Latest Features
UK Exclusive: Lineage II Chaotic Throne Gracia FictionUK Exclusive: Dawn Of War II Q&A - Part 2The Bourne Conspiracy Dev Diary 4UK Exclusive: Dawn Of War II Q&AFar Cry 2 - Q&AUser Reviews
There are currently 0 User Reviews for Fight Night 2004Write your own review for this game today and you will receive 100 Gamer Points.
Click here to register
Exclusive: Fight Night 2004 Q&A Feature
Derek dela Fuente
15/03/2004
Kudo Tsunoda gives the lowdown on why Fight Night 2004 is quite unlike any other boxing title out there...
Fight Night 2004, EAâs photo realistic, great looking boxing game with an all star cast which will have added support from Roy Jones Jr, who many believe is the finest pound for pound boxer currently around, looks certain to be a massive hit. With an extensive lists of features which include revolutionary new analogue controls, allowing gamers to pummel their opponents with surgical precision, controlling both punch location and power to cause damage with style and strategy, along with an all-new defensive system, also allows players full body control as they take a run at the title â“ are only a few of the dynamic mechanics implemented.
EA SPORTSM Fight Night Boxing 2004 challenges players to step into the ring and come out swinging for 12 rounds of intense championship boxing action.
Derek dela Fuente our boxing expert caught up with Kudo Tsunoda, the Producer on the title, who proudly boasts about being the Reigning Office Fight Night Champion, to give us some more knockout information on what the game will deliver.
TVG: What core expertise does the team that is creating the game, have, how au fait are they with boxing, etc. and would you agree that it is a necessity to have a love of boxing to be able create a game like this?
For EA Sports Fight Night 2004, we brought together an all-star team from the entire family of EA talent specifically to build this game. The goal from the beginning has been more than just revitalizing EAâs boxing franchise, but to revolutionize the way boxing games are played. The team is a mix of developers who have built key EA sports franchises and people with core fighting game experience. And of course we took people who are passionate about the sport of boxing. Several team members have actual fight experience in the amateur ranks. The people responsible for designing the gameplay in Fight Night 2004 started boxing to get prepared for building the game. I personally have always been a huge fight fan. I had never boxed before this project but spending the last 18 months fighting really helped prepare me for making this game. Our teamâs passion for boxing and what actually makes fighting fun was instrumental to our development process. It definitely shows through in how addictive the gameplay is.
TVG: When you go about developing a boxing game you must have looked first at other boxing games and written a must have list, as well as a priority list? Tell us about some of the preliminary work that has gone into creating the game?
Yes, this was the other key area of research that really helped define our design goals for the game. I probably played every boxing game made on every format going back to the Atari 2600. When you play that many games in such a short period of time, you really start to notice the similarities of the different products. It was amazing to me that in the nearly 30 years of console boxing games, the way you throw punches in boxing games has not changed at all. You press a button and a punch animation plays. Different buttons play different punch animations. Gamers really have no control over their fists. There is no sensation of actually throwing your punches. This basic punch mechanic has led to some really boring, repetitive gameplay. It is always each boxer running to the middle of the ring and both players hitting the punch buttons as fast as they can. The only skill to landing a punch is rapidly hitting a button over and over again. And that is just really not fun or rewarding.
This is what put our biggest feature, Total Punch Control, at the top of the must have list for Fight Night 2004. This allows you to not just play punch animations, but actually control your fists on screen by using the analog sticks. The Total Punch Control technology is used for throwing punches AND for blocking incoming punches. Both systems are fast and responsive, and make landing punches based on skill, not button mashing. The gameplay mechanics that have developed from this system completely change the way people play boxing games.
TVG: It is easy to see why EA chose Roy Jones Jr. to be the focus and marketing tool for this game. Can you tell us what actual input he had throughout the development of the game?
He has been the perfect person to work with on this title. Roy Jones Jr. is the best boxer pound for pound in the world right now. His type of skill comes around once in a generation. Being able to understand what makes Roy Jones Jr. so good at what he does helped define Total Punch Control. It is really cool to hear him talk about what he can do with his fists. It showed us how critical having better control of your fists in the game was to changing the old boxing gameplay mechanic. But what really amazed me was how dynamic the Roy Jones Jr.âs attitude is. Besides all the things he brought to the gameplay, his lifestyle and attitude were the core inspiration behind the gameâs overall presentation. His bigger than life, in your face, personality really shines through in the game.
TVG: How many âin game boxersâ will Fight Night offer (with signature moves and what are a few?) and can you select to be Roy Jones Jr.?
There are 32 total real life boxers in the game. We have a great mix of current champs (Roy Jones Jr., Lennox Lewis, Shane Mosely, Arturo Gatti), Legends (Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Jake LaMotta), and new up and comers (Jermaine Taylor, Jeff Lacy). You can play as any of the real life boxers or create your own character with our create a boxer system.
TVG: One facet with all boxing games is that they all rely heavily on the skills of the player and the actual boxer that they are controlling â“ his skills and attributes, are hardly disernable. Would you agree this is a good point and do you intend to change this aspect of the game?
