K-1 Pocket Grand Prix 2 (Game Boy Advance)

 I don't know much about K-1, except that it's some kind of kickboxing-adjacent sport that takes place in a ring similar to a wrestling ring. And I only know that much because of the S-1 mode in the Fire Pro Wrestling games. But I saw the boxart for this game, upon which are shown photos of two men who don't look like each other, but they do both look kind of like Randy Orton, and I thought that was kind of funny, so I gave the game itself a try.

 

Surprisingly, considering how serious and po-faced real life combat sports, their enthusiasts, and associated media tend to be, this game takes a weird kind of cartoony approach. A bunch of real life fighters (all of whom are short haired or bald muscular men in shorts) are depicted in an almost super deformed style, and all the stages are Street Figher II=style collections of national stereotypes. An Australia stage with Uluru and kangaroos in the background, a Japan stage with Fuji and geisha, and so on. Furthermore, the fighters all have super moves and a Fighting Vipers-style hyper mode, which can be activated a limited number of times per fight.

 

So what concessions to realism does Pocket Grand Prix 2 make, to keep itself in the realm of "combat sports game" and out of "fighting game"? Well, there's a knockdown system, like in Battle K-Road. Get knocked down three times in a fight, and you lose, even if you've got health remaining. There's also theoretically a timed rounds system, though the knockdowns rarely come into things, and I've never had a fight go past the first round, simply because fights are decided by knockout very quickly. 

 

Furthermore, there's also no jumping, and no throws. No jumping makes sense generally, because jumping just doesn't happen as much in real life as it does in videogames, no matter what the situation. And I know that K-1 doesn't permit throws in real life, as it's the same in the aforementioned Fire Pro S-1 mode, meaning you basically have to create specific characters with strike-based movesets to play it. This game also has a character creation mode, though it's very limited (your only appearance option is to change the colour palette of the one pre-made generic character), and, as far as I can tell, it seems to be impossible to make a character capable of standing a chance against the real guys.

 

K-1 Pocket Grand Prix is a strange one. On the one hand, the boring-looking characters and completely pointless creation mode are going to put off people who aren't particularly interested in the real sport. But at the same time, the cartoony aesthetic and animal spirit-manifesting special moves are probably going to be off-putting to people looking for a serious sports game. I'm going to be predictable here, and say that the best solution for both groups is to get ahold of a Fire Pro Wrestling game, and spend some time setting up a roster of characters to use in S-1 mode. Unfortunately, I'm not sure if the GBA Fire Pro games have S-1 mode, though the second one does have the UFC-like Gruesome Fighters mode.