'EA UFC 3' Q&A: Developers on new striking system, fighter ratings, microtransaction controversy

The third installment of the “EA UFC” video game franchise will drop Feb. 2, and already there’s much curiosity about how the game will differ from previous versions.

Many details about the game, which soon will be available for Xbox One and Sony Playstation 4, already are available. Some players even got the chance to get their hands on the game earlier this month when EA Sports released a beta version for a few days that allowed some early feedback on the product.

With less than six weeks until the official release date, MMAjunkie recently visited the EA Sports campus in Vancouver to sit down with Creative Director Brian Hayes and get some hands-on time with the game. The most notable takeaway off the bat was the amount of tweaking that’s been done based off beta feedback alone, and Hayes said that’s a key aspect of polishing the game to a point at which it’s as close to perfect as possible.

Here are the highlights of MMAjunkie’s Q&A about “EA UFC 3.”

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Why did you decide to completely revamp the striking aspect from “EA UFC 2,” from the visual aspects of movement/offense/defense to altering the controller scheme?

Conor McGregor

One of the reasons we took the approach we did is we had a technology opportunity with Real Player Motion (RPM) Tech to really do something that signified a foundational change. You don’t really see this level of change from one version to the next, because it’s pretty huge. You have some people that loved the striking in “UFC 2” and didn’t want to see it changed. There’s some people who love the ground game and didn’t want to change a thing. Others demanded we fix the ground game. There’s no pleasing everybody, but we did feel the way gameplay feels with responsiveness to the locomotion and combinations, and redefining how the health, damage and stamina works, it’s just been unanimously, for everyone that’s had their hands on the game for more than a day, they think, “This is the (expletive).” We’re confident that was the right call to make.

Were you able to make adjustments to the game based on feedback from the beta test? Will you continue to tweak the product based on post-release response?

There’s always tuning going on. We don’t want to make things exploitable. If we make kicks faster than they are, it makes it very easy to create a gameplay imbalance. We don’t get the same level of strategic variety. We try to avoid there being one simple factor that’s a recipe for frustration and success. There’s animation tuning and gameplay tuning going on throughout.

With the amount of things you can change, even live with the server, things can change drastically. Things that are difficult to change are the fundamental control scheme or adding wholesale new animations, but massaging and tuning the experience to work a certain way. From a tuning standpoint, we could tune this thing 180 (degrees) from a simulation experience to something completely cartoonish, but as far as the beta, we can change a lot. You can change a lot with games these days even after they’re out, but obviously that’s not what you want to do.

Fighter stamina was something that was addressed a lot based on public feedback to the beta version of the game. What were the issues, and how have they been adjusted?

The long-term stamina (in a fight) was something that came up more among the hardcore users. They wanted to make sure that if you’re working a guy’s body, or someone is really aggressive during a fight, that it has a long-term impact on the later rounds that you can take advantage of.

You also mentioned bringing knowledge about leg kick damage to the forefront. How does leg damage work in the game, and how does a game plan oriented around attacking the leg influence a fight?

Leg damage was one thing during the beta that a lot of people were thrown off by. Leg damage doesn’t regenerate during a round. It only regenerates between rounds. You can win a fight going for legs kicks, get a TKO, but can also lose a fight going for leg kicks by having them checked and causing damage. Not many people know that, but once they do, it will be part of their strategy moving forward.

What type of new moves and/or animations are in the game that weren’t seen in previous versions?

Because we completely revamped the striking based on the technology from RPM, there’s probably 3,000-4,000 new striking animations, and then there’s an additional probably 800,000 or so in the entire game, from ground game to celebrations. We’ve added new transitions, new submissions, movements on the ground, cage transitions on the grappling side and just a lot more striking variety.

We don’t just have a jab and a straight punch. We have a classic straight, a very Nate Diaz-looking 1-2 combination, a very Conor McGregor-looking one. There’s lot of animations made for certain fighters, fighter types and styles.

How does the roster size compare to previous versions of the game?

It’s about the same size as it was in “EA UFC 2.” We were thinking it was going to be bigger, but then a few people either went to other organizations or retired than we were anticipating. We weren’t necessarily expecting Gegard Mousasi or Lorenz Larkin or some of these other guys to go to Bellator. Some of that stuff was a little bit of a surprise, but “EA UFC 2” was around 260-270 fighters, and this is around the same.

In previous versions of the game you’ve included legendary fighters and added special unlockable characters such as Bruce Lee and Mike Tyson. Will anything similar be included in this version?

Legends are tough because it depends on whether the fighters were around when UFC had licensing for them. Even the ones the UFC does have rights and perpetuity for, it’s still a touchy subject. Bruce Lee is an unlockable character. Once we went past that – even Mike Tyson was still a little bit on the edge. But when we looked at other names coming up it was like Jean Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, and … no. I would rather put in like any other UFC fighter, like the 20th ranked fighter. They are far more deserving of a spot in the game.

