I’m doubling up the jab, here. My last blog entry was about boxing fiction; this one is about a boxing game. It may be an “old” game, but it’s still a fun action game to play. So nyah nyah.

Well, let me qualify that: Fight Night was fun to play.

Round Two was an improvement on the original. Round Three was arguably an improvement on Two. Then Round Four stunk so bad that EA Sports evidently gave up on it (until Fight Night Champion, which redeemed them to an extent I guess).

It seems that the design team used up the entire budget improving the graphics for Round Four, then had to outsource the game play programming to pro bono data entry clerks. Aside from adding long-overdue fighters like Mike Tyson to the pantheon…

…Round Four took every weakness of the earlier versions and concentrated on making them even worse.

1. EVERY BOUT RESULTS IN A KNOCKOUT. This is a case of entertainment-over-realism (real fights often go the score cards even when two punchers are matched). Not so bad by itself but a related issue is:
2. EVEN FEATHER-FISTED DANCERS ARE KNOCKOUT ARTISTS IN FIGHT NIGHT. Some attempt at capturing the style of the real fighters was made–the AI version of Ray Leonard has an incredible defense, for instance. But everyone’s a power-puncher.
3. THE TRAINING GAMES ARE EVEN MORE DIFFICULT WITHOUT BEING INTERESTING. This was already the trend by Round Three. Four put the trend on steroids.
4. YOU HAVE TO BE A COUNTER-PUNCHER TO WIN. According to this game, the only time one boxer can inflict serious damage to another is after blocking a punch. Whose idea was this?
5. AN EFFECTIVE PARRY RENDERS THE BOXER WHO THREW THE PUNCH UTTERLY DEFENSELESS. C’mon, have you guys ever even watched real boxers in a fight?
6. SUFFER ONE KNOCKDOWN AND YOU’LL PROBABLY NEVER GET UP. Your character might still have plenty of juice after a flash knockdown, but that won’t help you without the Magic Sequence of Controller Input. In the Fight Card Round Four Universe, Buster Douglass would lose in Tokyo; Jersey Joe Walcott retains the title after Marciano’s challenge; and Joe Louis loses half his fights.

But Round Four introduces some brand new sucky features, too.

• There’s a delay between control input and screen action that makes spastic brainless button-mashers invincible against those who attempt to use skill and strategy.
• The cut man is of little significance.
• Human-controlled fighters plateau in abilities after about 10 fights, while AI characters keep improving.
• Button configuration was designed for an epileptic octopus.

If you’re like me and enjoy fun games regardless of their vintage, I strongly recommend Fight Night Round Two or Round Three, or perhaps Champion, which adds a storyline, but duck Round Four like it’s Sugar Ray Robinson with something to prove.