Boxer Stats, the PDA and A.I. Quirks

The way that the stats system is described, you're meant to be able to focus your character-building efforts on making just about any sort of balance of strength, speed, endurance and durability as you'd like. You can focus on strength and durability while disregarding your speed and stamina recovery speed, or you can focus on creating a speedy light puncher that recovers his energy moments after firing off a punch. The statistics-boosting concept is put into action through optional mini-games, although players are rewarded more for actually playing the mini-games instead of using the game's built-in auto-training advancement system for the lazy or rushed. The fights you take part in provide no boost at all.

As I soon found out though, even the stat system itself seemed rushed, and it became one of my biggest issues with Prizefighter. As I played through the game, it seemed that no matter how many points I invested in my strength and endurance stats, I was never able to reach a level of power where a few well-placed combos could knock someone out cold, even when I unleashed a devastating power hit.

Even after I spent the entire game focusing on strength and endurance, I still could not seem to find a real difference in how my character played. When I reached the final match of the game, I felt about as weak as I did at the beginning, even though the two stats that I focused on were maxed out. Perhaps I was expecting too much, but I just wanted to be able to dish out some damage along the lines of what we saw during the 1980s, such as knockout punches that would make Mike Tyson proud. Maxing out the stats should greatly boost my ability to put someone to sleep, and I should have been able to knock out at least one opponent.

Prizefighter's impressive visuals don't make up for the flawed gameplay.

Since it seemed as if my character never really improved all that much no matter how many points I earned for my stats, most of the fights felt almost virtually alike. In a game where you're meant to advance and live the life of a rising champion, I felt more frustration than anything else, especially because virtually every fighter I went in the ring with always seemed to be superhumanly durable and strong. At first, I figured that perhaps my opponents just kept getting tougher as I did. Either that, or the stats system was outright broken and ineffective no matter how many points you earned. Either way, I found it damn near impossible to knock an opponent out cold. Instead, in all but a few matches I had to drain my opponents of their stamina and health, and then win on a technical knockout. I actually had some fights that went on for nine or 10 rounds. It wasn't that I was having a hard time dishing out damage, it was just that it took that many rounds to finally get a TKO.

However, the game does at least make an attempt to provide matches once in awhile that were actually unique. Occasionally you'll get thrown into a ring to experience a historical fight that once made the headlines, although the A.I. is still quirky and the majority of the time you're told to simply not get knocked out for three minutes. Other times, however, you'll end up dealing with a boxer that may have applied a chemical to his gloves, or even injected drugs into his system that make him doped up and immune to pain. Unfortunately, though, these fights were few and far between.

The game tries to continue the real world aspect by allowing you to receive messages and offers via your PDA, and also get opinions on the fighters that you're able to face. When you are presented with an opportunity by one of your contacts, you'll usually get an invite to partake in some event that will grant you extra publicity in exchange for a drop in your fighting stats, or a gain in specific stats by attending specialist training, which may take you out of the spotlight for a bit. Since the stats system in Prizefighter seems to be minimally effective, however, the events never really seem to benefit you all that much, especially in the case of your media rating. I actually ended up maxing out my media rating, but it seemed to do nothing for me whatsoever aside from raising my prize purse in each fight. Considering that you could never do anything with your money, the media stat itself made no sense as I played through, and even after I finished the game.

Prizefighter is far from a perfect game with more than a few bugs and quirky A.I. at times. I found a dodge position that I was able to replicate nine out of 10 times where the A.I. would get completely mucked up and my opponent would just stand there swinging at the air completely unaware that he was not landing any hits. The second the A.I. boxer would begin doing something like this, I'd get completely yanked out of any immersion that I was experiencing. The A.I. could have cared less that it was standing around swinging at my head and missing over and over again. This was a big one that would pop up in a lot of my fights, especially as I danced around and blocked to gain back my stamina.

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