The Fight from Sony feels like it has been a long time coming. It was one of the first titles mentioned to the press when the PlayStation Move motion controller started gaining hype. The Fight was originally due as a launch title for the PlayStation Move, but delays held the title back a month. Finally, we have our hands on it.
Grab your PlayStation Move motion controllers and step into the dark and gritty underground of bare knuckle brawling in The Fight: Lights Out. The power to climb to the top of the underground scene is in your hands. The only rule is that there are no rules -- you decide how to take down your next challenger. Get them in a headlock and throw elbows to the skull, or go ballistic by swinging with all-out haymakers. Use the PlayStation Move motion controllers to dominate opponents with accurately tracked strikes. Do you have what it takes to rule the underground?
Features:
- Take control of a rough and tumble bare-knuckle fighter in the campaign mode as you crusade to beat down anyone that stands between you and your shot at becoming the toughest fighter out there.
- Feel the action by using the PlayStation Move motion controller as you step into the game and command your fighter"s every movement with lifelike 1:1 motion for deadly precision.
- Unleash a wide arsenal of brutal attacks. Start simple with punches and uppercuts before amping up the intensity with headlocks and overhand blows to the head, plus an assault of other dirty fighting techniques using two PlayStation Move motion controllers at once, together with the PlayStation Eye camera.
- Get fit and burn calories! Weight-lift hit the speed bag as you perform different exercises to increase your character"s stamina, strength, and speed.
- Opponents are everywhere! Jump online and go head-to-head with other fighters and make in-game bets to win cash.
The premise of the game is to take on various opponents in underground fights. You control the game either by using one PlayStation Move controller and the navigation controller, or via two PlayStation move controllers. This is how we played the game as it seems to provide you with the most realistic feel and the best controls. In The Fight you make your fighting moves by simply throwing a punch as you would do in a fight. It works well on screen, as it shows your exact movement almost perfectly in tune with the way you throw your punches.
Holding up both PlayStation Move controllers to your face has you blocking, while some special dirty moves can be done but require a different style of motion from you. One is called the hammer, which has you throw your arm up in the air then back down to the ground. Your character on screen then does the hammer move in the same way you just did it and pummels your opponent if you have timed it right.
There are other special moves too such as headlocks and more that can be unlocked as you play. They do add a little bit of variety which adds to feel of the game overall. You can also do low level punches, by holding the move controllers lower down around your waist or through ducking down then throwing punches.
Holding both PlayStation Move controllers and swinging left or right has you dodging punches while holding down on the move button, allows you to awkwardly move around the "ring". The movement feels awkward when doing this, as if you are just shuffling around like a zombie rather than moving with speed or skill.
The AI can also be very slow in following up punches against you. This is most apparent when you are low on stamina and trying to move away. Also, for some reason when fighting, some punches do not seem to be detected by the game despite hitting your opponent. We"re not sure why this is and we can only assume it is a bug that has got through certification.
As you fight in the game you earn cash and you can use this money to repair injuries and to pay for training sessions. The better some of your punches are, the more you can earn while fighting. You can also bet on your fights if you want to. For example, you can bet on the match you are taking part in. This can either be to win the match or to complete a set rule such as knocking out your opponent in 60 seconds. It is a good idea which works well enough and can bring in some much need cash.
The multiplayer side of The Fight can be played via either split screen mode or over the PlayStation network. It adds some longevity to the game, though the same problems apply online as they do in the single player game. However, it is more fun to play against friends than the console controlled characters.
The game also allows what Sony have called Head Tracking which is done by the PlayStation Eye. No matter what we have tried to do in our setup for the game, we just couldn"t get this to work at all. The software kept telling us that our lighting wasn"t right or that there were other problems. We have also tried the game in other locations and had the exact same results each time.
The Fight also has the annoyance of making you calibrate the PlayStation move controllers each time you play against a fighter. Now at first it seemed as though this was a mistake on our part, but unfortunately not, as this occurs every single time you fight. There doesn"t seem to be any need for this to happen, as we were not moving out of the view of the PlayStation Eye camera or going anywhere else after our first setup of the game.
One thing that The Fight does well is to wear you out physically. This is mostly due to you throwing your arms around and punching left and right as hard and as fast as you can. In the end we were sweating after just 45 minutes of playing the game, and the next day we all had aching arms and shoulders. Although we are not sure if that is a good or bad sign, it at least gives you some kind of physical work out. The thing is though, throwing an extremely hard punch while physically holding the PlayStation move controllers in your front room doesn"t really come across the same in the game. It is never as fast or as hard as you do it, so it always feels a bit of a let down.
As you can see there are a lot of negatives in our review, but that doesn"t mean that it is all bad. The game has some great 1:1 motion control and everything you do gets shown perfectly on the screen from punches to dodging. The problem is that not all punches get noticed and the movement when walking can be awkward. Multiplayer modes do however add some additional length to the game, though the games faults will probably lessen the amount of players online in the near future. The Fight also lacks any kind of story in the single player mode which leaves it all feeling a little rushed without any depth, and the full motion video in the game is overly cheesy despite the adult feel the game aims to have.
In the end, The Fight feels like it is unfinished and rushed out. It had great potential and the 1:1 motion shows well on screen, despite never working as you hoped it would when trying to connect the punches. A technical knockout.