We will be holding a weekly Q&A with the Producers of Fight Night Round 4. This week, we are pleased to have Brian Hayes, Gameplay Producer and Mike Mahar, Legacy/Online Producer, join us.

Operation Sports: Will the "button configuration" be added in the shipped version?

Brian Hayes: No. There will be no button configurations in the shipped version. We are looking into providing button configurations via DLC.

Operation Sports: What can you say about the legacy/career mode that will keep it fresh, until the next version of the game, which we hear might not be annual?

Brian Hayes: A couple things. First, you can start your career in one of the original 8 weight classes. Playing as a Flyweight feels much different than playing as a Middleweight or Heavyweight. Each weight division will have multiple titles so you can unify the division and reign as an undisputed champion. You can move up a weight division (assuming you didn’t start as a heavyweight) and unify the titles there. All of these things, plus your popularity and Pound-For-Pound ranking feed into the Legacy Meter. You might not have what it takes to become the GOAT in your first Legacy. If you did, then you might want to give it a shot on one of the higher difficulty levels (there are 2 above the default level). You can also import created fighters into Legacy mode. All the while you will be receiving messages from your trainer, challenges from other fighters and playing the 6 training games that allow you to improve your Boxer’s stats.  

Operation Sports: Can created fighters be used in the legacy/career mode? If so, is there a limit to how many? Can we look forward to any boxers by way of DLC? If they will be available, can they be used in the legacy/career mode?

Brian Hayes: This is more than one question. Yes, you can import up to 20 created boxers into your Legacy Mode. Yes, we are looking at adding more boxers via DLC and yes, you will be able to use them in Legacy Mode.

Operation Sports: How quickly can your boxer progress/regress in career mode?

Mike Mahar: That depends on your skill and how aggressively you advance your boxers career. It’ important to note that there’s a fine line between scheduling a fight every 3 months and giving your fighter some period of prolonged training (the further out you schedule a fight the more training sessions you get). Only training once per fight might be good enough to get ranked in the 20’s…but once you’re running with the big dogs the extra time you spent in the gym…if you chose to…will certainly pay off. Running up against Kermit Cintron or James Toney…etc…with only a handful of training sessions under your belt is a risky proposition at best.

As a general rule…you always want to have better skills/ratings then your opponent. Spending the extra time in the gym means your career may not progress as fast as you’d like but it also means you’ll be more prepared come the big fights…trust me.

At the end of the day how fast a user will progress is up to them…we give them the control.

Operation Sports: Has the knockdown/get up mechanic (for lack of a better term) been tweaked? It was one of the major complaints that was echoed everywhere after the last round of impressions. To clarify, it is when you have to line up the first (LS) analog stick and then get the RS lined perfectly up to get up from a knockdown.

Brian Hayes: Since the community day and the demo, yes.

You don’t need to have things centered perfectly to push up on the RS, but if it is a little bit of to one side, it will pull in that direction when you try and stand up. Note, you can keep balancing with the LS while you are pushing up on the RS.

Operation Sports: How is the CAB sharing interface going to work? Will we need to be friends with someone to get to their CABs a la NCAA 09, or will it be community based a la MLB 09 "The Show".

Mike Mahar: Sharing boxers is done by uploading them to EA SPORT World. Once uploaded all boxers can be shared with every member of the Fight Night community. Once uploaded…your created character will be stored on the EA SPORTS World servers. Should you accidently delete him … you can go back and download them again.

Operation Sports: With the various boxing governing bodies and organizations in the game, will you have to fight a certain opponent once you become champ? If you don't, do you run the risk of having your championship taken from you?

Mike Mahar: We created three boxing governing bodies in the game which means each weigh division has a total of three belts up for grabs. Once you become champ there are mandatory title defenses required depending on which belt you own. We don’t strip the user of belts unless they jump up in weight class. Personally…stripping belts from boxer’s is one of my less favorite elements of the poli-tricks of boxing.

Operation Sports: Will created fighters brought online, display their name on their trunks for the opponent to view or will it simply say "Boxer?"

Mike Mahar: Created Boxers can be brought online in both Online Fight Now and in World Championship mode. Their name will display on trunks and robes provided it doesn’t violate our ‘inappropriate content’ sensors.

Operation Sports: What are rating limits on the weight classes? Ex: Created heavyweights couldn't have a speed rating higher than 75 or somewhere around there.

Brian Hayes: There are weight class limits on Power, Hand Speed, Foot Speed, Stamina, Head Toughness and Body Toughness. In Legacy Mode and Create Boxer, the ratings are displayed as a percentage of the weight class maximum. So, when you create a Heavyweight, you can max out their Hand Speed to 100%, but in absolute terms that is really an 80.

In all other Boxer Ratings, all boxers in all weight classes can be rated as high as 99.