Game Improvements 09.08.09: UFC Undisputed 2009 (360)

Posted by Chris Lansdell on 09.08.2009

Fed up with people who just trash games without saying what could have been done better? Then Game Improvements is the column for you! Our first project is UFC Unleashed 2009!

Greetings humanity! Welcome to Game Improvements, a new monthly column where I take a recent (or recent-ish) game and make suggestions on what I would have liked to see to make the review score just a bit better. We'll also be encouraging you the readers to tweet, comment or email your suggestions for improvement as well!

Why are we doing this? Well it seems to me that as game reviewers, we spend an awful lot of time saying what's WRONG with games and not enough time talking about how to make them better. It's just so much easier to complain. To paraphrase Lennon and McCartney: "Hey dude, About your game…We took the bad parts, and made them better". With that mandate in hand, bring on the

TEMPORARY BANNER!

Project 1 – UFC Undisputed 2009

Reviewed by: Armando Rodriguez
Review Score: 7.9
The 411:

UFC Undisputed 2009 is a great beginning for a new series, but lots of things need improvement if they want to become "King of the Ring" (or octagon). I can say that this is the game that has come the closest to capturing all the excitement of the UFC in video game form, but they need to work on improving the AI (especially when it comes to submissions), gives us more Create-a-Fighter options and reducing the amount of menu navigation and flash knockouts. Mild thumbs up for UFC Undisputed 2009.


The Good

Even for casual UFC fans, this game is a blast. There's a certain visceral pleasure to be had in making digital representations of yourself and that professional douche at work who thinks it's perfectly normal to spend the day on the phone talking to their family while you do all the work, and pounding said douche into oblivion. Personally I prefer tapping them out, but I know others prefer the primal thrill of watching the opponent's mouthguard go skittering across the blood-stained canvas as their foe slumps comatose to the ground as the result of a solid kick to the jaw. Others still like to affirm their alpha male status by climbing atop the opponent and tenderizing their face into submission.

This really speaks to the key strength of the game: it's not necessary to be a UFC fan to enjoy the game, much like it's not necessary to follow wrestling to enjoy the yearly Smackdown vs Raw offerings. That said, they've done a good job of capturing the feel and atmosphere of the fights, with everything from ring intros to cornermen to ring girls to well-engineered commentary.

The game looks gorgeous, and there's a certain satisfaction in watching the close-up replay of your knee rearranging the jawbone of your hapless antagonist. The developers also did an amazing job in making full use of the entire controller to make the diverse styles as realistic as possible. Too often a game will have wonky controls, but will leave some of the buttons unused. By using everything (except, I think, clicking the left analog stick), UFC avoids that problem.

I thoroughly enjoy this game, and in fact it cuts into my Prototype time even now. That's not to say the game is perfect however. I mean, why would I be writing about it in this column if it were perfect?



The Bad

The problems with this game are mainly cosmetic in nature, but there are two or three that frustrate me enough that I can't play the game for extended periods. The first of these is the autosave feature. After every match, and every sparring or training session in career mode, the game saves not only your career status but also your fighter's status, and it takes A LONG TIME. There is no option to turn off the autosave or to customize when it saves.

Then there's the Customize menu where you pimp out your fighter. As is often the case with new game franchises that include create modes, there are not many choices for your customization, and it's limited to his actual fight wear. It also takes FOREVER to navigate through the menus to customize your shorts. Now this would not be a big deal if adding logos and sponsors to your shorts wasn't such an important part of the game (enabling you to gain cred, which gives you access to better trainers and such). As it is, if you don't know the five-invite trick you'll be running back to this menu every time you break a new level and get a sponsor offering more cred per fight. There are something like 8 submenus to go through, each requiring a load time, to get to the logo screen, and each time you add one it send you back 2 menus.

The game includes an email system, which is how people like Dana White, your trainer and the matchmaker contact you. Problem is, all the important emails (choosing opponents, short-notice matches, autograph signings and so on) automatically come up anyway, so the only things you're missing by not reading the emails (which again requires 3 menus and a lot of loading) are the rankings (yours is the only one that matters and it shows on the calendar screen), trash talk from opponents and messages from Dana. None of these impact the game. Having a feature that serves no purpose is never a good idea.

Speaking of which, how many of you knew there were taunts in this game? Yes, pressing a direction on the D-pad will cause your fighter to taunt the opponent, which is fun in multiplayer but has no effect on either fighter. Well, if it does have an effect I never noticed it.

As good as the utilization of the whole controller is, it can feel a bit haphazard, especially when trying to counter submissions or apply one of your own. Button-mashing should never be such an important part of any game in a time where a new controller costs the same as a new game, and the constant stick-waggling is not much better.

I've saved the biggest issue for last, and it's one that really should have been fixed by now. In multiplayer, there is a large window of time between the match ending and the result being recorded. If a fighter disconnects during this window, the fight result is nullified. Therefore you get a ton of people running around online with perfect fight records because they quit if they don't win. I fought one guy the other night who was something ridiculous like 77-2 and tapped him out in 3 minutes. He quit right away. I almost screamed.



The Fixes

Fix the blessed menus in the customize screen It's not rocket science. Put more options in each menu, remove all the submenus, and give us an option to go back to the starting screen. While you're at it, give us some options for more gear, including gear to wear during octagon entrances. Also, give us octagon entrances.

Cut down on the autosaves It's a little excessive, guys. At the very lest, let us choose when to save. Make it semi-auto. Do SOMETHING. Maybe only save character data after each camp or spar and then the career after each fight.

Make the e-mails and taunts mean something If you're going to have these things in the game, then they should do something. Maybe taunts improve your opponent's damage if they connect but makes their defense weaker. Include some emails that can give you bonuses if you respond, or give you the chance to trash talk opponents which in turn helps you in the match. If you're not going to make these features mean anything, remove them!

More skill, less fanatic button-pressing I understand why the mashing was included – the developers have obviously tried their best to make this game as realistic and inclusive of the various UFC styles as possible, and button-mashing represents the brute-force method. The problem is that the technical method is no less frantic as it requires rapid rotation of the right analog stick. Why not make THAT the brute force method and have the technical one require timing or the right button combination?

More variety and uniqueness Apart from their looks, one kickboxer/BJJ fighter plays the same as another in this game. Perhaps each fighter could have a favourite strike and/or hold and/or transition, pre-determined for existing fighters and customizable for created ones. Have Chuck Liddell's overhand right do more damage, Mike Swick's guillotine is more effective in the first round, and so on. Also allow fighters to move up or down in weight class at the cost of a few weeks of training.

FIX ONLINE PLAY! This is a given, and something that should be easily patched. A fighter who abandons should get a loss, plain and simple.

A lot of these suggestions would have to be in a sequel, and the ones that don't (more customization for clothing, for example) SHOULD wait. I for one don't want to be digging through that menu to see what was added.

I hope you enjoyed the first installment of Game Improvements. If there's a specific game you want to see in the column, or if you just have general feedback, feel free to put it in the comments. Until next time, Stay Cool, Rock Hard.

Lansdellicious – Out.

Screenshots
All 11 UFC 2009 Undisputed Screenshots