Thud. That was the sound the Ultimate Fighting Championship’s first attempt at a video hitting the floor back in 2004. UFC’s Sudden Impact game was roundly booed and threatened to harm the company’s chances at legitimacy with any game in the future. Dana White, President of UFC, admitted as much in a recent interview:

“Everyone knows our first [video game] sucked. We were looking for a partner to help us squash the stigma of the old video game. This is going to be the best fighting game ever launched.”

We certainly hope so. And there’s ample reason for hope here. The words “real” and “virtual” come to mind when one views the screenshots and watches the video demo. It feels like you’re watching a UFC event on pay-per-view. The only difference is that you get to control the fighters. Of course, the fighters are digitized, but they seem very real, and it’s the same ring, fighters, announcers, and even ring girls from the UFC. You can choose from over eighty fighters on the UFC roster, setting up the possibility of nearly endless fighting matchups.

Here’s a look at a couple screenshots:

The reviews are favorable and it looks like the decision to hire THQ to work on the design and creation of the game was an excellent one.

But the real question is, how is the gameplay? Can you perform moves, counters and strike like real fighters do? Apparently, each fighter in the game is given a particular grappling and striking technique they specialize in and use the moves of. There’s no “health” or life bar, so you can be submitted or knocked out at any given moment, depending on the circumstances. There are only a certain set amount of moves you can do to counter or defend, so button-mashing will be counter-productive in this game. This is definitely a different set of ideas at play here compared to wrestling or other fighting games.

This game is set for release in Spring 2009. Are you ready to rumble?