Def Jam: Fight for NY

Def Jam: Fight for NY
Developer(s)	AKI Corporation, EA Canada
Publisher(s)	Electronic Arts
Platform(s)	PlayStation 2, Nintendo GameCube, Xbox
Release date(s)	NA September 20, 2004 PAL October 1, 2004 JP February 24, 2005 (PS2)
Genre(s)	Fighting game
Mode(s)	Single-player, Multiplayer
Rating(s)	BBFC: 18 CERO: C (15+) ESRB: M (Mature) PEGI: 18+ USK: Not free for minors
Media/distribution	DVD, Nintendo optical discs

Def Jam: Fight for NY is the sequel to Def Jam Vendetta, a hip hop-influenced 3D fighting game released for the GameCube, PlayStation 2 and Xbox and is followed by Def Jam: Icon. The game features several rappers, including Snoop Dogg, Method Man, Redman, Fat Joe, Ice-T, Xzibit, Ludacris, and Busta Rhymes, as well as the voices and likeness of other actors and celebrities, among them actors Omar Epps, Christopher Judge, Danny Trejo, Carmen Electra, and Kimora Lee Simmons. DMX, Keith Murray, Christina Milian and Funkmaster Flex were the only artists from the original game that did not appear in the sequel. The game was spun off into a 2006 PlayStation Portable game called Def Jam Fight for NY: The Takeover. In the video game, it took place in New York City.

Gameplay

The gameplay is expanded from the original game, which was primarily a wrestling game. Fighters can choose three of five fighting styles.

Styles

• Kickboxing
• Street Fighting
• Martial Arts
• Wrestling
• Submissions

The game emphasizes strikes more, as well as proper use of the arena's environment and the surrounding crowd. Tossing the opponent against barriers gives fighters the opportunity to inflict massive damage to their opponent by tossing or slamming them into the wall headfirst, or using other features of the environment, such as slamming a door or gate in their face.

The crowd will shove a fighter back into combat if he is thrown into them or gets too close, and will sometimes hold a fighter, leaving them open to attack. Some spectators carry weapons, and will offer them to the fighters, or even attack a fighter if the guy next to them holds him.

Momentum is gained by successfully performing moves, countering, and taunting the opponent. The rate at which momentum is gained is effected by the fighter's Charisma, which is set for most fighters. Created fighters can set their own charisma with a combination of clothes, tattoos, and jewelry; the more expensive, the better. A fighter with a good set of clothes, extensive tattoos, or laden with jewellery can often fill their momentum meter in just a few moves.

When the momentum meter is full, a fighter can activate it, which results in a Blazin' Taunt. In this state, the fighter is said to be "Blazin", and can pull off a Blazin' Move, a powerful and brutal attack personalized for each character. A created character can learn every single Blazin' Move in the game, but can only have up to four usable at any one time.

With the focus taken from mixed martial arts, the only way to win a fight is through Knock Out or Submission. A character can be made to submit by putting them into submission holds until the health bar of a single body part is depleted.

Knock Out is achieved by a unique health bar used in the game. Health is composed of two bars, one displayed on top of the other. The first bar is a fighter's consciousness and ability to fight (Displayed as an opaque light green). Underneath it is the fighter's physical wellness bar (Displayed as a semi transparent dark green). With every hit, a fighter's consciousness will fall quicker than his/her physical wellness. However, whenever a fighter is not losing health, his consciousness meter will recover only to be limited by the amount of physical wellness. When a fighter's consciousness is lowered to a very low point, the entire health bar will turn red. This indicates that the fighter is in danger of being knocked out. Knocking out an opponent in danger requires the use of strong hits, Blazin' Moves, and environmental moves (Such as slamming an opponent into the wall, or achieving a double team move with a crowd member, or using a weapon). It is possible to knock out an opponent by driving down his/her consciousness while his/her physical wellness remains very high. As a fight wears on, physical wellness will eventually fall low enough that when a fighter's consciousness recovers to the physical limit, it is still too low to turn green. This is sometimes known as permanent danger, meaning a fighter is permanently in danger of being knocked out.

