G4TV

While fighting games have been making a welcome comeback lately with such quality brawlers as Soulcalibur IV and Street Fighter IV, boxing games have never really fallen out of favor. Granted, there have never been so many of them at any one time that they actually wear out their welcome, but then they’re usually pretty solid anyway. Which makes this new Ready 2 Rumble kind of an odd man out because, while it is quite fun, its proximity to other arcade boxing games makes it kind of pointless.

Fight Fire With Fire

As you’d expect from an arcade-flavored boxing game on the Wii, this has you using the Wiimote and Numchuck to punch individual fists or to block, while moving your boxer is done with the thumbstick. Depending on how you move the Wiimote and Numchuck, you can throw all the classic boxing punches, including jabs, hooks, and uppercuts. And all of these are perfectly intuitive. You jab to throw a jab, move the controllers upwards to throw an uppercut, and so on except that it’s a little more involved than the boxing mode of Wii Sports. To do a right hook, for example, you move the Wiimote to the left. But to put a little more muscle behind it, you move the Wiimote to the right and then to the left. You can also modifiy your blow by holding the “C” button to change shots to the face into body blows, or by holding the “A” button when in “Rumble Mode” — a super powered state you get into by doing well — to unleash the fury. And defending yourself is just as easy, since you only have to move the Wiimote and Numchuck together to duck or weave.

The game also features a number of different modes in which to use the aforementioned controls. You can just jump in and start fighting with “Quick Fight,” or take on a series of up to eight opponents in “Tournament” mode. The centerpiece is the involved “Championship” mode, in which you take a boxer of your own creation up through the ranks by doing a series of training exercises (jump rope, speed bag, etc.) during the week, and bouts on the weekends. Though, oddly, we found the training exercises to be more challenging that the fights, at least in the early stages.

While it probably goes without saying that this is way more fun when you play with a friend…or an enemy…or some random person you pulled in off the street, we’ll say it anyway.

Fight Club

As with any cartoony boxing or fighting game, Revolution boasts a colorful cast of characters. Except that besides the usual clichés — like the requisite black man with afro — this game is risking multiple lawsuits by modeling characters to look like parodies of such famous people as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Simon Cowell, and Shaun White. They even get a bit esoteric; Fight Club is supposed to be Brad Pitt as Tyler Durden in Fight Club, The Imposter is a knock-off of Nicholas Cage in his Elvis outfit from Honeymoon In Vegas, while Hilarious D is Jack Black if Black landed the lead in a biopic about AC/DC guitarist Angus Young. The game even boasts a real celebrity (of sorts) in the form of Michael Buffer, the famed boxing ring announcer whose catchphrase inspired this series’ name. Though, sadly, you don’t get to punch him in the face, no matter how hard you swing the Wiimote.

For those who are more narcisstic than celeb obsessed, however, the game also lets you create your own boxer. But while it is fairly detailed — letting you both modify your fighting style and appearance — of all the games that have let me make my own characters, the only one that has ever looked like me is the Mii creator on the Wii.

K.O.

As fun as this all might sound, though, this boxing game is far from a heavyweight champion. While the controls are solid, and work well, the same can’t be said for the perspective, since, unlike boxing in Wii Sports, which employs a first-person-ish behind-the-see-through-head viewpoint, Revolution switches to the side view of a fighting game. Granted, this doesn’t ruin things — it doesn’t make the game impossible to play or anything — but it does reduce both the immersion and the visceral sense of the sport. You feel like you’re controlling a boxer, instead of being that boxer.

What really undermines this game, though, is that there’s kind of no reason for it. Sure, if you’re a fan of the series, you’ll have fun with it — it’s not bad or anything — but unless you’re a Ready 2 Rumble fan, it’s kind of pointless. The boxing part of Wii Sports does the job just as well, we’re still not bored of it, and if you really want to punch Jack Black, Nicholas Cage, or Simon Cowell in the face — and really, who doesn’t? — you can just make Miis that look like them. Plus the way Miis look, with their detached fists, is way funnier than any of the characterizations in this game.

If you just can’t wait, can’t handle the PlayMobil-looking characters of Wii Sports, or really just need to knock Nicolas Cage on his ass for squandering what was once a promising career as a quirky character actor, you could do much worse than this game. It is, ultimately, a fun arcade-style boxing game. Too bad it’s not anything more.

Article Written By: Paul Semel