Supremacy MMA Unrestricted
From: Kung Fu Factory/505 Games
For: PlayStation Vita
Rating: Mature
Price: About $NZ80
Release date: April 27
Unfortunately, that's really because it is the only one. And while some MMA action is better than nothing, there's enough working against Unrestricted to temper enthusiasm for the sport's Vita debut.
Most glaring is the uphill battle against UFC's and EA Sports' games for fighter name recognition - a problem Unrestricted arguably eschews by opting for a mostly fictional roster of fighters. This allows Unrestricted to take liberty and give most fighters a unique storyline to complete. The stories are short and won't win awards for creativity, but it's an angle the other games can't take, especially with a level of grit that doesn't always flatter the fighters.
The cutscenes look and sound good, too.
Unrestricted also breaks convention by including women fighters, and here it does opt for real-life fighters. Problem is, only two - Felice Herrig and Michele Gutierrez - are included, and they can only fight each other.
Like its peers, Unrestricted accommodates multiple fight disciplines and provides for ground, standing, striking and submission combat. Different fighters succeed differently based on their disciplines.
Unlike its peers, Unrestricted distills its action through what resembles a non-MMA fighting game. You get a lifebar, and the only way to win is to drain your opponent's lifebar. An opportunistic counterattack will hurt more than a plain strike, but there's no way to land one perfect punch that turns a losing contest into a knockout victory.
Unrestricted rewards players for focusing on specific body parts by giving attacks on weakened areas a premium, but the facets of a MMA fight are dampened when the lifebar rules all.
Unrestricted also mimics fighting games by taking place almost exclusively on a 2-D plane.
These aren't minor shortcomings if you want a true-blue MMA experience and not a fighting game with MMA trimmings. But if you can settle for the latter, Unrestricted'shandling of multiple disciplines certainly suffices, and each fighter has a nice complement of moves.
The game also performs in the features department, with storylines for 14 fighters and separate upgrade paths for all 16 male fighters. A training mode and two tournament styles round out the single-player options. A no-frills multiplayer option is available.
- By Billy O' Keefe
