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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief The developers of UFC Undisputed 2009 had quite the task on hand when they set out to make this game, the first such attempt at this sport for next generation platforms. With past attempts to bring the sport to the video game world being disappointments, fans worldwide were hoping for a faithful representation of the sport to go along with a fun game. Thankfully, while the game isn't perfect, as a start to a new game franchise and the first attempt to bring the sport to the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, UFC Undisputed 2009 succeeds in almost every area. From the controls to the career mode to online play, the game is a fun, challenging experience that is a must own game for MMA fans everywhere.
The Controls: The control system for the game is extremely deep, and takes a lot of practice and time to master the intricacies it presents. The face buttons work as the basic punches and kicks, with the left shoulder buttons working to change the location of the strike, either low or high. On top of that, strikes are thrown differently depending the distance between the opponents. It's a wonderfully detailed system that makes for a lot of different and interesting combinations and stand up action.
The real sense of deep control, however, comes when the game goes to the ground. With the right stick being your best friend, you use a series of minor and major transitions with short and longer rotations of the right stick to advance or defend your positions. In another case of needing a lot of practice, the ground game is something you'll need to learn to win in this game.
Game Modes: The regular exhibition mode is a great way to get practice with your favorite fighters, and depending on your difficulty level chosen can be an extremely challenging endeavor if you're just starting out. As everyone knows there are over 80 fighters in the game through the different weight classes, so there's a massive number of fighters at your disposal.
Outside of that, the classic fights mode is a really cool feature. With a select number of "classic" fights to choose from, Rachelle Leah sets the background for each fight before getting a genuine prefight package for the fights themselves. The goal of this mode is to recreate the method of victory in the correct round of the fight, and by doing so you unlock a video package from that fight itself. It's a cool feature, though it can definitely be expanded upon in the next release.
Career mode is one spot you may want to spend a lot of time, as you create a fighter and take him through a career, training for fights and trying to get yourself better along the way. The frustrating part of this mode is the amount of time it takes to increase the attribute points for your fighter through the sparring mode in training. Other than that, you get a chance to learn new skills in the game by bringing in fighters from the many different fighter camps at your disposal, and this is where you can get the new skills to work on and move along in your respective skill sets.
The bulk of most people's time may be spent online, however, as even the bare bones online mode brings a lot of fun and allows you to face off against other fans, or even fighters, around the world. You gain points and rankings based on how you perform in the game and as you get better you'll face fighters at or above your skill level, making you constantly stay on your game.
Verdict: Overall this is a wonderful game. It has some minor flaws, but those can be overlooked as this is the first iteration of this game on these platforms. Subsequent offerings should build upon everything they've done right with this game and for now this is about as good of a UFC game as we could have hoped for. It's challenging and requires the time put into it to get a great experience out of it, but once you do it's well worth it. This is a must have game for every MMA fan, and hopefully I'll run across a few of you on Xbox Live!
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
STAFF COLUMNISTS: Shawn Ennis - Jason Amadi
Frank Hyden - Rich Hansen
Chris Park - Matt Pelkey
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