For the PlayStation 3 version of the game, there's an additional mode called "get in the ring." This mode plays just like the play now mode, except you view the action from a first-person perspective. Everything you see is how your boxer would theoretically see it, so when your opponent has been tap dancing on your face for three rounds, your vision will start to get blurry around the edges as your boxer's face swells up from the punishment. It's a great effect, and the first-person mode is a lot of fun. It plays just like a regular boxing match, so once you spend a few minutes getting accustomed to the new perspective, you should be able to bob and weave, throwing punches with ease. You can also choose to play any of the other game modes from a first-person perspective, which is a nice touch. The computer-controlled opponents in the get-in-the-ring matches seem to be a bit easier than in the normal quick matches, and as long as you have any experience with the game, you'll be able to take on just about anyone. You'll also notice that these matches rarely last more than a couple of rounds, and most opponents will be down for the count after a second trip to the canvas.
Career mode returns, but it has an entirely new look and structure this time around. You can choose to create your own boxer, or you can rebuild a legend like in previous Fight Night games. Again, you begin as an amateur, and you have to fight your way up to the professional ranks. Professional and amateur, however, are the only real "ranks" in career mode. In the past, as soon as you went pro, you'd get a ranking. You'd start as the 50th ranked boxer and steadily move toward number one as you won fights. Now, there is no rank; you simply fight one bout after another. As you win fights, your popularity increases. Once your popularity gauge is full, you qualify for a special contract fight, such as a sponsored fight or a title fight. In career mode, you can become the champion of your weight class, or you can switch weight classes and go for another title. While career mode in Round 3 lacks the rigid structure previously found in the Fight Night series, the basic principles are still intact. You still sign contracts one at a time, then train in one of the three minigames, and then fight. The difference is that there aren't any clearly defined goals or progress indicators, aside from your fighter's stat increases. As a result, career mode feels more like a series of loosely related exhibition matches, rather than an ongoing struggle to fight your way up the ranks and become a champion.
The fights start off extremely easy, and if you have any previous Fight Night experience, you'll be able to cruise through your first dozen or so fights without getting knocked down once. In fact, most of the early fights will be over before the third-round bell. You can increase the difficulty at any time, but the computer opponents still tend to behave the same. The most noticeable difference in higher-level fights is that your opponents are able to absorb a lot more blows, and they inflict more damage per punch. As far as boxing strategy goes, though, you'll see the same few combos thrown repeatedly throughout the game, and before long, you'll be able to recognize and anticipate all of your opponents' moves.
Round 3 introduces to career mode the concept of rivalries. As you make your way through your career, you'll face one or more rival boxers. You have one main rival in the game, and you'll have to face him several times throughout your career. There isn't much of a difference between these matches and any of the others, aside from the ridiculous cutscenes of the weigh-ins before the fights and that rival boxers tend to throw illegal blows while all normal opponents play by the book. Aside from that, and the novelty of beating the same guy's face in multiple times, the rivalries are entirely superfluous.
There's no substitute for the bitterness and bad blood you share with perfect strangers when you fight online. The PlayStation 3 version of Round 3 has online play, with a full complement of stat-tracking features, leaderboards, and match options. The online play is smooth and lag-free. It's also easy to set up and find matches. After each bout, you get kicked out to the main online menu, which can be frustrating if you were hoping to get a rematch without going through the entire setup process again. You can play both ranked and unranked matches online, as well as take your custom boxer online as long as he has been retired from career mode. The game also integrates ESPN content, so you'll constantly be updated on sports news and scores while online. The get-in-the-ring and ESPN classic modes are also available for online play.