Story Mode

Follows the narrative of an unknown created character fighting his way through the New York Underground. Winning matches rewards the player with cash, which can be used in shops to buy clothes which include famous clothes lines such as Reebok, Phat Farm, Air Jordan, and even rapper Sean Comb's clothes line, Sean John and many other clothes lines. As well as clothes, the fighter can get haircuts, tattoos, and jewelry from Jacob "The Jeweler" Arabo, as well as Development points, which can be used at the local gym, run by Henry Rollins, to increase the character's skills, or to purchase and set up new Blazin' Moves and up to two additional fighting styles.

Winning matches also unlocks the fighters defeated, as well as their Blazin' Move, and often the jewelry they may wear. Created characters can have the jewelry of Sean Paul, Crack (Fat Joe), Xzibit, Crazy Legs, Lil' Flip, Def Jam Records, Roc-a-fella Records, State Property, and many others (except for some particular signature pieces such as the medallions worn by Flava Flav or Modify it like Ghostface Killah's Sun God Plate Gold and Diamond piece.), the fighters may be used in Battle Mode, while their moves and jewelry may be purchased and used by the player.

Battle Mode

Battle Mode is the versus mode of the game, allowing up to four players to fight at once. It has several sub-modes:

• One on One - A single match between two fighters.
• Team Match - A two on two brawl that ends only when both fighters on a team are knocked out or submitted.
• Free for All - A match between three or four fighters, where it's every fighter for themselves.
• Cage Match - No crowd interference, but the cage itself can be used to attack the opponent. Main Venue: Club Murder.
• Ring Out Match - The wooden barriers lining the ring can eventually be broken, and the match can be won by throwing the opponent through the resulting gap, or by a typical knock out. Main Venue: Dragon House.
• Inferno Match - A battle in a burning building. Contact with the ring of fire damages fighters immediately. In addition, bits of flaming debris will sometimes fall from the ceiling, which can be used as weapons. Main Venue: Red Hook Tire Co.
• Demolition Match - Two SUVs form part of the arena, and fighters can use each other to mess them up. The match can end by totaling the opponent's car. To total the opponent's car smash them into two different sections of the car 3 times (Player 1 - Black Cadillac Escalade) (Player 2/CPU - Silver/Gray Hummer). Main Venue: Gun Hill Garage.
• Subway Match - Fight in a Subway terminal. At regular intervals, a train will roll past. Fighters can be thrown or knocked off the platform, and into the path of the train. Naturally, throwing an opponent into the path of a moving train takes them out of the fight immediately, no matter how much health they have. If both fighters get hit by the train it will result in a double KO. Main Venue: 125 Street Station.
• Window Match - Three large windows line one side of the arena, and a four-story drop awaits the person slammed through one of them. No matter which window they get smashed through, in the cutscene that follows they can be seen being smashed through the middle window. Main Venue: Crow's Office.

Each sub-mode allows the players to choose between 3 rule sets:

• Standard Rules - No holds barred. All moves are usable, and the goal is to defeat the opponents. This is the rule set used for all story matches.
• Crowd Favorite - Through a reward-point system that awards points for specific moves in each match, and awards bonuses for achievements at the end of the match, the winners are decided by the highest point value (and consequently, the largest pay), and not necessarily by who gets knocked out. This means the winner could have been knocked out in the match.
• No Submissions - This match prevents the use of any submission holds. Submission moves are replaced by other moves decided by a player's alternate fighting styles.

Story

The game's story picks up immediately after the first game (Def Jam Vendetta). D-Mob (Christopher Judge), the underground boss from the first game, has just been arrested, when the car transporting him gets broadsided by an SUV. The SUV's driver rescues D-Mob from police custody and drives off.

