EA Sports UFC 5 – It’s (Almost) Time for the Premier Mixed Martial Arts Game in all of Combat Sports

There’s that moment in every major UFC event, where you’ve cheered for your fighters during the preliminaries, main card, and co-main event, but then the time comes for the main event. You’re on the edge of your seat as the arena lights go dark. The walk out song starts playing, the fighter begins the trek out to the octagon, the arena erupts in flashing lights, and a thunderous crash of cheers resonates throughout the arena – and you know two warriors are about to engage in violent battle until one emerges as the victor.

Watching the EA Sports UFC 5 reveal trailer perfectly recreates this heart-pounding rush of adrenaline experience. It’s so lifelike from start to finish – from the walk out, to Israel Adesanya “shooting arrows” into his fallen opponent, right down to Jon Jones staring out across the ring at his next victim. Chills!

In a follow up to the cover athlete announcement from a few days ago, Electronic Arts just shared the full reveal about EA Sports UFC 5, including release date, pre-order details, new features, and more! I attended a press event supporting today’s announcement and witnessed many of these new features firsthand and explained in greater detail. All I can say is, fight fans, you are in for a treat!

We already know Alexander “The Great” Volkanovski and Valentina “Bullet” Shevchenko share the cover of EA Sports UFC 5’s standard edition, while Israel “The Last Stylebender” Adesanya graces the cover of the Deluxe Edition in spectacular fashion befitting the iconic fighter and current Middleweight champion. If that wasn’t reason enough to cheer, check out what else is coming to the game when it launches in October.

My biggest takeaway from the event was how the team is so invested in creating the most realistic Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) simulation in all of combat sports, and how many of the innovative new features and technology will be incorporated in the series for the first time. During the press event, the team focused on three main pillars in the development of EA Sports UFC 5 – making it as real as it gets; creating an authentic MMA experience; and celebrating the culmination of all the hard work and training with an exciting Fight Week.

As Real As It Gets

I mentioned EA Sports UFC 5 is implementing several “for the first time” features in the latest installment, and one of the most exciting instances of this is, for the first time in series history the game will be utilizing the Frostbite engine and will support 60 Frames Per Second (FPS) during gameplay and when rendering replays.

Using Frostbite technology allows for “highly detailed characters, next-gen lighting and shading, improved rendering quality, all new presentation of environment, and visual effects.” Simply put, the game looks and plays – as real as it gets! With features like strand-based hair, new facial animation technology (FaceRig) and advanced body technology (Shapeshifter), you will experience a level of realism never experienced in the games before now.

While Frostbite guarantee fighters look their best at the start of the fight, it will also ensure they look like they’ve gone through three (or five) rounds of all-out war. Damage is authentically represented with realistic accuracy. To put that in greater detail, your character model will have 8 regions for cuts, bruising, and swelling, with multiple levels of injury progression in each region, resulting in a combined 64,000 different possibilities. All inflicted damage carries true game play altering consequences – affecting stamina, mobility, and defensive ability.

All the technology used to bring a level of realism to gameplay will also be used to recreate those spectacular Knock Out moments with more intensity than ever before, with dramatic lighting, dynamic cameras, super slow motion, and immersive sound effects. The video I saw of this demonstration showed a devastating head kick that landed with ear ringing, jaw jarring effect that sent blood and sweat flying across the octagon – I thought I was watching an actual highlight reel from an Adesanya fight. Spectacular!

Authentic MMA

In addition to having lifelike athletes who look, sound, act, and bleed like their real-world counterparts, EA Sports UFC 5 must immerse you in an authentic MMA experience for you to fully feel like you are the next UFC champion, and feel it you will, with the new strike and submission animations, physics driven hit reactions, and Real Impact System.

The game features new and improved strike animations including ground and pound elbows, spinning attacks, calf kicks, body punches, and more. Plus, with the Real Impact System, the damage you and your opponent sustain isn’t just a visual representation but is translated into authentic damage impacting gameplay – a broken nose will result in slower stamina recovery; a cut or swollen eye will result in more vulnerability on the affected side; leg damage (those calf kicks can be a game changer) will result in slower movement and impaired takedowns. And any injury, if severe enough, can ultimately lead to a doctor stoppage.

In another series first, the ringside physician plays a role in EA Sports UFC 5. Sustain an injury severe enough, or badly damage your opponent, and the referee will pause the fight long enough for the doctor to come in and evaluate the severity of the injury. If you’re lucky enough, you’ll be able to continue (or is that unlucky), but if it’s too severe, the doctor can call a stop to the fight.

It’s important to note combat sports can be a bloody and brutal endeavor, and the level of realism on display in EA Sports UFC 5 has resulted in the game receiving a Mature rating for the first time for blood, violence, and language. The developers were careful to honor the fighters with the same amount of respect they often show one another after the battle is over and the dust settles, so some of the more gruesome and often career ending injuries will not appear in the game – they very rarely happen in real life, nobody wants to see them happen, so the decision was made to leave them out. Fine by me!

One of the most significant changes from previous editions in the series is the new seamless submission feature. Previous games relied on a submission system using multistage mini games, but the team felt this was too lengthy of a process that bogged you down and removed you from the excitement of the fight. The new method features over six hundred grappling and submission animations allowing you to focus on the fight while smoothly and seamlessly switching from transitions, counters, and reversals. You’ll feel like a black belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in no time, and to help you perfect your skills, you’ll have access to another series first – the Performance Institute (PI), hosted by none other than former Women’s Flyweight Champion – Valentina Shevchenko.

