Don King Boxing

Don King Boxing first appeared on the Xbox 360 in 2008, where it garnered mostly poor reviews for its weak visuals and wonky control system. So has the transition to Nintendo’s motion-sensitive wonder console made a positive difference? No. No it hasn’t. In fact if anything the game is actually worse.

Don King Boxing is actually promising to begin with, presenting a rags-to-riches story with plenty of input from famous figures from the boxing world. The problems start when you begin playing. It introduces you to the game with an unavoidable tutorial, which is where you first encounter the awful controls.

When the Wii controllers work they can offer an amazing experience, but Don King Boxing is an example of what happens when they go wrong. The game seems completely unable to interpret your moves to the game, leaving you swinging wildly in an effort to pull off simple punches.

This makes getting through the tutorial a challenge since it asks you to do specific tasks which are rendered very difficult by the wonky controls, but once in the game it’s not much of a hindrance at first since you can simply win a match by waving the Wii remote and nunchuk around. Later on it gets much tougher as you have to pull off very specific attacks, and it’s just dumb luck whether you get the right combo.

The graphics are actually a slight improvement on the Xbox 360 version, but since the control system is so broken it doesn’t matter. Every Wii owner already has a far superior boxing game in the form of Wii Sports, which is both more responsive and more fun than this mess.

Verdict: 20%

The controls on this boxing game are completely broken, making it a chore to play, though it does simulate the feeling of trying to fight after being punched in the head by Mike Tyson.