Unlike the four pre-set characters from the first game, the player is allowed to create his own character, in a sequence where the cops who lost D-Mob are asked to describe the player to a police sketch artist (Lauren). The player can also choose between several voice types as well, unlike the previous hero(es), who never spoke in the game. The voice selection is not available in the GameCube version of the game and is restricted to the rough voice. The other voices the player can choose for PlayStation 2 and Xbox are street, clean, cocky, smooth and gruff.

At first, the action will center around shoring up D-Mob's suddenly shaky empire, which has been rocked by the events of the first game, D-Mob's near arrest, and the ruthless Crow (Snoop Dogg), who uses this period of uncertainty to try to take over D-Mob's turf. The fights take place in "clubs." When a fighter for either side manages to either fight off all comers in a club, or simply a captain holding it, or both, he is said to have taken it for his side, and control changes to that side. In the very beginning, the player will be fighting other fighters in D-Mob's group as he gets started, then will quickly be called upon after a few victories to defend clubs that are under attack from fighters that Crow is sending to try to take them, and later go on the offensive to attempt to take clubs from Crow.

The player will also need to fight for respect in D-Mob's crew. Many of D-Mob's lieutenants and top fighters will doubt or be disdainful of the player's skills and abilities at first, most notably Sticky Fingaz, who begins as D-Mob's top fighter until the player begins to replace him, and slightly less vocally by others like Ludacris. Fortunately, the player is quickly befriended by and taken under the wing of Blaze (Method Man), who is not only one of D-Mob's top lieutenants but also a major advisor to the underground boss.

Soon after, D-Mob arranges a match against the legendary Ice-T for the player to prove himself to the rest of his crew. Afterwards Crow himself crashes the party and openly announces his intentions to take over D-Mob's turf, and begins offering top dollar for D-Mob's fighters to switch to his side. With Crow seemingly having an edge in both money and the sheer number of fighters, the situation looks grim and many of D-Mob's men, such as WC, desert him after this incident.

The player can also gain a girlfriend (Cindy J, Kimora Lee, Lil' Kim or Shawnna) after fighting for her; he can get the girlfriend he wanted, or if he loses, an uglier one, and later, she ends up in a catfight with Carmen Electra over him. The player can then choose to keep his current girl, or switch to Electra.

After this the war heats up, but even though the odds seem to be against D-Mob's group, the rise of the player through the ranks, and his ability not only to capture clubs from Crow but also from third party groups, such as the Triad-run Dragon House (unique home of Ring Out Match battles), or the Babylon, run by a Jamaican mob in Brooklyn, begins to offset Crow's advantages in cash and fighters.D-Mob sends Blaze to fight Crack,but eventually loses to him.

Eventually, Crow proposes a winner-take-all Cage Match between Crack, one of Crow's best and most feared fighters, and D-Mob's "best man." D-Mob, with encouragement from Sticky, accepts this deal, only to infuriate Sticky when he picks the player as his representative. Sticky storms off angrily, but D-Mob encourages the player not to worry about it and keep his mind on the fight. The player wins the cage match against Crack right in the heart of Crow's territory, but as he, Blaze, and D-Mob are celebrating in their limo, a car drives alongside, and gunfire erupts from the window. D-Mob and Blaze are injured, and Sticky, who participated in the attack, is revealed to have joined up with Crow. After a Subway Match against Crow's enforcer and gunman Trejo, the player returns to the limo, where a wounded D-Mob orders him and Blaze to escape from the rapidly-approaching police (Trejo does not appear again, and can be presumed dead because the player has the option to throw Trejo in the path of an oncoming subway train, killing him).

D-Mob is arrested, and Blaze takes over in his stead, using the player and Blaze's friend Doc (Redman) to take all of Crow's clubs in retaliation. During this time, the player fights in a team tournament, and must choose between two fighters whose respect he earned early in his career: Ice-T and Omar Epps. The player chooses one of them and eventually fights the team of the other person not chosen and Magic (Busta Rhymes). The prizes consist of a large cash prize for one team member, and a customized black Cadillac Escalade for the other (which the player takes).

