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Welcome back to the Octagon
UFC 3 is launching at the end of the month for all those who didn't know, I've personally been hyped about this game since EA first announced it. Previous instalments of the EA franchise have offered various improvements from the old UFC games, but so far none of them have really hit the spot for me. I often find myself reverting back to playing Fight Night Champion to get that buzz, so why am I expecting anything better from UFC 3?
Well.. Quite frankly, it looks phenomenal, the combat animations were a little clunky pre-beta but they seem to have ironed out a lot of those kinks, the stamina system in UFC 2 was laughable, online mode became a grind fest with 90% of the people playing just maxing out their striking stats and paying absolutely no attention to anything else because it was all about landing them combos. Well, you can't do that now, if you did you'd find yourself sucking in air after a few minutes and being left completely at your opponents mercy, the stamina system in UFC 3 is an unforgiving monster, button mashers be warned!
Striking has been completely overhauled, relies far more on buttons than the movement sticks, it's going to be strange to get used to but it comes with its benefits, now you can fire those much needed uppercuts whilst moving back. If you ever played Fight Night Champion without using full spectrum control that's pretty much what they went for with the striking in this, if you didn't, the striking is going to come as a shock to you, you will have to completely re-learn everything, including combos and when to throw them.
The ground game hasn't changed much but it never really needed to, the ground mechanics were never outrageously broken, but they have been tweaked to provide a more realistic approach. If you're familiar with UFC2's ground mechanics you shouldn't have much of an issue with UFC 3's but you'll be pleasantly surprised by an addition of new transitions and animations to further that realism.
Career mode has been overhauled, it'll no longer be a grind fest, now you get to promote your fights and control your fighters attitude during promotions, which I think is pretty cool feature. Ticket sales will influence popularity which will influence the speed of your rank advancement so it does serve a purpose. I'm not entirely sure on all the career changes but this alone seems like a major step up and adds a bit of spice to the game.
Unfortunately there are some drawbacks, it's pretty close to being realistic but much to my disappointment UFC 3 caters more to the casual gamer than the hardcore MMA fan. You can still brutally beat up your opponent over and over and they'll still get up every time, unless you knock them out cold. HP recovers too quickly and you can still walk around the Octagon to back away from situations without utilising the step + much more, also the lootbox system that features in every EA game will be making a return to UFC 3 (Yay :/) All in all however, based on the beta it's the most realistic MMA game I've played to date.
What do you guys think about UFC 3? Should it appeal more to the casual gamer or should they focus on absolute realism?
I'd also be interested to hear what people think of EA's lootbox system which I find personally infuriating.