EA Sports UFC Demo Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here (Xbox One, PS4)

[Game_time85]

I am a long time ufc gamer. Ever since the first installment of the serious with the first undisputed game. For me personally there a lot of positives on the demo. The graphics including the damage throughout the fight and the fighter renderings. The submission battles feel organic and when you pull one off it is very rewarding. But what I think is going to ultimately ruin this game is the complicated controls and the frequent cart wheeling kicks and risky maneuvers.

THQ had it right on the prior installments by separating the punches and kicks by using a modifier for kicks and punches being standard fave buttons. This delegates the variety of strikes leading to more fluid combos. I can't count how many times in the game I would land a good one two combo to just have my fighter throw a random and pointless head kick to finish it off. These need to be separated and have there own individual functions. Throwing combos should be easy and fluid and the gamer should have more control over the types of strikes they throw.

Which leads me to my next point. How many times have you seen someone throw a cart wheel kick 5 times in a real mma fight?!?! These are way to easy to pull off in the game and lead to a more gamey and arcade like game experience. You may see an Anthony Pettis type maneuver like this once in 150 fights. So my question is why is it so easy to act like a circus clown but putting consistent punching combos takes way more concentration.

Transitions feel about right. Keeping it to a left right system makes it feel like more of a battle then THQ's versions. In prior installments I was able to just hold down on the right stick to keep an opponent in a bad position. I also like how dangerous punches are harder to pull off when you have your opponent on his back. In prior installments I was able to easily pull off 3 to 4 significant strikes and finish the fight quickly writhing seconds of getting my opponent on the ground.

I will be getting this game no matter what because I am a huge ufc fan, but I can't help but feeling unimpressed overall.

[jeremym480]

Quote: Originally Posted by GameplayDevUFC

I'm not going to record and post any videos...it's not something I'm really in a position to do and I imagine the red tape of trying to get something like that approved is more work than I have time for. You'll just have to take me on my word when I describe things. I have no doubt that someone on these forums will post videos of pretty much everything discussed once the game comes out so you won't have too long to wait. So I played a bunch of games this morning with the intention of testing out a few scenarios. I played Weidman (me) vs. Machida (CPU) a few times on different difficulty levels and employing different strategies. I also played Jones (me) vs. Cormier (CPU) on pro. The TL;DR of the whole experience is that CPU Machida does employ a more defensive, counter striking fighting style, but if I was to guess it's not as extreme as you'd like to see. DC however was a pretty damn good representation and was a stark contrast to Gus. I was much more pleased with his representation. So on to the details... I played against Machida on Easy, Normal, Hard and Pro. I did several tests on each level. In the first batch I performed no takedowns to maximize the time on the feet, but played a regular standup game otherwise. I also intentionally didn't finish the fight on the lower difficulty levels to make sure we went the distance each time. In the second batch I tested not performing any strikes at all, and just dodging and parrying to see how that would alter the stats and strategies. Finally, I played a normal game where I performed takedowns and played a normal ground game mixed in with everything else. Number of strikes thrown by Machida in these scenarios ranged from 130-230 depending on the test I was performing and the difficulty levels. According to fight metric, Machida threw 61 strikes in the 3 round fight against Phil Davis, and 108 strikes in the 5 round fight against Mousasi. That's roughly 20 strikes per round on average in real life. I'm actually surprised it wasn't more against Mousasi as I seem to remember him being much more aggressive in that fight. Although perhaps it skewed higher in the earlier rounds...who knows. Anyway, it looks like we're trending best case having him throw twice as many strikes as in real life, and worst case 3.8 times as many as in real life. I couldn't find stats for how long each of those fights were spent standing up vs. on the ground, so it's possible taking that into consideration would put our results in a more favorable light. Doubling his strike output compared to real life isn't that bad in my opinion, but I would have liked to see it lower I think, especially in the tests where I didn't engage him at all. I got the most realistic numbers when fighting normally and mixing in the ground game. I found when I parried him, his AI slowed down a bit more that if I dodged him. Not sure why. I found myself circling into kicks quite often when employing the dodging strategy and almost got KO'd a couple of times. Since I wasn't trying to finish the fight, I had to hold off striking him which may have increased his output artificially...not sure. I found there would be 5 second breaks (real time not on the clock) between strike attempts by him on average, which is different from what I'm seeing in the demo videos for sure. He also threw kicks considerably more than punches, and he targeted the body a lot more than the head (this was very noticeable). I saw the occasionally jab flurry, but not that often. Only other punch I remember seeing was a few superman punches. Lots of kicks. He only attempted 2-3 takedowns a fight on average, and seemed very happy to stand up if the fight ended up on the ground (which didn't happen often as I was mostly trying to test the standup). He was clearly a counter puncher, but did push the pace when I deliberately held off engaging. I'm thinking this and overall strike volume are where people are most likely to find fault. The AI does behave differently depending on what you try and do in the fight, so this is more of a general impression over multiple fights and not a guarantee of how he will perform when you fight him. I guess that's it for my Machida scouting report. As for Cormier, he was way different. He felt slow but powerful when standing, threw strikes that looked completely different from Gus (again, slow, deliberate but powerful looking), nothing flashy at all. The reach difference was very noticeable and had him rocked when we were standing up. I think maybe i could have finished him, second guessed myself since I wanted the test to continue, and then he took me down. Once on the ground I definitely felt his strength and wrestling skill. I had a hard time getting out from under him...I think we ended up on our feet again but I don't remember how. Didn't dominate as much once we got back up, he clinched me, dropped for a takedown, got to side control and smothered me until he got the GnP finish. I could not get out of his side control for the life of me. That fight felt really authentic to me and was a really nice thing to see after the slight disappointment with my Machida test. Hopefully this gives you guys a taste of what's to come. I'm not trying to sell you anything, I'm just trying to give you my honest assessment of how the game stacked up in those two tests from a "sim" perspective. I love the game and think it's a ton of fun, this was more an exercise to break down some of the sim aspects for the hard core guys. I don't want anyone reading this post to misunderstand my thoughts on the game overall. I love what we've built. There are things we could have done better no doubt, but overall I'm very proud of what we delivered.

