MMA by EA SPORTS™ Review

By Andrew Nesvadba, on October 22, 2010

Publisher: Electronic Arts
Genre: Entertainment
Released: 20 Oct, 2010
Size: 111.3 MB
Price: $0.99

PROS

MMA fighting with juicy impacts.
Customizable character; evolves over time.
Challenge mode featuring classic MMA match-ups.

CONS

Only one career save slot.
No multiplayer mode to combat friends.
The usual 'limited' announcer problem.

VERDICT

MMA by EA Sports manages to capture mixed martial arts in a way that feels great for iDevices, but its limited repertoire could hurt its long-term appeal.

Full Review
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Games that feature genuine fighting aren't easy to emulate thanks to the incredible amount of variety skill that goes in to these bouts. MMA by EA Sports is perhaps one of the best, if not the only game that tries to capture mixed martial arts in a way that feels authentic while still controlling comfortably for iDevices.

To pull this off, players will need to master a handful of controls that, depending on the style of fighter you're using, will initiate one of a handful of attacks. Movement in general is handled by tilt controls, flicking forward or back to dodge to the sides and in stand-up players can tap the quadrants to perform quick strikes or swipes for heavier blows. Transitioning to grapples requires double-swipes and from the various positions you can either swipe outwards to cancel a grapple or use other combinations to pull off submissions. Stamina plays a huge role in strategically outplaying your opponent and is expended depending on how well you defend or attack and managing to score a combo hit or submission while the other player is gassed can quickly end the match.

Should you start a career you'll have the option of customizing your player, though the options are limited and you'll be locked in to a specific fighting style. The graphics are fairly simplistic and washed out, but it's hard not to recognize the bigger stars from MMA.

The biggest weakness of MMA by EA Sports is the somewhat rigid and limited amount of options available despite the variety of fighting styles in the game, resulting in a vanilla handful of strikes, take-downs and submissions. This mars an otherwise excellent MMA title for iDevices, but it shouldn't put off sports or action fans after something this unique and polished.

Screenshots