Issue 121
November 2014
The 10-0 Serra-Longo ‘Funk Master’ admits to being well beaten by Madden and COD.
What was the first video game system you remember having as a kid?
“I had a few but I believe the first one was the Sega Genesis (Mega Drive). It was pretty cool.”
Have you always been a gamer?
“Growing up I was always big into video games. Especially to help me cut weight in high school and in college. I slowly stopped playing when I didn’t have enough money to buy the newer systems, controllers, and newer video games. ‘#BrokeCollegeKidProblems’.”
What were some of your favorite games growing up?
“Some of the ones I played most were Sonic Adventures, Streets of Rage, TMNT: The Hyperstone Heist and every game from the Street Fighter series.”
Did you ever get into any sports games?
“Oh yeah, I was huge into the Madden football series until 2005, when they started adding too many new features for me to use. I couldn’t adjust to the changes and I started losing every single game I played (laughs). I got so upset I just retired my ‘Madden controller’ forever.”
Do you do any online gaming and interact with fans at all?
“I did interact with fans online but I’ve stopped playing Call of Duty for a while now. I need a break. And now I don’t want to hop back on there to get thrashed by everyone.”
Have you played any of the UFC games and what do you think of the latest version?
“I’ve played all the UFC video games. They get better and better every time they release a new version. I haven’t gotten a chance to play the newest one yet, but I will eventually that’s for sure.”
If you could be any character in any video game who would you want to be and why?
“I would be Ken (from Street Fighter), because he’s a warrior, but at the same time he has a little more swag than Ryu does (laughs).”
BACK TO THE FUTURE: SOLDIER OF FORTUNE
Video game history of MMA: pain is temporary
Five years before Anderson Silva’s shin bone twisted around Chris Weidman’s knee at UFC 168 last December, the Octagon hosted a single night of fights which not only equalled that grotesque scene, it went several steps further. And, ironically, it was all in the name of raising money for injured US military personnel.
The fighters of the first UFC: Fight for the Troops suffered an unusually high number of afflictions. On the prelims, TUF 5 graduate Corey Hill snapped his right tibia in two on Dale Hartt’s left leg, Razak Al-Hassan wouldn’t submit to Steve Cantwell’s armbar until his elbow was dislocated, Ben Saunders landed 34 strikes in the clinch to give Brandon Wolff an enormous haematoma on his forehead, and in the main event Yoshiyuki Yoshida had to be taken out on a stretcher after he was knocked stiff by Josh Koscheck. Plus Nate Loughran got broken ribs off Tim Credeur.
Between auctions and telephone donations during the night, the UFC apparently raised around $4m for the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund. Your guess is as good as ours how much they spent on hospital bills for all the competitors.
If there’s anything you should have learned from this Back to the Future piece over the past two years it’s that life imitates art (and sometimes art imitates life – depends which is more convenient). Any gamers watching the card might have put the theme of gruesome injuries together with its intention to benefit soldiers and realized they were basically watching a real-life version of infamous first-person shooter Soldier of Fortune.
Released on PC in 2000, then later on Dreamcast and PlayStation 2, it ended up getting banned outright in Germany because you could electively blow bits and pieces of terrorists’ arms and legs off with an array of weapons.
Alright, so it’s not exactly the same, but is shooting a thug’s forearm or shin off that different from Hill’s leg break, or Al-Hassan’s immobilized elbow? We think you know the answer.
LAUZON’S BEST BITS
Geek and UFC 155lb contender Joe Lauzon shares morsels from his life in video games
On the early concept of the PS4 social share button: “Sony’s going there because there’s a huge community on YouTube where basically people play video games and teach other people how to get better. I think Sony’s thinking, ‘Oh, this is the future. Everybody’s watching all these other guys play video games.’ But I think they missed the boat on it. YouTube already has a firm foothold in that market.”
SEPARATED AT BIRTH
Lyman Good/Joseph Turok
We’d be lying if we said there wasn’t a whole lot of Andrei Arlovski in the PS3/Xbox 360 incarnation of Joseph Turok, protagonist in the dinosaur-centric first-person shooter Turok. But while Arlovski has had a George Michael phase, and a 300 phase, he’s not had a mohawk phase like our jurassic crusader here.
Former Bellator 170lb champ, and TUF 19 candidate Lyman Good has, however. Plus, look at their equally angular jaw lines, deep-set eyes and rugged five o’clock shadows. Could the six-foot New Yorker kill a dinosaur with his MMA skills if required? Well, in several of his losses he’s been subject to lay ‘n’ pray, and we hear dinosaurs only want to ‘stand and bang’.
