14 DAY TRIAL // EA Sports UFC is certainly an ambitious game and I must applaud the dedication of the development team that worked on it, but I have a feeling that only the most dedicated players will stick with the game for long enough to become proficient and deliver fights that resemble those seen in the real-world competition.
The developers are smart enough to force those who get the demo to spend quite a bit of time finding out how to perform the various moves, how to block and how to throw punches and I had to go through it three times in order to get a decent, if not actually solid, handle on what I was doing in the Octagon.
I then promptly lost my first actual match in EA Sports UFC in just one round because, even if I had the moves somewhere in my mind, I was unable to chain them in any meaningful way in order to actually hurt my opponent.
The game asks players to carefully use the stamina of their fighter, which is constantly replenishing but can quickly be depleted by a complex move, in order to hurt their enemy and either damage him enough to force a knockout or bring them to the ground for a submission.
I basically lost because I was unable to have enough energy after landing some serious kicks to take my enemy down and make him concede.
After that, I went through the tutorial one more time and then managed to get a solid victory by targeting the head of my opponent, launching some decoy punches and then using solid foot-based strikes to bloody and then knock him out.
The game certainly has tactical depth and the movement and the various physics interactions show the realism that the Ignite engine can deliver on next-gen devices.
The sound design is also impressive, with context sensitive cues from the trainers and interesting reactions from the crowd.
EA Sports UFC has the potential to be a very deep simulation of the sport, but it might be hindered by the amount of time that players will need to put in so that they can master its complex set of moves.
Take a look at the images attached to this article in order to see how EA Sports UFC looks in action.
The game will be officially launched in its full form on the PlayStation 4 from Sony and the Xbox One from Microsoft on June 17.