I totally agree with what you are saying about how all boxing games have characters that feel exactly the same no matter who it is. I can remember playing with two totally different characters (like Butterbean and Sugar Ray Leonard) and dancing around the right with Butterbean while Sugar Ray Leonard was hunting me down fighting me like a slugger. It just wasnât right. Each of our boxers has numerous physical attributes and ratings that are tuneable by our designers. Different boxers also have different styles of animations and fight with different tactics. So not only are the differences between a boxers skills and attributes a major factor in the gameplay, but their animations and the actual decisions they make in the ring are driven by their attributes. Of course, the gameplay still relies on the skills of the player. They need to understand their boxerâs skill set and use them to the biggest advantage.
TVG: How many detection points will the average boxer have and will they all scar up, be susceptible in differing ways?
With Total Punch Control, and the physics that can get applied to our punches, the way we detect punches is a bit different from what you have seen in other games. Instead of having detection points, you can really hit your opponent anywhere on their body or face. With all of our punch reactions based on physics, you get great reactions to every point where a fist makes contact with their opponent. You can do damage all over your opponentâs face. Bruises, swelling and cuts appear all around both eyes. You can individually target a boxerâs nose if you want and cause damage there. Or, damage will show up on a boxerâs lower face and mouth. Each of the boxers cut and bruise differently as the damage is matched specifically to each boxerâs face. All boxers also have different cut ratings that dictate how easily they injure. Somebody like Arturo Gatti will swell up around the eyes much earlier than a Bernard Hopkins.
TVG: What innovations do you hope to offer and how important is technology advancement to the team?
Besides the Total Punch Control, one our biggest innovations has been the way we handle knockdowns. All of the knockdowns in Fight Night 2004 are completely based on physics instead of using pre-canned animations. So you can knock somebody down a million times, and you will get a million different knockdown reactions. Each is completely unique. The boxerâs legs turn to jelly, they lose control of their body, and drop to the canvas. The physics system was developed specifically for this title and is a huge technological step forward in game physics. We really focus on creating our breakthrough technology to pay off the gameâs biggest features. The physics system is also used for all punch reactions and for animating any parts of the boxerâs or ring girlâs bodies that need to be controlled by real world elements.
TVG: Can you please explain the âTotal Punch Controlâ and briefly the new school attitude feature for the readers?
Yes! So I have talked some about Total Punch Control already, as it is our biggest feature in the game. Again, it is controlling your fists with the analog sticks allowing you to control every aspect of your punches as well as being able to use it to pick off incoming punches. Boxerâs fists make a very specific motion when throwing a punch. You make this same motion on the analog stick to throw that punch. As you move the analog stick, you see your fist making that exact same motion on screen.
As far as the gameâs new school attitude, we just felt boxing and the way the sport is presented needed an update. Boxing, unlike any other sport, does not have a centralized group that updates things like how boxing is presented via the media. So nothing has really changed in boxing since the 1950s. The people who surround the sport of boxing (announcers, commentators, etc.) are the same types of people that were doing that job in the â50s. Every other sport is continuously updating their presentation and keeping it fresh⦠boxing has remained stuck in a time frame that we have not seen in the last 50 years. So we wanted to make the game more appealing to the people playing the gamesâ¦more representative of Roy Jones Jr. and his personality.
TVG: Will the game pretty much be a fighting and progression to the next fighter to eventual best in the world or are there sub elements to the game?
Heck no! Our career mode goes into a lot more depth than a simple fighter progression. There are 50 ranked boxers in any one of our 6 weight classes. Each time you schedule a fight; you have different choices of where you fight and who you fight, for what purse. How you manage your career, who you fight when, has a huge impact on how quickly you can move up the rankings. Each time you have a fight, the other boxers in the weight class fight each other as well. So not only are you constantly moving in the rankings, but like in real life each boxer in your weight class has a career they are managing. In each year of your career, older boxers retire and new boxers enter the rankings. So you are never stuck fighting the same boxers over and over again. Once you win the title, new younger boxers will move up the rankings and try to take your belt from you. The career mode has an endless number of different types of boxers you might fight. It is just how many you can fit into a 20 year career.
TVG: What modes, training, and sets up will be on offer and can you create your very own boxer?
You can fight exhibition fights, you can fight online, or you can fight in our career mode. You can create a boxer of your own for any of these modes or you can use any of our real life boxers. Create a Boxer is the most fun I have seen in any game. While it is always fun to create your own character and take them into a game, it adds a whole different level of fun when you and a friend can build characters that look like you, take them in a ring, and fight it out. I have been in fights with my Kudo character and it is a real blast to see my face all bruised, swollen, and beaten. It is hysterical!
In career mode, there are 4 games you can play, 1 before each fight. You can hit the heavy bag, work a combo dummy, practice with target mitts, or go for a sparring session. How you perform in each of these games determines how many rating points you get to build your character with.
TVG: In one sentence - sum up Fight Night 2004.
More fun than actually punching somebody in the face for real!!!
