Fight Night Round 4 Review

Fight Night Round 4 was one of the most anticipated games of the year.  After Fight Night Round 3 became such a huge blockbuster on both the PS3 and Xbox360 people were expecting a successor to that great, if unrealistic, Fight Night Round 3.  Does Fight Night Round 4 live up to the hype?  What's it like to step into the ring as Mike Tyson?  How is the career mode?  Is the music good?  All these answers will be revealed to you, dear reader.

Audio -  

Commentary:  Joe Tessitore returns as the voice of the series, providing the play-by-play with the recent addition of Teddy Atlas on color commentary.  Tessitore recycles quite a bit from FNR3, but it fits into the action quite well, and gives a good indicator of how the fight is going.  As far as Teddy Atlas goes, his off the wall references will either endear him to you or drive you nuts.  He comes out swinging with homespun sayings, stories of Cus D'Amato and strange topical anecdotes covering "That beautiful sunset" Tessitore saw on vacation to Ray Charles' rendition of "God Bless America."  The only real problem with the commentary is that it is not varied enough, and repeats and recycles throughout the fight.  Another complaint is that the commentary sometimes describes things incorrectly, calling an inside fight an outside fight, or stating the wrong person winning on the cards.  All in all, they did a much better job than some other series, but reusing lines from FNR3 and the lack of variation is a bit disappointing.

In Game Sounds:  Very good, every punch sound indicates the power of the punch on impact, boxers breathe audibly, and the sounds of bones cracking as in FNR3 are still in.  The ropes, bells, ref and announcers are as good as they should be.  The seconds yell from outside the ring encouragement and advice.

Music:  I have to be honest, I turned off more than half of the music.  It will depend on your personal taste, but I thought songs such as "Rocker", "Cheah Bear", and "Mercury" were just dreadful.  There were a few good picks on there such as "N.A.S.A. Music" which features Method Man and E-40, and a remix of El-P's "Flyentology", I also liked the Mos Def track "Life in Marvelous Times."  Like a lot of EA games, it's a mixed bag and what I dislike, some of you will like.

Control:  As far as punching the game revolves around Total Punch Control, a new scheme that is a bit difficult to go in depth on without seeing it.  Luckily the game provides a tutorial.  I still dislike TPC but it is alright, except when you go online.  Because of lag it is sometimes hard to get the punch you want.  I've heard that they will patch it for traditional button inputs, which I personally would prefer.  Some will like TPC a lot though, I am sure.  It is improved from the old version from FNR3, but I believe it should be optional none the less.

Graphics:  I honestly didn't see a big improvement from FNR3, if you like that, it will be good for you.  It still looks fantastic, and as far as the Created Boxers go, importing pictures makes for a realistic looking boxer.  Created Boxers cant really be made to look otherworldly or ridiculous anymore and the equipment is limited compared to FNR3.

Gameplay:

The boxing is great, very realistic.  This could be a turnoff to a lot of people, as FNR3 had crazy "super punches" and other things like that.  Gone are the Flash KO punches and similar things.  Also changed are the parrying system and counters, no longer can a Philly Shell boxer land a huge counter 3 seconds after the parry.

The computer is actually a challenge this time, though I think that it goes for parry-counter way more than a real life opponent.  Definitely a step up from Fight Night Round 3.

Legacy Mode is an addition that will probably be very popular with some, but I found it to be a bit too involved and hated the training games.  The training minigames are a lot more difficult this time around, with many people I know just doing auto-training.  All days must be simulated through which is a bit of a waste of time, it makes sense in Legacy Mode for NHL and NFL games but managing one boxer shouldn't require all this nonsense.

Online is done pretty well.  There is a problem with input lag, as I mentioned above in the control section.  There is very little recourse for ragequitting, but after a few rounds the dropper will receive a loss.  I do think that the button controls for punches should be reintroduced to combat the input lag.  World Championship Mode is great to prove your skills with a Created Boxer as well.

So, is it worth a buy?  Maybe.  If you're a true fan of boxing, you'll be impressed with the 48 boxers in game, online is alright, and the game is very realistic in comparison to other boxing games.  If you're looking to slug it out, it's not as entertaining.  My only gripes are the Total Punch Control system, mediocre to terrible music, Teddy Atlas' sometimes stupid canned commentary, and the online input lag.  Other than that, awesome game.

Lives up to the hype, but still not the best out: 8.5/10