Fight Night Champion

Ever since I was obsessed with the NES "Punch-Out!", I've been searching for the next great boxing sim. With playable characters like Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Evander Holyfield, Lennox Lewis, and Mike Tyson, I thought this had the chance to be great. Unfortunately, like with most pugilistic video game efforts, it is just too difficult to play without a steep learning curve.

Though playing as classic boxers is fun, it doesn't make up for the fact that boxing video games have almost an impossible task when it comes to controls. I played this with some friends for a couple of hours, and after that time all we determined is that we would need more practice to truly be good. A LOT more practice. Until you completely master the various punching/blocking/dodging controls, you it is pretty much just randomly hitting buttons and hoping for results.

For a comparison: Shortly after trying this game out, I also got WWE 2K14 for the XBOX 360. Within one match, I could easily pick up the controls and had great fun with the game. I knew there was more in-depth controlling I could do, but I didn't need to be an expert button-er to dive right in. This relegated "Fight Night" to the back of the gaming shelf.

Overall, then, while this game is so tantalizing in offering all the classic fighters from days gone by, the controls still are not good enough to make it all that fun of a game. Unless you really want to invest the time into perfecting it, don't bother picking this one up.