

Taken on its own merits, it's fun as hell to wreck the bodies of opponents, and the myriad ways in which you can do this are staggering. Not to take anything away from the fight system, though. Just like in pretty much every wrestling game before it, strikes are merely a way of buttering your opponents up before putting them down with a heavy, and preferably flamboyant slam.Ĭrazy Legs also gots a crazy face. Much to my disappointment, however, I never really felt like I could win a match without resorting to heavy grappling.

Intrigued by the possibility of kicking and punching my way through game, I had my story mode character learn all three of the striker styles. Kickboxing looks like kickboxing, without a doubt, and if you develop your character the right way, your kicks are going to do crazy damage good luck knocking an opponent out using nothing but strikes. But the differences between these and the grappling-based styles - e.g., wrestling and submissions - feel mostly cosmetic. Of the five fighting styles available, there are three that aren't ostensibly centered around grappling: street fighting, martial arts, and kickboxing. When it comes down to it, though, Fight for NY is, at its core, a wrestling game.

If you're in the slightest sense sadistic, you'll likely get more than a few kicks out of the outlandish way that the violence is rendered. That said, you'll be hard pressed to find a fighting game with a more satisfying sense of impact. The sound effects accompanying the moves are harsh and explosive, and the animations are completely over the top.

Straight up, the fighting in this game is insanely violent. Words from the Nutcracker The reason why Fight for NY earned an M rating will become readily apparent the first time you fight. What we have here is a game that is substantially more robust than its predecessor in pretty much every conceivable way, and not to mention a game that is as fun as all hell in its own right. EA didn't settle for a half-assed roster update. What is surprising, however, is just how much more was packed into this sequel. Given how well received its predecessor was, it's not really surprising that Def Jam: Fight for NY turned out as well as it did. Now in its second iteration, the Def Jam wrestling games continue to defy logic. Apparently, however, the idea was just crazy enough to work. I'll say it again: whoever at EA came up with the idea to make a wrestling game starring some of hip-hop's most flamboyant personalities must have been crazy.
