Great for new fans, masterful for expert fans, plain hard knuckle fun.
A twelve year spanning career mode only offers a Create-a-Fighter challenger the chance to hold the gold but does a great job of simulating the journey from unknown to champion, with a strong custom skill class, attire and fighter modifications. A huge roaster of real fighters across five different weight classes waits at startup, throwing them into the cage with exhibition matches, title defense, title (capture) mode, tournament and Ultimate Fights, which recreates the best fights in UFC history, or gives the chance to change them. Online only offers exhibition or tournament play between players with custom UFC/create a fighter rules, leaving the UFC selected fighter possibly destroyed by a highly skilled CAF. A brand new game comes packed with a code for online play; a used copy will cost roughly an extra $5 for online fighting.
The fights appear just like the sport that inspired it. Fighters appear weak or tired with increasing body damage and a few fists to the head will leave a cut for blood to drip onto shoulders, bodies and the mat. Fighters are limited to competition in their respective weight classes, height or reach don't play a much of a factor due to the feel of balance between each fighter, never knowing when you might get stunned or knocked onto the mat makes engaging play. Graphics and sound look great in presentation to make this title look more like the actual sport. The control scheme parallels those in recent boxing games with the left stick acting for fighter movement and right as takedown or submissions. The controls remain the same when fighters hit the mat but as any true fan will know that's a whole different game in the struggle to stay victorious, hunter or hunted can quickly be toppled for the win.
Plenty can be found for anyone in the various modes or only exhibition matches. The excellent, responsive controls that can lead to easy upset/defeat is the meat on the hook reeled in by near life like capture/presentation of the sport. The demo did a great job of setting up the game with much more in the full version. Anybody looking for a never ending title with different character selections and match outcomes or an engaging sports/fighting title should step in the octagon.
Last Words: B+, easy to pickup & fun to master, an easy title that you can lose a few hours in, not many of these titles exist anymore.