Phineas's Review of

Def Jam: Fight for NY [Electronic Arts] [Xbox - PS2]

I love videogames for many different reasons. One of them being the fact that you can do things in a game that you can’t (and sometimes shouldn’t) do in real life. This is definitely the case with Def Jam: Fight for NY. Def Jam: Fight for NY is the sequel to Def Jam: Vendetta, which once again places you in the shoes of your favorite rap artist as you vie for control of New York by beating the ever-loving tar out of anyone who gets in your way.

If only all problems were solved this way…but I digress.

Def Jam: Vendetta is in my opinion the most visceral fighting game I have ever played. If you play this game for more than fifteen minutes, you yourself may need some bandages. It looks like it hurts that much! The game does a wonderful job of conveying the sense of giving (or taking) a major beat-down. While not as heavy on the blood as some other titles, the sound of the game is where you really feel your avatars pain. Punches and kicks are delivered with such bone-crunching aural splendor that you may flinch thinking you just dislocated your own shoulder.

The game has multiple modes including, story mode (the real meat of the game), team battles, free for alls, cage matches, etc. etc. The healthy amount of fighting modes in addition to the story mode will keep you snapping arms and breaking noses for weeks to come. In story mode you get to create your own character to your hearts content. There are hundreds of different clothing, jewelry, hairstyle, and tattoo combinations to make your fighter the baddest of the bad. Want to be covered in tattoos and expensive bling? You got it. Want to go into the ring dressed like a baseball player? You can (although I wouldn’t suggest it). And all this customizable content plays a big role in the game as well – especially the jewelry you buy. The more gaudy and outlandish your bling, the more charisma you will have, and the more likely the crowd will assist you in a fight (more on that later).

Fights are waged on a number of different stages, each with its own unique way of dishing out pain to your opponent. You can fly off the top ropes, throw your opponent through a window, smash his face in his the window of his own car, and even throw him into a jukebox. Almost all stages have acquirable weapons as well. The stages are most often enclosed by the crowd gathered to watch your fight. They’ll periodically brandish weapons such as pool cues, and empty bottles, and even baseball bats. Grab one, and proceed to unleash the fury with reckless abandon upon your opponent. As your progress, you will gain money and points for upgrading. You can use the money to buy your gear, and the points to upgrade various aspects of your character’s ability to fight. You can upgrade his toughness, health, speed, upper strength, and lower strength. What’s more are that all these stats do different things for different styles of fighters. In the beginning of the game you will pick an initial style with which your character will fight. You can choose between being a kickboxer, a streetfighter, a martial artist, a wrestler, or a submission artist (one who specializes in getting his opponent to tap out as opposed to simply winning by KO). Suffice to say, the level with which you can customize your brawler is staggering, but all the options play a role which ultimately shapes you into the fighter who will own the various clubs scattered throughout the game. There are the obligatory boss battles throughout the game, most often being a notable rapper. Just a few of the stars you’ll face include Xzibit, Busta Ryhmes, Red Man, Method Man, and even some old school stars such as Slick Rick. As you beat your opponents you will acquire their special moves for use in dealing extreme amounts of damage to your enemy once you have filled up your “Blazin’ meter.” You fill this meter by simply doing a certain amount of damage to your opponent. These moves do significantly more damage than standard moves, and often turn the tides in a fight.

Controlling your musician of pain is farily [most of the time] easy. You have a punch, kick, and throw button. From what direction, and where in the environment you attack will change the look of your attack contextually while keeping the amount of button memorization to a minumum. This game is about brutal combat, not memorizing button combinations. It may sound almost too simplistic of a fighting scheme, but trust me, it is not. Their is a great deal of strategy to be used in how and where you beat your opponent into submission.

As I said before the sound is great. You really feel the fights! Rap and Hip-Hop music from today and from its inception are scattered throughout the game as you navigate the menus, and engage in your bloody conquest of New York. The addition of the actual rappers voices within the game lends a nice amount of credibility and depth to the game. The graphics are no slouch either. The rappers definitely resemble their real world counterparts, save a little bulking up for most of them. The lighting of the stages is done very well, and details such as shattered glass, splattered blood, and semi-destructible environments are all pretty to look at (until you break them).

One problem I had with the graphics in the game is one that often comes up in games that include an active crowd. The people in the crowd look ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE. I know that the crowd graphics are generally low in detail in order to lessen the strain on the game, and thus improve its frame speed. That’s all well and good, but if you are going to do that, don’t have close-ups of the crowd so often. Def Jam has numerous instances of zooming out into the crowd before and during the fight to let you see the visual nausea that is the surrounding onlookers. Not only are they horrible to look at – they get in the way too. The camera will at times position itself to give what it thinks is a better view of the action only to have you blinded by those there to watch the fight. This is extremely annoying. Another issue I have with Def Jam is that of collision detection. At times, the collision detection in this game is simply atrocious. You’ll get hit by punches thrown by your enemies in other directions, and you’ll get hit from the top ropes when your opponent clearly jumps completely over you. The amount of damage you will take at times from this problem is another major annoyance. One last problem is certain fights are very unbalanced. Some of your computer opponents will block and counter 90% of your attacks – no matter what kind of strategy you use. In these instances, I just beat them into submission with found objects. This strategy is annoying, but effective.

All in all, Def Jam: Fight of NY is a great and bloody fighting game. Whether you are down with the Hip-Hop culture or not should not persuade you in your decision to play this game. If you are a fan of the fighting genre, pick this game up, you won’t be disappointed.

Who knew beating the daylights out of rappers could be so much fun? Maybe next time, EA will give me a game in which I can smack around Garth Brooks or the Dixie Chicks. A guy can dream can’t he?

I give Def Jam: Fight for NY a B.