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Product summary
K-1 World Grand Prix has all the basics down, but ultimately the game falls just a little bit short.
Specifications: ESRB: Teen; Genre: Sports; Elements: 3D Fighting; See full specs
Gamespot editors' review
- Reviewed on: 07/09/2003
- Released on: 07/09/2003
While not quite as well-known as UFC or even Pride in North America, the fighting sport known as K-1, which features various martial arts based mostly on striking, is immensely popular in Japan. But whether you're new to the sport or have been a fan for quite some time, K-1 World Grand Prix from Konami can provide an entertaining experience, not necessarily because of its gameplay mechanics, but rather because it offers a wide variety of different modes that will keep you interested in this strategic fighter that successfully captures some of the nuances of the sport.
The game falls just a little bit short of its potential with its clunky combination system and somewhat unresponsive controls.
That's not to say that K-1 World Grand Prix is a perfect representation of the sport, or that it's even one of the better martial-arts-style fighting games on the market, because it still has some problems--the most prevalent of which are its controls. The control scheme is designed so that each face button on the PlayStation 2 controller is essentially mapped to a limb on your fighter's body--one button controls right punch, one controls left punch, one controls left kick, and one controls right kick. These punches and kicks can be modified by pressing in different directions on the analog stick or by coming out of a defensive stance. There are also buttons for executing knockout blows and quick combinations, which can also be slightly modified. While this control scheme isn't difficult to use, at times it just doesn't feel responsive enough, making it difficult to execute truly effective combinations.
Once you discover this, you'll undoubtedly stumble upon another one of the game's major flaws: You rarely have to use combinations at all. The best strategy in K-1 World Grand Prix involves repeatedly striking at your opponent's legs and then following up with a knockout punch or kick. This won't always result in a knockout, or even inflict a serious amount of damage on the other fighter in the ring, but it almost guarantees that you'll win the decision from the judges at the end of the match.
Of course, if you're a feeling a little more honorable, K-1 World Grand Prix does present a number of alternative strategies. There are three main areas you can attack on an opponent's body: his head, his chest, or his legs. After repeatedly pounding on one of these sections, the area will become vulnerable, meaning that the next few punches or kicks to that section will result in a knockout (if you're going for the head) or an injury knockout (if you're going for the legs or chest). Whatever method you decide to use ultimately depends on the fighting style of your opponent and the types of attacks he's vulnerable to. Naturally, your opponent will be trying to do the same thing, but at the end of every round, you can choose to recover health in specific areas, regain your overall health, or forgo those options and instruct your fighter to go for the knockout.
It's a reasonable representation of the sport and the strategy involved, but it's the nuances of the sport that K-1 World Grand Prix executes really well. Just like in the actual sport, you'll see strikes that cancel out other strikes, as well as totally random knockouts. At one point during a match, for example, we fired a knockout kick at an opponent who had almost full health and stamina and actually knocked him out of commission simply because the kick came at the right time. You might say that such a thing isn't fair when it happens to your fighter, but it doesn't occur all that often. Plus, it's just one of the exciting aspects of the sport that has been incorporated pretty well into the game.
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