As part of your training camp and quest for the championship in UFC 5, you’ll have access to the PI where you can focus on improving and mastering your striking, grappling, health, damage, and stamina attributes. The whole training camp experience has been improved with the return of Coach Davis, upgraded sparring challenges, and a new challenge pack grading system.

Fight Week

Fight week is an exciting time for the fighters and fans and features several events leading up to the actual fight night. In real life, this manifests in press conferences, ceremonial weigh-ins, and the often-tense face-off between the competitors. And now for the first time in series history, EA Sports UFC 5 is incorporating real world UFC events into special in-game challenges and events. I don’t want to spoil some of the specific details since they will result in a unique player experience, but one feature I’m looking forward to is Fight Predictions.

Leading up the next UFC event, you will have the opportunity to view the fight card and pick your predictions for winners and losers, the method and round the fight will end, and who will get the fight of the night bonus. You’ll automatically be pooled to compete with others, and whoever scores the best based on the real-world UFC fight results will be rewarded with in-game coins. How cool is that!

There are also daily matches you can participate in for a chance to win in-game coins, and these matchups are also based on the real UFC schedule, with each daily match getting progressively harder as you near the end of the week. As a big fan of UFC in real life and the video game series, I applaud this innovative integration between the two.

There’s a lot for fight fans to look forward to in EA Sports UFC 5, and the good news is the launch is less than two months away, right around the time many of us will be watching UFC 294 and wanting to jump in a game and recreate the epic battles on that card! 

EA Sports UFC 5 releases October 27 for Xbox Series X|S and is available for pre-order today. The Deluxe Edition includes 3 days of early access, plus Fedor Emelianenko, Muhammad Ali, and Mike Tyson – three of the greatest warriors to ever compete in combat sports. Check out the official website and follow @EASPORTSUFC for more details.

UFC® 5 Deluxe Edition

Electronic Arts

☆☆☆☆☆

★★★★★

$99.99

$89.99

EA SPORTS™ UFC® 5 is as real as it gets. Powered by Frostbite™ engine’s advanced rendering capabilities, your favorite fighters now have unparalleled character likenesses to complement next-level environment fidelity that’ll make their walk to the Octagon feel like a PPV main event. The all-new authentic damage system brings the intensity and strategy of a fight to life, as cuts and strikes absorbed can affect mobility, defense, stamina, and more. Take too much damage, and the doctor will check to see if you’re able to continue. For lovers of the ground game, the new Transition-Based Submissions make grappling feel more fluid and realistic than ever before. And if you like to admire your handiwork, new Cinematic K.O. Replays capture your fight-ending finishes in all their punishing glory. Plus, a completely revamped live service schedule builds exciting challenges around all PPV fight weeks. Bring the next evolution of the fight game home with UFC 5.

Pre-order* EA SPORTS™ UFC® 5 Deluxe Edition and receive:**
-3-days early access
-Mike Tyson
-Fedor Emelianenko
-Muhammad Ali
-Bruce Lee Bundle
-4 Alter Egos (Jon Jones, Israel Adesanya, Alexander Volkanovski, Valentina Shevchenko)
-Origins Bundle (Conor McGregor [2013], Leon Edwards [2015], and 22 Vanity Items)
-30th Anniversary Vanity Bundle (4 Vanity Items)
-Online Career Mode XP Boosts (x5)

**EA account, internet connection, and all game updates required to claim and use pre-order content.

This game includes optional in-game purchases of virtual currency that can be used to acquire virtual in-game items.

*Conditions & restrictions apply. See http://www.ea.com/games/ufc/ufc-5/game-and-offer-disclaimers for details.

UFC® 5

Electronic Arts

☆☆☆☆☆

★★★★★

$69.99

$62.99

EA SPORTS™ UFC® 5 is as real as it gets. Powered by Frostbite™ engine’s advanced rendering capabilities, your favorite fighters now have unparalleled character likenesses to complement next-level environment fidelity that’ll make their walk to the Octagon feel like a PPV main event. The all-new authentic damage system brings the intensity and strategy of a fight to life, as cuts and strikes absorbed can affect mobility, defense, stamina, and more. Take too much damage, and the doctor will check to see if you’re able to continue. For lovers of the ground game, the new Transition-Based Submissions make grappling feel more fluid and realistic than ever before. And if you like to admire your handiwork, new Cinematic K.O. Replays capture your fight-ending finishes in all their punishing glory. Plus, a completely revamped live service schedule builds exciting challenges around all PPV fight weeks. Bring the next evolution of the fight game home with UFC 5.

Pre-order* EA SPORTS™ UFC® 5 Standard Edition and receive:**
-2 Alter Egos (Alexander Volkanovski, Valentina Shevchenko)
-Muhammad Ali
-30th Anniversary Bundle (4 Vanity Items)
-Online Career Mode XP boosts (x5)

**EA account, internet connection, and all game updates required to claim and use pre-order content.

This game includes optional in-game purchases of virtual currency that can be used to acquire virtual in-game items.

*Conditions & restrictions apply. See http://www.ea.com/games/ufc/ufc-5/game-and-offer-disclaimers for details.