As the player continues to rack up victiories and chips away at Crow's empire, Crow continually tries to get the player to join his side, but fails (One of the first attempts consists of Magic threatening the player in a parking lot after a cage fight with Lil' Flip - this results in the game's only Demolition Match). Finally, Crow resorts to kidnapping the player's girlfriend and forcing him to retake all the clubs he has earned for D-Mob's side, one by one, an apparent betrayal that angers the rest of D-Mob's crew. Crow warns the player that if he tells anyone the real reason for his change of sides, the player's girlfriend will be killed.

With the last club won in a fight against Doc (before which a distraught Blaze angrily takes D-Mob's pendant from the player), Crow claims to have one final task for the player. The scene is moved to an empty scrapyard, where the player finds Blaze brutally beaten by Magic, the final task being to finish him off. The player refuses, and knocks out WC. He and Blaze then battle Crack and Magic. The player must defeat them both in the game's final 2 on 2 match with a weakened Blaze.

After the fight, the player figures out where his girlfriend is being held, and that Crow never planned on letting her live. He and Blaze rush over to an abandoned factory, where Sticky is about to set the entire building on fire. The player engages Sticky in an Inferno Match and leaves him to die in the burning building. After he wins the fight, he can be seen taking his girlfriend out of the burning building before it collapses. She remains unconscious as the player tries to shake her awake (leaving her true fate undetermined), and enrages the player enough to confront Crow.

The player and Blaze confront Crow at his headquarters, backed up by Crack and WC, whose respect they earned, and the rest of D-Mob's crew, whom Blaze had cleared the player's good name with. As a rumble breaks out with Crow's gang, the player rushes to face Crow in a final showdown. After a brief stand off involving a gun, given to the player by a repentant Magic, the player decides that Crow is not worth killing. However, an enraged Crow attacks him with a knife hidden in his cane. After a Window Match, Crow is defeated, and thrown out the window by the player. The player then takes a minute to reflect after Crow is finished.

Gamecube version

There are missing features that's exclusive to PS2 and Xbox. As mentioned earlier, the player is restricted to one voice which is the rough voice. Ten of the thirty tracks are missing. The Gamecube's hardware lacks the light blur effect that permeates on the characters and arenas. Furthermore, certain 3 or 4 player arenas has the crowds cut down due to the minidisc limitations. ^[1]

Production

Josh Holmes, the producer from EA Canada wanted to further revolutionise from the last game Def Jam Vendetta. The research they've done points out that Veteran AKI gamers were familiar with the game control system but new players were intimidated by the complexity that's been used since "WCW/NWO World Tour" that first appeared on the N64. So the team simplify the controls to make it more intuitive. He also finds out that no matter how polished the fighting system is established, one on one fights plays out the same way and will go stale overtime. So secondary elements like crowds, weapons and environments have been added in. Lastly, individual players prefer to use their own tactics so fighting classes has been implemented in unique ways with their own unique KOs except for the Submission class.

Also the omission of the create a fighter is now implemented and tied to the Story Mode. He explains that with other successful fighting games, the convention of a sequel is to add complexity to the control system, multiplayer focus to the exclusion of all else, shallow single player, limited character customization and having a gameplay that's skewed towards the hardcore gamer. Probably the most common that's typical in fighting games like the first game is that it's empty and devoid of people. Inevatibly, there's nothing going on except it's just you and your opponent. So they turned the concept on its head by filling the gap to make the fighting game more interactive and less predictable in order to keep it fresh and accessible for beginners and veterans alike.

