‘YO “I remember we visited Ghostface Killah[of the Wu-Tang Clan]and he was mad at us!” recalls Daryl Anselmo, a former EA employee and artistic director of the 2004 hip-hop fusion beat-em-up Def Jam: Fight for NY. “Ghostface had a solid four-pound gold coin eagle bracelet “And he insisted that his character’s finishing move should be for this bird to come to life and peck the eyes out of all the other rappers. The limitations of the PlayStation 2 technology and our restrictions on violence meant we couldn’t pull that off. It was impossible.”
The game’s producer, Josh Holmes, chimes in: “When Ghostface first asked me about the eagle, Lauren[Wirtzer Seawood, another of the game’s producers]told me to nod and smile. When we saw him back on the set for the sequel, I apologized[for misleading him]and we quickly moved on to recording his character’s expanded insults for the new game. I remember one was, ‘Go home and cry to your mom. And while you’re at it, tell her I’m hungry! ’”
With or without Ghostface Killah transforming into a gigantic murderous eagle, the resulting game, Def Jam: Fight for NY, released 20 years ago this month, remains one of the most vibrant left turns in the fighting genre. It’s a rare game from the 2000s that still dominates social media conversation, despite the fact that it’s never been remade or re-released. Its 67-character roster included rap legends like Snoop Dogg, Busta Rhymes, Method Man, Ice-T, Scarface, Ludacris, Flavor Flav, Slick Rick, Warren G, Mobb Deep, and it improved on the slower-paced gameplay of its predecessor Def Jam: Vendetta in every way imaginable.
Vendetta was basically publisher EA’s idea to milk an engine built for a canned WCW wrestling game that was stuck in development hell and confounding executives. At one point, in desperation, they even suggested it could be salvaged and turned into an intergalactic wrestling game filled with alien characters. But since Holmes and Anselmo had directed 2001’s hugely successful NBA Street (which added a faster-paced, cartoonish hip-hop aesthetic to the basketball multiplayer mode and handily outsold that year’s higher-budget (and far more boring) NBA Live 2002), they were seen as the perfect pair to turn what started out as a loose idea at a board meeting (“What if rappers wrestled each other?”) into a full-fledged retail game.
This meant traveling to Japan and back to work with developer AKI Corporation, while also touring the U.S. and meeting with rappers who were signed to or affiliated with the legendary Def Jam label, eventually earning their trust. They shaped the characters’ mannerisms, from moves to taunts. “To be honest, I was living the dream,” Holmes adds. “I grew up obsessed with hip-hop. As a teenager, I worked at a music store and sold Flavor Flav a bass when Public Enemy came to Vancouver for a show. Flavor really remembered me! It was a beautiful time. Who would have thought I’d end up recording with my hero or that I could go to Snoop Dogg’s family home?”
However, he admits that the core concept of Def Jam: Vendetta and its sequel Def Jam: Fight for NY was not an easy sell. “Executives had a hard time putting the pieces together for a rapper fighting game. It was a controversial concept,” says the producer, who later worked for Microsoft and 343 Industries on Halo 4.
“When we explained to them that feuding and diss records and competing for the crown were the foundation of being the best lyricist in the hip-hop scene, they finally got it,” Anselm reveals. “Because hip-hop is filled with so many vibrant and competitive personalities, the character roster could still sound like Street Fighter II or Tekken 3.”
In Def Jam: Fight for NY, this concept of rappers beating each other up really hit its stride and connected with critics—it has a solid Metacritic score of 83. “Vendetta was rushed,” Holmes says, “but it still sold very well. The success meant we were able to expand the gameplay with Fight for NY and take our time to get it right.” AKI Corporation took the constantly shifting, momentum-based combat from its legendary 2000 game WWF: No Mercy on the Nintendo 64 and turbo-charged it all with hyperactive Blazin’ moves (my personal favorite remains Busta’s backbreaker, which was more devastating than Bane dismantling Batman’s spine).
The art design achieved a look that sat somewhere between The Wire and a comic book, with an ambitious range of dynamic combat styles (kickboxing, street fighting, martial arts, wrestling and submissions). There’s also a story that features Snoop Dogg as the elusive vampiric villain Crow, someone who will whack you with his cane and then cleverly taunt you: “You got a dental plan?” You can choose to wear Roc-A-Wear or Ecko tracksuits, rise through the ranks of your boss D-Mob’s underground fighting syndicate, dressing ever more stylishly as your respect slowly increases. It’s as if Fight Club had been directed by the brilliant rap music video director Hype Williams.