Has the physical makeup of fighters been updated from the previous game? Will the fight models include new tattoos, hairstyles, etc.? Can those be updated post-release?

Michael Bisping

We’ve updated as much as we can, but it all depends from a timeline standpoint. When they fight and when the UFC has the opportunity to shoot them with their new look or tattoos or whatever. We have to get those photos from the UFC, give them to the art team and get them processed. When we release our downloadable content there’s updates to current fighters in addition to new fighters.

There have been a number of inquiries about referees in the game and why they’re not more interactive. Have you considered adjusting animations so the referee physically separates the fighters after a knockout, TKO or submission?

We’ve looked at it. It is kind of challenging. Not to say it’s impossible, but from a prioritization side, when we’re adding thousands of new animations to build a new gameplay experience, it’s not at the top of the list. We’d like to have Herb Dean tackling a dude, but we focused on gameplay for this version. It’s something we’re aware of and you’ll probably see in the future.

Why is “Big” John McCarthy not included in the staple of referees in the game? He recently said on Twitter he thinks EA “doesn’t seem to like” him. Can you clarify?

It’s nothing against him. We haven’t added any new refs since we launched the official version of the game. And if we’re going to add somebody to the game at this point, I would rather add someone who impacts the game, like a fighter. The referees don’t do anything different in our game. It’s not like one lets the fight go on too long or someone stops it too early.

Have there been any adjustments to in-game judging and how fights are scored?

Unlike real life, our scores aren’t based on a subjective opinion on who did more damage. We know, because it’s a video game, exactly who did more damage. We can look at that stuff through every single round. It had to change for a few reasons because we fundamentally changed how head damage and body damage and leg damage work. There’s been adjustments, and I guarantee we’ll end up doing more tuning as the result of the beta and after launch once millions of people playing it.

You’ve completely removed “overall” fighter ratings from the game. Why was this decision made, and how do ratings work now?

We don’t have a single number for ratings. There’s no overall. We got rid of that because what it led to last year was like, Conor McGregor is in the game and on the cover, and because there was so many attributes in the game, that even though he’s really good and has really high striking and health states and OK grappling, but because his grappling was among the best in the game, there were variables. His overall didn’t match up with the skills. Same with Ronda Rousey; we had to make her striking better than it was so her overall was better. Now we put everything together. McGregor might be a 95 in striking, but his grappling is middle of the road.

There’s been some controversy and concern around EA and the topic of microtransactions. AstuteGaming.com released a story calling this game “the single most egregious implementation of microtransactions to date.” Can you address this subject and explain what presence microtransactions will have in this game?

T.J. Dillashaw

One article got written and it came hot on the heels of the “Star Wars: Battlefront 2” controversy. There’s no microtransactions in play now, there’s no microtransactions in career mode, create-a-fighter, tournament mode, custom events, live events, ranked championships, quick fight, skill challenges, grappling mode. They only exist in Ultimate Team (mode), in the same way they existed in “EA UFC 2.” The article painted the picture that you can only buy moves and that’s the only way to level up and it existed in every mode in the entire game. I understand that’s a massive concern, and people thought in online play, where there is no online transactions at all. If you want ranked play where there is no upgrading of moves you can still top the leaderboards. It only exists in Ultimate Team. It’s one fraction of one fraction of the game.

Ultimate Team in “FIFA” works that way with your team. You can play online head-to-head against people, you can play offline against the AI. There was a pay-to-win structure that had people concerned, which has varying levels of merit. We try to have matchmaking that takes into account that if I just started playing the game and I only have one move and have a low-level fighter, when I go searching for a match when I go into Ultimate Championships, we prioritize matching up people that have similar levels of moves and fighters. That’s not to say it would never happen, that I might get matched up with somebody that has better moves. Say in an extreme case there’s only two people playing online, and one person has been playing the game for two months and one just bought it, the person who has had it for two months is going to have much better stuff in the game. If they’re the only two people online and looking for a matchup, they’re going to match up. That’s obviously a hypothetical, extreme case. We try to match up people who are in the same place.

Any final thoughts on the game that you want people reading this Q&A to know before release?

After the beta dropped there were a lot of people in the first 12 hours who said, “What the hell happened to the controls?” Then in the second 12 hours, people would post on Reddit, “At first, I was really pissed off, but now I’m hooked.” Part of my concern is how many people are going to give it the day to learn the new controls and get used to it. In my heart of hearts, the stand up gameplay is so much (expletive) better in every way. My concern is people who say, “I found it hard in the first hour” and might not give it a chance.