I appreciate you testing these. If you're taking request, do the same thing with Demain Maia next to see if he looks to take the fight to the ground and goes for submissions
Although, since he went down to WW his striking has improved immensely.

Like I said earlier in the thread, although it may not be 100% realistic I still think this game is going to be a ton of fun as well as very competitive which are two things I look for the most when playing. Even playing on Easy I'm still having a great time with this game. Last night I was using Gus and was focusing on not throwing any heavy strikes. I was mainly just trying to keep control of the fight by taking him down and staying on top of him. When we were on our feet I used combos, but didn't throw any hard strikes. I dominated Bones in the first and half way through the second, then I had one lapse of judgement... I shot in for a take down from too far away and Bones cracked me with a right hook. I was dazed and stumbled back, then I could cover up he flew in with an elbow that brought me to the ground. From there he jumped on my and pounded me out (pause) for the TKO victory. Fights like that show me that even on Rookie the A.I. can be a threat. If you make one mistake and take on hard shot, the fight can end in an instance. I can't wait to see what the A.I. is like on the higher difficulties.

[Phobia]

Quote: Originally Posted by jeremym480

I appreciate you testing these. If you're taking request, do the same thing with Demain Maia next to see if he looks to take the fight to the ground and goes for submissions Although, since he went down to WW his striking has improved immensely. Like I said earlier in the thread, although it may not be 100% realistic I still think this game is going to be a ton of fun as well as very competitive which are two things I look for the most when playing. Even playing on Easy I'm still having a great time with this game. Last night I was using Gus and was focusing on not throwing any heavy strikes. I was mainly just trying to keep control of the fight by taking him down and staying on top of him. When we were on our feet I used combos, but didn't throw any hard strikes. I dominated Bones in the first and half way through the second, then I had one lapse of judgement... I shot in for a take down from too far away and Bones cracked me with a right hook. I was dazed and stumbled back, then I could cover up he flew in with an elbow that brought me to the ground. From there he jumped on my and pounded me out (pause) for the TKO victory. Fights like that show me that even on Rookie the A.I. can be a threat. If you make one mistake and take on hard shot, the fight can end in an instance. I can't wait to see what the A.I. is like on the higher difficulties.

Its not the 17th yet?

[aholbert32]

Quote: Originally Posted by Phobia

Its not the 17th yet?

Lol. I'm think I'm done playing the demo. At this point I just want the game to come out so that I can actually see what kind of game we have.

[SwedishTouch76]

Quote: Originally Posted by DaveDQ

Parry then strike back and also taking my time on the ground is where I see results with stamina. But still, I am concerned about stamina being too forgiving. I played FNC online for a very long time and saw how they brought the game to almost perfect stamina and then tuned it back to favor the aggressor.

yup. Forget what patch it was since the gameplay changed so much. But for a short while it was perfect. If you threw nonstop your temporary and permanent stamina dropped quickly. Of course the amount of whining that ensued from the spammers was insane and was quickly changed back.....

[Phobia]

Quote: Originally Posted by aholbert32

Lol. I'm think I'm done playing the demo. At this point I just want the game to come out so that I can actually see what kind of game we have.

Yea, I'm going to uninstall it tonight and get back on the watchdogs train until this finally drops.

[DaveDQ]

I won't stop the demo until I better handle the ground game and land some submissions.

Just can't get the hang of it.

[aholbert32]

Quote: Originally Posted by GameplayDevUFC

The only reason I'm dodging the question is because I was given instructions to only talk about gameplay (which makes sense because that's all I'm really well versed in), and the people who gave me the go ahead to do this are all down at E3 right now so I'm playing it safe. It's nothing specific to the CAF slot question itself. Ask me anything about career or any game mode and I'll have the same answer. I hope you guys can understand that.

Got another question for you:

I know you can fight a 3 round and a 5 round title fight in Fight Now but is there an option for a 5 round non-title fight?

That option would be great as now there are 5 round main events that are not title fights. Thanks.