On the Xbox 360, Round 3 looked amazingly lifelike, with some of the most realistic and detailed fighter models to appear in any game. The graphics hold up on the PlayStation 3, with equally lifelike and technically impressive models that are slightly more detailed than on the Xbox 360. Everything from the tape on a fighter's gloves to the look of sheer exhaustion on his face makes you feel like you're watching a real bout. The heads-up display has been removed, and while you do have the option to turn it on, you really won't need to. You can judge how your fighter is holding up by the expressions (or contusions) on his face. The default camera is pulled in close, and it always provides a great perspective on the action in the ring. The knockout replays are especially fun to watch, because the face on the receiving end of a punch contorts and deforms as shock waves ripple through flesh and cartilage. All of the venues and crowds look detailed on the PlayStation 3, but upon close examination, you'll notice that the backgrounds do still suffer from the cardboard cutout look. If you have a high-definition display, you'll see an amazing amount of clarity and detail, but even on a standard-definition display, the game looks great. That said, minor issues, such as feet clipping through the canvas or a fighter's trunks clipping through his legs, do detract from the overall presentation of the game, if only slightly. There are also some very lengthy and frequent load times in the game, and they're worse on the PlayStation 3 than in the other versions of the game. The loading times are so bad in fact that they just about break the create-a-fighter mode. It's extremely tedious to make a fighter because every time you change a feature such as hair style or skin color it takes several seconds to load each new element, and sometimes they don't load at all. It makes the entire create-a-fighter mode more trouble than it's worth.
The boxing legends included in the game look accurate, although greats such as Marciano, Liston, and Foreman are noticeably absent from the roster. The animations are still somewhat spasmodic when fighters are changing up their blocks, and the ridiculous, twitching rag dolls are still in full effect, but otherwise, the game looks and moves as good as it plays. There are half a dozen venues in the game, from the Staples Center and Madison Square Garden to a warehouse and a hole-in-the-wall boxing gym. The action has been slowed down a bit from previous games, which is noticeable at first, but it doesn't take long to get used to the pace. If anything, the slower gameplay serves to highlight the differences between fighting styles, as you'll see a significant change when switching from a slugger to a speed-style boxer. The dramatic replays return, so you can see each and every knockout punch in all of its crushing glory.
For as good as it looks, there are some tremendous eyesores in the form of excessive advertisements in all three versions of the game. You'll see Dodge and Burger King logos everywhere, as if it were stipulated in some contract that each frame of the game had to have at least one corporate logo. You can even unlock the Burger King mascot to serve as your trainer, which pretty much destroys any pretense of authenticity in this game. It's just as offensive in the PlayStation 3 version of the game as it was on the Xbox 360, given that both versions retail at a premium price point as opposed to the discounted price of their PlayStation 2 and Xbox counterparts.
The first-person perspective will give you a newfound appreciation of your skull.
The audio is well done in all three versions of the game. When you knock down an opponent with a slug to the mouth, you'll hear the sickening crunch of unseated teeth and snapping tendons, followed by the thick, wet sound of spit and blood flying from his mouth. The excessively gruesome effect really punctuates each knockdown, and it makes you want to avoid being on the receiving end of such a punch. The commentary is once again provided by Joe Tessitore, and while he's competent behind the mic, he isn't very exciting. He also tends to repeat himself often. It gets tiring to hear all about the "textbook boxing style" and "well-rounded skills" of your fighter half a dozen times in one fight. The music is composed entirely of hip-hop tunes, which sound good enough, but there are only a handful of songs, and they get repeated endlessly. As a result, you'll probably end up muting the music after a couple of hours of playing.
EA Sports' heavy-hitting franchise doesn't change up its approach for the third time through, but the gameplay remains as tight and enjoyable as it has always been. So while there are no surprises in store, you can expect a great game of boxing, with a fully capable single-player experience backing up a solid online multiplayer game. Most of the changes to the PlayStation 3 version of the game are hardly noticeable, but the new first-person perspective works surprisingly well and will hopefully be a standard option in all subsequent Fight Night releases. Although it doesn't drastically improve on what is already a great game, Fight Night Round 3 for the PlayStation 3 does enough to give it a slight edge, although not quite enough to make it worth another investment if you already own the Xbox 360 version.
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Where to buy
Fight Night Round 3 (PlayStation 3):
$8.00 - $19.82
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$18.99 | Yes |
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$19.82 | Yes |
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$8.00 | Yes |
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