Virtua Fighter 5 (Xbox 360)

As a keen martial artist and a lifelong video game fan, combining the two is one of my favourite things. The Beat ‘Em Up genre has been around for nearly as long as the first video games now, and have come a long way from their roots in the form of games such as Karate Champ (fans of Bloodsport will remember Mr Van-Damme playing this in the hotel lobby).

Virta Fighter 5 carries on Sega’s pedigree lineage in the VF series, with the latest two iterations of the game being widely regarded as the finest fighting games ever created. The 2D purists will argue that Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike perhaps deserves that mantle, but there’s no denying the fact that Virtua Fighter 5 is an awesome game!

Fans of the series will be pleased to see familiar favourites back again and spruced-up with glorious, shiny HD visuals. Stalwarts such as Akira and Jacky are still going strong, and the newcomers El Blaze and Eilieen (Lucha Libre and Monkey-style kung fu respectively) make their presence felt from the get-go. On the subject of styles, there’s a wide variety represented with varying levels of realism; everything from Judo to Shaolin Kung Fu so there’s bound to be something to please everyone.

The presentation and graphics are gorgeous, as you’d expect from a next-generation title, and one ported from a hugely successful arcade title. This is actually the Rev.C version, as opposed to the Rev.B which was used in the PS3 version, the geekier of you may be intrigued to hear. What this means to the vast majority of people who’ll play this is negligible though, you just need to know the CPU plays a mean game and is no walkover! It’s in Vs mode that the game really comes to life though, be it two people in the same room playing, or over the outstanding Xbox Live online implementation.

It’s not an easy game to play at first, but if you put the time in working through the Dojo training area and the vast Quest mode – where you can customise your character’s appearance and improve your Kyu/Dan ranking – it’s a rich, rewarding experience and one which will last a long time. People new to the game won’t find it too daunting to pick up, the premise of Virtua Fighter’s system has remained unchanged throughout its history – a button to punch, one to kick and one to guard. That’s it. The vast range of moves are executed with a combination of the joystick and buttons. The only difficult choice is which one of the 18 characters to use!

Fighting game fans rejoice, finally something worth sinking your teeth into on the 360! Just be warned that the learning curve (especially online) can be quite steep.

ESRB rating: Teen

Buy it now.

TSDAdam gives Virtua Fighter 5 a BBMReview rating of….