Fight Night Round 4...

I'll be getting that. FN3 was the first console boxing game I couldn't put down. I just hope you can press A+B+Y+Y+Up and chew off the other dude's ear when playing as Tyson LOL

That can't be good. I will rent first.

Tyson?They couldnt get any more relevant fighter? The sport is in a downward spiral I think as MMA becomes more main stream.

(doh but this reminds me, I taped Wedensday Night Fights but forgot to add time on the DVR so hopefully the softball game prior didnt go long and the fights ended quickley).

Looking forward to this. Part 3 was awesome (although admittedly I didnt get a lot of replay value out of it for some reason.....not really sure why). I wouldnt sweat them rewriting the game engine. They rewrite things to improve them. Boxing is one thing EA has usually gotten right, and it will have been a couple years unlike the yearly ports of Madden/NBA/Tiger.

Also, its great to have Iron mike in the game. He's a mental freak, but he was also a boxing freak of nature in his prime. Makes for a fun video game character if you ask me!

The only thing that worries me is that this one will be developed by a completely different studio.

After EA Chicago shutdown, Fight Night development was moved to EA Canada, and the person who I believe was the driving force behind part 3's development won't have any involvement since he's moved onto Microsoft http://www.gamespot.com/news/6185160.html.

I remember seeing videos of Kudo passionately promoting the first game, and he seemed to be a real boxing fan as well. I know that the Canadians can make a great hockey game, but I just hope they have people on staff who have as much love for the sweet science as Kudo appeared to have...

this is good news and the new Prizefighter game will give the consumer more choices as well.

Confirmed fighters for fight night round 4

Heavyweight

* Muhammad Ali
* Joe Frazier
* Mike Tyson
* Lennox Lewis
* Rocky Marciano
* Evander Holyfield
* George Foreman
* Joe Louis
* Sonny Liston
* Tommy Morrison

Light Heavyweight

* Roy Jones Jr
* Chad Dawson
* James Toney
* Antonio Tarver
* Jeff Lacy
* Bernard Hopkins
* Glen Johnson

Middleweight

* Sugar Ray Leonard
* Winky Wright
* John Duddy
* Kelly Pavlik
* Arthur Abraham
* Joe Calzaghe
* Thomas Hearns
* Marvin Hagler
* Felix Trinidad
* Jake LaMotta
* Jermain Taylor

Welterweight

* Sergio Mora
* Oscar De La Hoya
* Ricky Hatton
* Floyd Mayweather Jr.
* Emanuel Augustus
* Miguel Cotto
* Shane Mosley
Lightweight

* Roberto Duran
* Joel Casamayor
* Jos? Luis Castillo
* Hector Camacho
* Diego Corrales
* Michael Katsidis
* Amir Khan
Featherweight

* Manny Pacquiao
* Gerry Penalosa
* Rey Bautista
* Naseem Hamed
* Marco Antonio Barrera
* Willie Pep

I was thinking the same thing, that a different studio doing it is worrisome.

A different studio means there's actually a shot of this being a serious boxing fan's game and not just an arcade fighter featuring real life boxers.

I cant wait for this game. Mike Tyson in his prime is still the most dominate and intimidating boxer I've ever seen. Hell I even go back and play Punchout on a NES emulator from time to time. And I still cant beat Iron Mike there. His personal life gone amuck does little to ruin the image I retain of great competitor he was many years ago. Hell I could watch a replay of Mike Tyson greatest knockouts right now if it came on tv.


As for the "new" engine/studio.

I've personally never seen EA go backwards. (ok.. well I take that back.. but that was only their first offerings on the new HD consoles).

So I really dont expect the game to play any worse. No matter what studio is working on it. If the new engine isnt better, then it doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out.. "hey lets just use the old engine instead".

After all.. if its one thing we can agree is.. is that EA knows how to put miles on an engine. If it was a Toyota.. they would have 700,000 miles on a 2004 Camry.

Thats a good lineup to me

That's a great line up! I wanna see how they implement Floyd's shoulder roll.

Hehe... Looking at the Heavyweight line-up all I can think is "one of these things is not like the other... one of these things just doesn't belong".

Tommy wanted money? Cheap to license, I'm sure!

I can definitely see why Tommy would want to be in the game. Just an interesting choice from EA's perspective.

Great lineup, still some glaring omissions though...