^{[2] [3] [4] [5]}

Featured Artists

Crow's Crew

• Snoop Dogg as Crow (Leader): the main antagonist of the game / the kingpin of the Crow gang.
• Fat Joe as Crack (Crow's "Best Fighter", who later turns on him to join D-Mob's Crew)
• Danny Trejo as Trejo (Trusted enforcer, seen more often than Magic)
• Busta Rhymes as Magic (Trusted enforcer but later switches to D-Mob's crew by refusing to shoot the player when Crow told him to do it, then he gives the player his gun to kill Crow)
• Bless
• Bone Crusher
• Bubba Sparxxx
• Carmen Electra (Switches if chosen as girlfriend)
• Crazy Legs
• David Banner
• Elephant Man
• FAM-LAY
• Havoc
• Ice-T (If he is rejected by the player)
• Lil' Flip
• Lil' Kim (Switches if chosen as girlfriend)
• Mack 10
• Omar Epps as O.E. (If he is rejected by the player)
• Prodigy
• Sean Paul(body guard of Crow)
• Slick Rick
• Warren G
• Xzibit

D-Mob's Crew

• Christopher Judge as D-Mob (Leader): the kingpin of the D-Mob gang.
• Method Man as Blaze (Adviser, later acting leader)
• Sticky Fingaz as Sticky (A higher-ranking member who later switches to Crow's Crew)
• Redman as Doc (A Body Guard of D-Mob, Blaze's best friend)
• Capone (N.O.R.E.'s friend)
• Comp
• Erick Sermon
• Flavor Flav
• Freeway
• Kimora Lee Simmons
• Ghostface Killah
• Henry Rollins (The main character's training coach)(is the only character that dominates four styles)
• Ice-T (joins D-Mob's crew if accepted as partner of character at the chop shop)
• Joe Budden
• Ludacris (Sits in on meetings, doubts the player at first but later accepts him)
• Memphis Bleek
• N.O.R.E. (Sits in on meetings)
• Omar Epps as O.E (joins D-Mob's crew if accepted as partner of character at the chop shop)
• Scarface
• Shawnna
• WC (The first to switch to Crow's crew then returns at the end)

Venues

• The Foundation
• The Limit
• Club 357 (also High Stakes)
• Babylon
• Dragon House
• Syn Energy Power Plant
• Red Room
• Club Murder (also Crow's Office)
• 125 Street Station
• Terror Dome
• The Chopshop
• Hunt's Point Scrap Yard (also After Hours)
• 7th Heaven (also DTP)
• The Heights
• The Pit
• Red Hook Tire Co.
• Gauntlet (also Intense)
• Gun Hill Garage
• Stapleton Athletics

Soundtrack

• "America's Most" - Method Man, Redman
• "Anything Goes" - C-N-N
• "Bust" - OutKast
• "Comp" - Comp
• "Dragon House" - Chaing
• "Flipside" - Freeway
• "Koto" - Chiang
• "Let's Get Dirty" - Redman
• "Let's G" - Shawnna
• "Make It Hurt" - Busta Rhymes
• "Mother Mother" - Xzibit
• "Move!" - Public Enemy
• "O.G. Original Gangster" - Ice-T
• "Pop Off" - Joe Budden
• "See about ya" - Beezle feat. Bonecrusher
• "Take a Look at My Life" - Fat Joe
• "Walk With Me" - Joe Budden
• "We Gon Hit Em" - Deuce, Dub and the Junkyard Gang
• "What's Happenin'" - Method Man, Busta Rhymes
• "Yes Sir" - C-N-N
• "Man Up" - Sticky Fingaz

Not available on Gamecube:

• "Are we Cuttin'" - Pastor Troy
• "Get into it" - Comp
• "Get it now" - Bless
• "Lil' Bro" - Ric-A-Che
• "Mama Said Knock You Out" - LL Cool J
• "Nuff Respect" - Big Daddy Kane
• "Pistol Grip-Pump" - Volume 10
• "Poppa Large" - Ultramagnetic MC's
• "Seize the Day" - Bless

^[6]

Reception

The game received positive reviews. GameSpot and IGN gave it a score of 8.7 out of 10 and GameSpy and X-Play gave it a score of 4 out of 5. Alex Navarro praised this game for improving nearly every aspect from the last game like the inclusion of fighting styles, character creation and interacting with weapons and environments. Criticisms really lies on the camera view and frame rate issues that permeate all console versions. Also using profane language but it works within the context of the game. Other criticisms is the girlfriend is less pronounced in the story, why we should care about the created character and how D-Mob, a tyrant from the first game, turns out to be a good guy for this sequel.^[7]

