Have you ever anticipated something so much that you started, sort of, stalking it? Reading up about it, watching videos, even terrible quality YouTube ones, just so you can see a bit more of the thing you’re interested in? Yeah, well, that was us with Def Jam: Icon.

Now, have you ever been so bitterly disappointed that the object of your infatuation turns out to be such a letdown that you feel stupid for paying an interest and angry at the world for allowing that to happen? Yeah, well, that’s us now. Then have you ever had to write four pages on the thing that jipped you? Ha ho, here we go.

Put your arms in the air if you enjoyed the first couple of Def Jam games! Okay, fair enough, that doesn’t even rhyme, but we’re not rappers, not like Mike JONES!. But the request remains: hands up who liked Vendetta and Fight For New York? We
did. They were ballsy with their liberal use of foul language, extreme violence acted out by actual proper hip-hop legends and, of course, the guy who would be everyone’s favourite uncle if they could choose – Henry Rollins. Unfortunately, that’s all changed for Def Jam: Icon and in its place is a namby-pamby and somewhat effeminate beat-’em-up based on throwing people at things.

The things we miss most are the Blazin’ Moves; those incredibly overthe-top finishing moves that saw Hispanic hard nut Danny Trejo pick up an opponent, slam him into the concrete floor face first and then kick him in the balls. Not just any old kick, but one that’s so hard it requires a run-up and when it connects, the force picks up the unfortunate victim and carries his body several feet. Even women cross their legs in sympathy when they see it. In Icon you get to throw people at cars that inexplicably move in time with the soundtrack. Violence begets Bemani? Anyway, there were tons of these Blazin’ Moves
and cool special characters in Fight For New York and in Icon there aren’t any.

There is, of course, the pleasure of beating Sean Paul’s stupid face in return, but that’s it. No more hefty boots to the happy sacks and instead there’s… well look, when someone’s on the ground you don’t run up to them and casually shake your foot in
their face, do you? You kick them, you stomp on their neck, you try to hurt them. Put a bit of welly into it Redman! Don’t pet him on the head Ice-T, your name’s not Tracey… oh wait. You see, the violence has been so neutered that even the traditional ground attack has turned out wet. But this is just the beginning of the list of things that are not fun in Def Jam: Icon.

There is another, smaller list… well, it’s not even a list, it’s just a piece of paper with “the thing that is good about Def Jam: Icon” written on it and below that it just says “graphics”. The graphics are amazing – well, the characters are – but the backgrounds, even though they’re bouncing about, aren’t very impressive. However, the faces on the characters are incredibly realistic. Obviously they’ve all been scanned in, but when you see Sean Paul grimace after being slapped in the
face, you know that’s what he’d look like if you ever got the chance to do it in real life.

This realism is detrimental to the game, though – not The Game, since he still looks quite beefy – but when you see these rappers and hip-hop stars that most people have never heard of start flipping out all over the place and throwing people ten feet across a nightclub’s dance floor, then it just starts to look ridiculous. Fight For New York used caricatures of its cast
and was all the more believable for it, even Flavor Flav had a bit of muscle added to him so you didn’t baulk at the crazy kung fu moves he pulled off. In Icon, you’ve got the incredibly fat Fat Joe doing things that would be impossible for a man of his size, and as for the evasive rolls – or triple-tuck back flips as some of the gangstas can do – well, these just further emphasise that this mixture of realism and outlandish fighting doesn’t really mix.

Okay, now that we’re back on the ‘no fun list’ we can start banging on about the control system. We don’t like it. Def Jam: Icon wants you to use all of the pad, all of the buttons and to twirl those analogue sticks like a DJ cursed with the world’s smallest turntables. For a start, you’ve got two quick attacks, one high, one low. Next you’ve got two hard attacks, also one high and one low. Then there are the directional attacks performed by twirling the right stick, which knock your opponent sideways so you can manoeuvre them into the danger points on the level. You can press down twice on the right stick to get a knock-back attack, and up twice to initiate a grapple. Once in a grapple stat you can use the D-pad to perform a suplex and other wrestling moves or you can use the left stick to throw your opponent at one of the dangerous areas.

There’s more. You can try to do combos with the high and low, light and hard attacks. A maximum of five hits can be combed together, although it’s better to cancel into a grapple after the fourth. And you can block high and low. This works really well for the AI but not so well for you because it’s nearly impossible to predict and even more difficult to do on reaction. If you do manage to counter a blow with a well-timed block, you automatically go into a grapple state, but it happens so rarely that you tend to get caught offguard. Plus, by the time you realise you shouldn’t still be holding the right trigger and absentmindedly pushing up and down on the left stick, the grapple has been broken.

You can waste time as much as you want with these moves, but the only way to score some decent damage is to throw your opponent at the objects on each level that do things in time with the music. Or you can activate them yourself by miming
like a DJ. And this is the height of the violence; throwing people into a wall of speakers, pretending you’re scratching a record, and boom! The speakers react by sending out supersonic sound waves that catapult your victim, usually right back at you, which takes off some of your health. It’s not a particularly good system and there’s very little chance that you will ever feel satisfied with the way you have to fight.

The whole point that you’re throwing people at stuff is even more ludicrous. On an off-chance you’re given the opportunity to help make a record label; you’re set up with a dingy flat, a computer, given some cash and then you have to deal with
signing the big names, like Mike JONES!, and selling their records. And all of these tasks can be successfully carried out by using your fists. From stopping an insane fan from bothering Ludacris to getting back Sean Paul’s demo tapes every time
they’re sent out, there’s someone you have to beat up. There is a small management aspect to it too, but it just stems around paying bills. For example, if Lil Jon wrecks his hotel room, you pay for it to keep him on your label. Similarly, you can earn girlfriends and keep them sweet in the same way until you have four hoes on the go and you get 35 GamerPoints. Eventually, you become so good at paying bills and banging heads that you beat the evil record company and the good guys win. The problem is that, as you chip away at the opponent’s health until it ends, the fights are just so terminally dull. And then you get to do all over again because yet another crazed fan is bothering Ludacris.

Is there any incentive in seeing what becomes available in the shops so you can dress your character differently? No, of course not. Maybe there is incentive enough to get all 850 GamerPoints, but we reckon even hardcore Sticky Fingaz fans wouldn’t bother supporting his career after a few fights in the story mode.

So yeah, Def Jam: Icon is one big disappointment. After the fun and exuberance of the previous Aki Corporation-developed Def Jams, EA’s own Chicago studio offers up a dull, variation on the beat-’em-up. Which really makes us just want to
paraphrase Ice-T: “Hey EA, you’re nothing but a punk, your daddy’s a punk and your momma’s a bitch”.

Tim Empey