Ray Robinson
Larry Holmes
Julio Caesar Chavez

I'm one of the Administrators on the Maxboxing.com forums (if you're a boxing fan, you should definitely be posting there), and we have a member who goes by the name of "Brizzo", and is an EA dev. He was a member of the now defunct EA chicago team. Now, he is the assistant producer on FNR4. This is great be cause he's a hardcore boxing fan. I've always felt like the FN series was made by casual boxing fans for casual boxing fans, but this time, it'll be different. To get his dev team in the mode for this game, Brizzo is making them actually get in the ring and do some training. He's created a youtube channel showing some of their training, and he hopes to post some more behind the scenes dev stuff in the future.

http://www.youtube.com/user/FightNightFour

Oh, and check out Maxboxing.com if you're a fan at all. I post there as "Keyza Soulsay".

As for the rosters, some eyebrow raising omissions- Sugar Ray Leonard, Erik Morales, Sugar Ray Robinson, Arturo Gatti, and Mickey Ward spring to mind. Would also be nice to see Juan Diaz, David Haye, Edison Miranda and Antonio Margarito in there.


Chavez is difficult to get in games for the same reason Tyson was- He likes to license himself out to exclusive games that bear his name- In theory, he could make more money off of "Julio Caesar Chavez Boxing" than he could from licensing it out to EA. There was a JCC boxing game out for SNES looooong ago, but it was never released in the U.S. Actually it was, but it had Riddick Bowe's name on it.

I have to call you on that. I heard that from day 1, before FN 1 came out. Having his team train will do nothing to help make a realistic game.. FN will always be about 4-6 KD a fight. special punches, awful parrying, & only holding when it is convient. & Stamina not playing a factor, again. I don't care how hard my fighter is breathing. You can still throwing way too many punches per round.. Especially for middle through heavy..

& the list, while the best so far, still has too many retreads..

And you know this because?

Brizzo has already stated that they are aiming to make the game more realistic, and that having people get into the ring will help the devs to understand some of the basic mechanics of boxing that the FN series has been lacking in the past. Doing some training is sure to help more than hurt, and having a guy who is a hardcore, actual boxing fan helps a ton. I remember seeing a dev interview from FNR3, and none of those guys were hardcaore fans, and it's clear from the product.

EA's past track record. Is madden a Sim? Is Live a sim? But FN 4 will be a sim?
You are very naive if you think he will change what the head honcho's at EA deem as 'fun' & 'boring'.. He still has to follow orders from the top brass.. I'm not saying it won't be more realistic then previous efforts, but I'm very skeptical.. As EA markets FN to the MK/SF/DOA crowd, with sim aspects sprinkled in. Casual gamers who buy FN think going the distance is boring. My friend hates boxing but loves FN3 cause of all the special punches you can do..

Believe me. I want FN4 to be the greatest boxing game of all time. & I still find 3 to be the best.. & will probably pick up 4..

Is ANY sports game truly a "sim"? Even Boxer's Road 2, The best and most sim boxing game possibly ever, isn't all that "sim"...

Yea, sports games have to cater to the casual fan as well as the hardcore fan. Most of EA's games can maintain that balance fairly well. But boxing fans working on a boxing game will yield different results than casual boxing fans (like say, your friend) working on a boxing game. You know why the FN games had those awful arm dangling parries? Because the devs didn't know any better. Know, you have devs that do.

Really, FN only has a few things to tweak gameplay wise- Haymakers, Parries, Stamina, and Stats are the big things, but should be easy tweaks. Career mode is the other big one, and this is where I hope the difference will be seen. I could have lived with Round 3's broken gameplay if career mode had been top-notch.

Really? you can't wait to use Prince Naseem?

Thank God he's done fighting in the US (at least I think he is).

He has to be most annoying boxer I've ever seen.

I did enjoy watching him get pelted with a beer and then get his ass kicked.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxM6yRiFliw

The Klitschko brothers being included would be nice.

manny pacquiao should be on the cover. afterall, he is the number 1 pound for pound fighter in the world.

We have the same video game boxing dream

I dunno about that one.. well atleast not in real life. Lennox greatest skill was his jab. Long, accurate and boring. I dont think either Vitali or Vlady wanted any of that.

I know they have decent jabs too.. but it just doesnt seem as dominant to me.

Vitali almost got Lennox, but that cut was bad. Probably one of the worst cuts I've ever seen.