Face Breaker

Greetings and salutations fellow FaceBreakers!

Following up Professor Juby’s post is going to be tough but I’m going to do my best. I’m Trey Smith the Creative Director on FaceBreaker and I’ve been asked to give you the “Low Down” on all things creative with this post.
Before I get started I want to thank you, yeah YOU, for taking the time to read this stuff. And want to give a big shout out to our homey Matt Tripepi and our growing FaceBreaker community folk. The team and I are very proud of FaceBreaker and we’re psyched that we have a forum like this to share stuff with you.

So…The beginning

Our mandate from ‘the powers that be’ was to make a boxing game that was NOT Fight Night. Sounds like we had a lot to play with right? Not quite. When you’re working with a sports title, there are some imbedded rules and limitations that you have to work with or they cease to represent the sport. Notice that all of our characters have gloves and fight in a ring. These were important rules for us, and two of the few rules we did not break. With FaceBreaker we did not set out to live amongst the Tekkens, Virtua Fighters, and D.O.A.’s of the world. We are a Boxing game. For me personally this was a relief, as I just don’t have the time and commitment it takes to remember 27 billion button press combos per character needed to enjoy a game these days. Todd Batty, our fearless leader and Gameplay Guru, has a great line for this: “You are not going to need a degree in dexterity to play and enjoy FaceBreaker.” Batty will give you the dig on gameplay soon, but rest assured…FaceBreaker IS NOT a button masher. It’s got a great pick up and play feel to it and then some deceptively deep strategy once you get the hang of things and learn the ins and outs of each character. I’ve been playing it for months and I’m still discovering new things every time I pick up a controller. Again, more on the gameplay front later 

So FaceBreaker is a boxing game, not a fighting game. True. But as some of you have already noticed, we’ve got some characters that use their feet. Why did we break that boxing rule? Because it’s more fun damnit!  We held on to the “no kicking” rule for as long as we could, but made the call to open up the ability to kick for some characters because they, the characters, simply wanted to kick. When you dive as deep into these characters as we have, you start to get into their heads. Some of our characters would stop at nothing to win a fight and since there is no ref…well we felt they would take advantage of that fact. If you listen, they almost talk to you and tell you what they want to do. If you don’t, they just end up as window dressing. I’ll give you an example….

Ready 2 Rumble. Played it. Loved it. Awesome! Even when we were doing research early on in the project, a lot of people said “The characters need to be just like Ready 2 Rumble.”

Alright gamers, I’m going to ask you to take a quick quiz. No Googling allowed!

Pencils ready?

Ok here we go….Name 3 characters from Ready 2 Rumble.

Alright, pencils down.

I’ve asked this question to 100+ gamers and barring a couple of Dreamcast fanboys, the VAST MAJORITY of people say “Let’s see….there’s Afro Thunder and……uh…….there’s uh….”

I’m sure there is a handful of you hardcore monkey stickers out there that remember that Boris guy or the Big Mama character, and for those that admit it, Michael Jackson, but for most of you…I’ll bet it was Afro and nobody. Pretty interesting stuff huh? I was surprised too. Anyways, my point is…outside of Afro Thunder, an undeniably kick ass character, the rest of the cast of characters in Ready 2 Rumble were essentially just window dressing. With FaceBreaker we didn’t want to create a “one character show.” We set out to create an eclectic cast of characters that provides a little something for everyone. We want ANYONE that picks up a controller to immediately identify with, and thus want to play as, at least one of our characters. And hopefully, there are a handful of other characters that are next on your list to check out. If you don’t like them all well, that’s okay. Some of the characters were made to make you laugh, while others were made to make you want to punch them in the face. The characters we’ve discussed so far are actually pretty tame in comparison to the characters to come, so if none of them have “clicked” with you yet….stay tuned.  We’ve got more. If we’ve done our jobs right, when someone asks you 10 years down the road to name 3 characters from FaceBreaker, you’ll nail it. If you can’t, then it’s all Juby’s fault.

Lastly for this post, I wanted to touch upon something that is imperative when you’re working with a new IP. Vision.  
For those of us that grew up on Punch-Out! and Ready 2 Rumble, the idea of a non-simulation/Arcade Boxing game is nothing new. BUT…it’s been awhile gang.

1984 – Punch-Out Arcade
1987 – NES Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out
1991 – Street Fighter II
1994 – SNES Super Punch-Out
1999 – Ready 2 Rumble

These games were HUGE inspirations for us, but they were just that, inspirations. As for our tie to Fight Night? Well, Fight Night is the ultimate boxing simulation. It’s gritty, it’s edgy, it’s real and its F-ing great! But… it’s not where we wanted to go with FaceBreaker. Why? Because we’ve already got another Fight Night in the works…Round 4 to be exact…. and with Facebreaker we wanted to create something more lighthearted, less serious, and more…unexpected. We really wanted to create something fresh and new with FaceBreaker, something that would appeal to the young and old, males and females, and to the casual and the hardcore. Something that people would see and say “EA Sports made this?” Something that was inspired by all of the great old school games we used to play back in the day – but with all of the fancy bells, whistles, and Wiimotes that we have to play with today. And we’ve learned a lot about what makes a great game since then too. Just to give an example, this team is comprised of major contributors to other great sports games like Fight Night, NBA Street, FIFA, NBA Live, MVP Baseball, Skate, and SSX  to name a few. Many of us have waited our entire careers to work on something new, from the ground up, and we’ve really poured our hearts, souls, and development experience into this game.  Hopefully this will come across once you get to check FaceBreaker out with your own two hands. And well…because if you use someone else’s two hands that would be kind of creepy.

At the end of the day, we set out to make a game that you can break out anytime you’ve got friends over and want to have some fun. That’s what FaceBreaker, and our fancy new sub-brand EA SPORTS FREESTYLE, is all about. Fun! Yay!
Well, I’ve got to get back to work now so I hope you enjoyed yourself and thanks for stopping by.
And just a head’s up, you ain’t seen nu-nu-nuthin’ yet 