Fight Night Round 4

Enemy AI has improved considerably and the enemy is far more unpredictable, making each match a true challenge right from the early days of your champ's career. This can be a daunting thing for those who prefer button control, since not only do they have to cope with the challenge of using the dual analog sticks for punching, but they have to work their way up the rank.

The game's career mode has been given a large dose of steroids, and it's bigger and better than before. You have many more options where character customization is concerned, and should you feel the need to, you can even pick from preset boxing legends such as Mohammad Ali or Mike Tyson and start a career for them from their rookie days. Once your character's up and running, you can use the game's Virtua Tennis 3 styled calender to pick what events, exhibition matches or training you wish to attend depending on the dates they're on and your time management skills. You can even take your custom champ online to face others via the career mode, in the most seamless way.

Speaking of training, there are six minigames you can play to build on different stats of your champ. These minigames might be some fun initially, but they get old all too soon; thankfully, the game allows you to train automatically too for an average number of points, which becomes almost a habit after you play the career mode for a while.

There's a new system in place that lets you allocate points in between rounds, unlike the last game where you had to heal in auto or manual mode. Here, depending on how well you perform during a round, you get to decide whether you want to replenish your fighter's energy, whether you want to fix his stamina, or regenerate his strength.

As you can see, Fight Night Round 4 isn't low on innovation and if it weren't for the exclusion of button control, the game would have been very close to perfect. As it stands, the game improves upon Round 3 in almost all areas, and delivers one of the best experiences in sports gaming. The game's scaled difficulty might be too much for new players to handle, but veterans will love the challenge. If you wish to take the dive and buy yourself a copy (we recommend this one) the game costs Rs. 2,499 and is available at most major retailers.