A key mission involves choosing between a 128-bit Lil’ Kim or Carmen Electra as your new girlfriend, and Method Man will call you the next day to ask if you’ve slept with her. The latter is a part of the game that Anselmo now regrets. “Lil’ Kim could have beaten up any of the male MCs and it shouldn’t have been[reduced to that],” he admits. “In 2004, every rap music video was about the objectification of women, which of course, in retrospect, is really unfortunate. The reality is that we were asked to up the sex appeal of the game to make it more culturally relevant.”
Fight for NY remains a refreshing challenge even today, as a recent replay of my dusty GameCube version reminded me. A boss battle featuring Fat Joe’s Zangief-esque Crack character had me throwing my WaveBird controller into a wall as a teenager. You can only beat an opponent if you take the time to figure out how to counter their attacks, a process that’s sometimes exhausting but makes it all the more satisfying when you finally prevail.
“The game was designed so that you had to work hard and learn something new to win,” Anselmo smiles. “Hiro Abe (programmer) and Hiroya Tamura (artist) from AKI were geniuses. To be good at Def Jam: Fight for NY you had to master the gameplay mechanics and get used to losing. In modern games, beat-em-ups are too easy, and that’s why I think a lot of people still come back to play our game.”
And a lot of people are still playing Fight for NY. Not a week goes by without someone playing. Posting with nostalgia a viral TikTok gameplay video, almost unable to believe it existed. Even rappers (including Ice-T) who played characters in the game still respond to fan tweets asking for an updated version.
A$AP Rocky called contemporary rap “the new wrestling,” due to the commercialization of petty infighting and mainstream MCs treating their rap personas more like WWE’s tough talkers. Holmes agrees with my theory that Def Jam: Fight for NY, which shows MCs perpetually caught up in slurs and gang politics, now feels more like a documentary, especially considering how public rap feuds have become. “Rap has become more and more about drama,” he agrees. “You see a lot of videos on social media of rappers fighting. It’s interesting how game violence seems less silly nowadays.”
You could argue that a game that trivialises hip-hop fights – especially when a worryingly long list of rappers tragically continue to lose their lives to violence every year – is wrong and perhaps deserves more criticism. Anselmo counters: “I get it. You know, because of the practice, I don’t think you could make this game today. The climate is too hostile. But our only intention was always for Def Jam: Fight for NY to be a fantasy, escapist experience. It was like the gangsta rap version of The Warriors. It was just a bit of fun; we were hoping that the audience would know that it wasn’t okay to throw someone out of a window in real life. We really tried to respect hip-hop culture.”
The original Def Jam: Fight for NY discs for Xbox, PlayStation 2, and GameCube are in high demand and command high prices on the used market. But we haven’t seen another game in the Def Jam series since 2007’s disappointing Def Jam: Icon, nor has there been a remaster of Fight for NY. Why?
Lauren Wirtzer Seawood, former vice president of marketing at label Def Jam, played a pivotal role in the development of the first two games, acting as a liaison to introduce the shy development team to the exuberant MCs. She also worked hard to sort out complex licensing deals, from imagery to music to in-game brand partnerships.
She tells me that these intricate business mechanics are one of the main reasons it’s so unlikely we’ll ever see the franchise revived. Def Jam: Fight for NY cost around $15 million to make, but now that both hip-hop and video games have become multi-billion dollar global businesses, the licensing costs would be astronomical today. “I’m sure a lot of rappers would rightly want a lot more money if the game was re-released today,” says Wirtzer Seawood. “A sequel could be one of the most expensive games of all time! Several different parties would have to come to the table and agree – Def Jam is now owned by several corporate entities. Many of the characters in the game have also left the label, so negotiating a new game or even a remaster would be complicated and complex.”
Wirtzer Seawood considers Def Jam: Fight for NY to be one of the highlights of his career and, on its 20th anniversary, hopes it will be recognised as one of the best fighting games of all time. “There’s been nothing like it before or since,” he smiles. “There’s a huge community of players who still play Fight for NY… they want a new version where they can fight modern rivals like Drake versus Kendrick Lamar.” He reveals that in an alternate universe, Kanye West and Jay-Z were playable characters. Sadly, Def Jam-affiliated label Roc-A-Fella Records decided to drop all of its artists, as they wanted to make their own game, which was subsequently shelved.
“I think it’s still a very interesting movie because it was so unexpected and risky,” Holmes concludes. “This strange little game captured the hearts of a hip-hop culture that desperately wanted its own blockbuster video game. I wish we could have given Ghostface that murderous eagle!”