Should be called Fight Night: Counter-Strike... or Counter Fight... or Don't Bother Throwing Regular Punches: Round 4
The knockdowns are almost there. They've done away with the silly rag doll physics I hated so much from before and made me believe somebody just got knocked out. The only thing that irks me is the sound it makes on the knockdown punch... a hybrid of dropping a carton of eggs and jamming a fist in a jar of petroleum jelly. Maybe he had a mouthful of jello when you hit him.
The good said, lets move on to the inevitable bad that always accompanies a Fight Night, being that it has a monopoly on the series, therefor lacking in checks and balances. The mini-games for training are ridiculously hard and confusing. Even completing one without making a mistake will usually net you the very minimum of reward. I swear one is based exclusively on the difficulty of controls... where pressing left may result in one of 3 punches, messing up your combination. Being forced to auto-train leaves you at generally worse stats than your opponents. And when the 3 challengers you have to choose from to gain rank are Tommy "Gunn", Evander Holyfield, and James Toney... you kinda want some skillz.
As for the fighting... don't bother throwing regular punches. I've wailed on guys with haymakers and uppercuts for 2 and a half minutes only to have a jab counter my jab and send me down. Fight Night is notorious for its silly counter punching rewards. Just keep weaving and hope your opponent likes throwing head punches. And this time around percentage landed is way too over-important. It sways judges and even though you just got your ass handed to you, landing 4 of 4 punches last round has given you enough points to completely heal up before next round. This seems like a modern day version of hitting select on NES MT PunchOut.... make Doc's hand work overtime.
Combined with the still oh-so-terrible music... come on EA, some of us don't like terrible rap... 'Uh, yeah, throw a punch, counter, block, move, punch, you da winner." are great lyrics and all, but some of us are white folks....... and the fact that Tyson is consistently knocked out in my Tyson - Ali sim matches... Good effort EA, but keep trying.
-edit-
After more playing, I have more things to complain about. Legacy mode is basically quick play with mini-games. There is no feel of building a fighter. Your "messenger" is basically a spam mail you are bothered with... filled with such deep and personal messages as "You Are Winning" or informing you of a new champ in some weight class somewhere and if you care to find out who, you'll have to do it yourself. All the clothing and personalizing options from FN3 are non-existent now. I actually forgot I could change shorts, and didnt care enough to when I did remember. And the ring entrance is also lacking. The ESPN announcing talks the whole way through and whatever music you selected for your entrance plays first... regardless of who is actually entering the ring. The fight announcer is apparently announcing from the back row of the audience and has forgotten his microphone, because all you'll hear is the crowd cheer for somebody.
It's like the FN3 team was all fired and a new team was brought in to make it more 'pretty'. The gameplay feels like a sidenote.