Im gonna be upfront by saying that i haven't played this game in maybe a year, but I wanna give my thoughts on it. Before the release of this game, the UFC was beginning to build a lot of steam with popularity that was gaining from the mainstream. This game couldn't of been released at a better time with the sport becoming mainstream.
Enough with opinions of the sport and now moving onto the game itself. UFC 2009: Undisputed gives a terrific first impression. The knockouts are brutal and the controls are very fluid and give you lots of options. Granted if you went through the tutorial. I will say the controls are complex and a little confusing at first, plus if you are not too familiar with the sport of MMA i definitely recommend gong through the tutorial first to learn more about the sport and the controls that go with each situation.
Booting up the game you are presented with a couple of options. For Single Player options there is the quick play, greatest fights mode, career mode and practice/tutorial mode. Those options are a little bare bones and I wish that they presented us with more options like a tournament mode or a better career. Going into the modes more deeper, the quick play is self explanatory, you and a buddy can select your weight class, fighters and other options and battle it out. the greatest fights mode, is essentially a challenge mode where you recreate certain fights that have already happened by fulfilling challenges. Its a decent mode that rewards you quite nicely by giving you short clips of the fight that you recreated. Career Mode is quite a disappointment, there is a laundry list of reasons. First off the create a fighter aspect of the game is a little sloppy not giving a lot of good options and your fighter will never look that good. Next is that the training aspect to raise your fighters level is confusing and not user friendly, also the menus are just confusing because you can get buried in maybe 4 or 5 screens in and always have to keep backing out. Its just a mess.
The game itself looks quite good. The arenas and crowds look pretty good and so does the octagon itself. Popular fighters such as Brock Lesnar, Forrest Griffin and Georges St Pierre look terrifically detailed, while almost all of the lesser known fighters in the game such as Frankie Edgar by example look terrible and seems like they were generated by the sloppy create a fighter. This not so consistent visuals of the fighters are a little sloppy but it will please most people that the popular fighters look really good.
All of this wouldn't matter if the game did not play well. I'm extremely happy to tell you that the game plays terrifically. Everything from the striking to the grappling is handled very well and is smart about the controls. I don't wanna go too in depth with the control because it would take up this whole review. A few gripes with the game's control is that for BJJ fighters, they basically dominate the ground and are nearly unstoppable. another small problem is that each fighter doesn't have moves tailored for them, they have a set of default moves and that loses a little sense of originality in each fighter. Still these gripes do not take away from the merits of the games smoothness and playability.
I know it seems like this review is a little negative but the game truly shines with its Multiplayer. First of, the local multiplayer is terrific. Since the game is a blast and competitive, competing with your friends or advisories locally is as much fun as playing street fighter or smash bros locally. Online is done amazing, now the options are simple with ranked, player and private matches but you earn experience points and a rank kinda like Call of Duty. This works out perfectly giving you credit for wins and taking away points and rank for losses. Another small but really cool features is the game reads how you play and tells 3 facts/opinions about your playstyle and displays it on your profile. So maybe your a good wrestler who loves to kick, then the game will say that you are a strong wrestler with great kicking ability. Its really smart and a nice touch.
MMA fans and casual viewers of the sport should definitely check this game out. Its certainly not perfectly but it shines in many areas and is a terrific start to the franchise. With a couple of fix-ups this series is looking at MMA perfection. I know UFC 2010 is out (its also a better game), but this game developed roots for a series that defines sports combat and is definitely worth a purchase. Plus its dirt cheap