not an overstatement or an example of someone who’s a prisoner of the moment. The renders in the original already held that crown in my book. The recreations of fighters in the latest version have only built on the foundation established back in 2014.
You might be thinking: “what makes these knockouts so cool?” The
answer to that is: the physics engine, facial damage and rag-doll
effect. The first part of this trifecta is best appreciated during the
slow-motion replays of your knockout. You can usually see exactly how
strikes landed and missed their targets. It makes the devastation and
evasion all the more spectacular. To nitpick, it would’ve been nice to
have the option to control the replays. Zooming in and out, speeding up
or slowing down the KO would’ve made the aftermath all the more
gratifying.
The facial damage is accelerated in KO mode, just like the damage that comes from each strike. One or two shots draw blood and induce swelling on the mugs of the fighters on the business end of punches and kicks. Again, this adds to the drama and effect of each knockout.
Lastly, but most important in this particularly satisfying guilty pleasure, is the rag-doll effect. When a guy or girl (yes, the women’s weight classes are included in KO mode, but they can’t fight the men) gets dropped, their crumpling bodies hit the canvas in a manner that is best described as: “cartoolistic.”
Hardcore MMA fans might remember the Spinning Wheel Kick that Edson Barboza used to destroy Terry Etim at UFC 142 in 2012. Well, imagine being able to score that type of KO 10 times a day without any real human beings losing consciousness; That’s what the EA Sports UFC 2 KO Mode offers fans.
In KO Mode, gamers go head-to-head or against the CPU in an all-out brawl where winning by KO is the only option. There’s no grappling and it takes just five solid shots to the head or body to score a KO. The fights are best-of-three contests by default, but you can change the setting to sudden death or even make it a best-of-five series. If you want to extend each round, you can increase the energy segments from five to 10.
The concept is simple, but addictive.
The game has other features, including: Ultimate Team, a career mode, online championships, an awesome event creation option (which I’ll examine more closely in later posts) and exhibition matches. All of those feature offer a more realistic take on the sport. However, for cheap thrills that’ll keep you saying: “one more fight,” the KO Mode is the feature that is likely to resonate with a larger audience.
The game’s entire 250-plus fighter roster is available to use in KO Mode and each is rendered with extraordinary detail. To put it plain, EA Sports UFC 2 has the best player models in the history of sports video games. Believe me, that’s not an overstatement or an example of someone who’s a prisoner of the moment. The renders in the original already held that crown in my book. The recreations of fighters in the latest version have only built on the foundation established back in 2014.
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The facial damage is accelerated in KO mode, just like the damage that comes from each strike. One or two shots draw blood and induce swelling on the mugs of the fighters on the business end of punches and kicks. Again, this adds to the drama and effect of each knockout.
Lastly, but most important in this particularly satisfying guilty pleasure, is the rag-doll effect. When a guy or girl (yes, the women’s weight classes are included in KO mode, but they can’t fight the men) gets dropped, their crumpling bodies hit the canvas in a manner that is best described as: “cartoolistic.”
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