The first thing I did after installing UFC 2010 to my 360’s hard drive was run through the tutorial. I played UFC 09 a lot, to the point where I very rarely lost, but when I tried the 2010 demo, I found that the core gameplay had changed sufficiently enough for me to get my hind quarters handed to me quite a few times. A run through of the tutorial for the full game, was essential.
Some of the controls I remember from UFC 09 are null now, such as pressing the opposite direction on the right analogue stick to the direction your opponent is trying to transition in the ground game to block the change. Now all you do is hold back to block, or tap back at the right time to reverse it and, sometimes, end up in a more advantageous position. And now, instead of having to transition into the postured full mount, you transition into full mount, free your head, and control your posture with the left analogue stick.
This can only be a good thing. Where the previous installment’s controls were a little clunky, such as attempting to predict the exact move your opponent is going to make before even he knew, the game has been streamlined. Now the friend I always had over and played UFC with won’t constantly get destroyed every time I decide to throw up my hands and knock him down into some ground-and-pound. Now he just has to get the timing, which is a good thing, as his ESP is a little off.
As far as the rest of the core gameplay, there are a few new things introduced, such as submission transitions, the sway system, new clinch positions, cage interaction (ie, you can not actually touch the cage around the ring, rather than conspicuously slide off it like water from a duck’s back), all of which will be covered in more detail in the final review. Oh, it also feels much faster than the previous game, too. You can rain down punches like an automatic punchgun if you time your first punch right.
A single mistake can, quite easily, win (or lose) you the fight if you’re skilled enough.
The game looks gorgeous, of course, provided you don’t take issue with using the word ‘gorgeous’ to describe lots of heinously muscled men beating each other up. Fighters are as detailed as they ever were, blood still flies all over the place – the only really noticeable differences between this and the previous installment are the fighters, who seem to have had the difficulty ramped up a little bit more.
The differences are negligible, but it’s difficult to improve on a game that causes people to actually ask ‘what channel is this on?’ when they walk into the room. Knockouts and just as satisfying cringe-worthy as they were previously, with the added benefit of an improved fighting system to cause them with.
The create-a-fighter mode is much more detailed than it was, too, with my favourite part being the new fighting techniques – you don’t pick a technique and get given its moves, now you can cherry pick moves and build your own fighting style from the ground up. My 09 ambitions of having Brock Lesnar’s surging punches combined with the head kicks of Chuck Liddell can finally be realised.
Career mode has a good few changes up its sleeve, too. Whilst it is, in essence, the same, what’s there has been streamlined yet again. Now, you don’t have to manually spar, which took a lot of time in 09 and was relentlessly dull. An auto option will spar reasonably well, saving you time and frustration.
From the first level (20 exhibitions and 4 hours of career mode) UFC 2010 has improved in every area it could have over the previous game in the series. Stay tuned for our full review.