Scores & Awards
Aggregate scores
Aggregator	Score
GameRankings	GC: 84.6% (39 reviews) [8] PS2: 83.6% (48 reviews) [9] Xbox: 83.2% (60 reviews)[10]
Metacritic	Xbox: 84% (54 reviews) [11] GC: 84% (33 reviews )[12] PS2: 83% (46 reviews) [13]
Review scores
Publication	Score
GameSpot	8.7 / 10 [14][15][16]
GameSpy	[17][18][19]
IGN	8.7 / 10 [20][21][22]
X-Play	[23][24][25]
Awards Entity Award E3 Game Critics Awards: Best Fighting Game (2004) [26]

References

1. ^ http://www.1up.com/reviews/def-jam-fight_5
2. ^ http://au.gamespot.com/gamecube/action/defjamvendetta2/news/6093608/def-jam-vendetta-ii-qanda?mode=previews
3. ^ http://au.gamespot.com/gamecube/action/defjamvendetta2/news/6093608/def-jam-vendetta-ii-qanda?mode=previews&page=2
4. ^ http://au.gamespot.com/gamecube/action/defjamvendetta2/news/6107602/def-jam-fight-for-ny-designer-diary-1?mode=previews
5. ^ http://au.gamespot.com/gamecube/action/defjamvendetta2/news/6107602/def-jam-fight-for-ny-designer-diary-1?mode=previews&page=2
6. ^ http://au.music.ign.com/articles/544/544998p1.html
7. ^ http://au.gamespot.com/gamecube/action/defjamvendetta2/review.html?tag=summary%3Bread-review&page=3
8. ^ "Aggregate score for GameCube at Game Rankings". http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/920172.asp. 
9. ^ "Aggregate score for PlayStation 2 at Game Rankings". http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/920171.asp. 
10. ^ "Aggregate score for Xbox at Game Rankings". http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/920170.asp. 
11. ^ "Aggregate score for Xbox at Metacritic". http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/xbx/defjamfightforny. 
12. ^ "Aggregate score for GameCube at Metacritic". http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/cube/defjamfightforny. 
13. ^ "Aggregate score for PlayStation 2 at Metacritic". http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/ps2/defjamfightforny. 
14. ^ "PlayStation 2 review at GameSpot". http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/action/defjamvendetta2/review.html. 
15. ^ "GameCube review at GameSpot". http://www.gamespot.com/gamecube/action/defjamvendetta2/review.html. 
16. ^ "Xbox review at GameSpot". http://www.gamespot.com/xbox/action/defjamvendetta2/review.html. 
17. ^ "PlayStation 2 review at GameSpy". http://ps2.gamespy.com/playstation-2/def-jam-vendetta-2/549391p1.html. 
18. ^ "GameCube review at GameSpy". http://cube.gamespy.com/gamecube/def-jam-vendetta-ii/549394p1.html. 
19. ^ "Xbox review at GameSpy". http://xbox.gamespy.com/xbox/def-jam-vendetta-ii/549393p1.html. 
20. ^ "PlayStation 2 review at IGN". http://ps2.ign.com/articles/549/549064p1.html. 
21. ^ "GameCube review at IGN". http://cube.ign.com/articles/549/549067p1.html. 
22. ^ "Xbox review at IGN". http://xbox.ign.com/articles/548/548875p1.html. 
23. ^ "PlayStation 2 review on X-Play". http://www.g4tv.com/xplay/reviews/57/Def_Jam.html. 
24. ^ "GameCube review on X-Play". http://www.g4tv.com/xplay/reviews/57/Def_Jam.html. 
25. ^ "Xbox review on X-Play". http://www.g4tv.com/xplay/reviews/57/Def_Jam.html. 
26. ^ "2004 Winners". Game Critics Awards. http://www.gamecriticsawards.com/2004winners.html. 

External links

• Official Site