This isn’t Super Smash Bros, a game that, thanks to a web of licensing agreements, places restrictions on what characters can and can’t say and do. This isn’t The Avengers, where every character that appears needs a special scene that makes them look really cool in order to sell merchandise to kids. No, the reason Def Jam: Fight for NY stands alone is that it is the only big-budget crossover title that doesn’t seem to have any reverence for the people that are in it. Īnd as impressive as that roster of characters is - seriously, look it up, it’s mind-blowing - that alone is not what makes the game so uniquely special among crossovers.
The game also featured Omar Epps, Carmen Electra, Danny Trejo, Black Flag’s Henry Rollins, and Jacob the Jeweler, a man who provided inspiration for Uncut Gems’ Howard Ratner. But Def Jam: Fight for NY didn’t stop there. Rappers like Method Man and Redman returned, alongside tons of new artists including Ice-T, Flava Flav, Lil’ Kim, Xzibit, and Snoop Dogg, who voices the game’s main antagonist. Then things got even wilder for the sequel.ĭef Jam: Fight for NY featured a cast of 45(!) real-world celebrities, compared with Vendetta ’s 14. Ludacris, Joe Budden, Method Man, Redman, DMX, and other superstars signed on to be in the original game, either playing themselves, or as in the case of Method Man, playing characters that looked and sounded exactly like them but had a different name. For Def Jam Vendetta, the developers enlisted a group of artists, both contemporary (well, for 2003) and legendary, to appear in the game and just beat the shit out of each other. No, the reason Def Jam Vendetta and Def Jam: Fight for NY sold over 1.8 million copies worldwide and are fondly remembered to this day is their impressive character rosters, among the most extensive seen in gaming. The gameplay was solid, flashy, and satisfying, and if you were to go back and play Def Jam Vendetta or Def Jam: Fight for NY today, you’d be surprised by how well the mechanics hold up.ĭespite its quality, however, the game isn’t remembered for its fighting system, or for its over-the-top finishers.
In true pro wrestling fashion, matches can’t just end with whittling down an opponent’s health bar either, players must perform an over-the-top finisher, land a submission move, or make use of a weapon or environmental hazard to actually knock the opponent out.
The games in the series (well, up until AKI Corporation bowed out prior to 2007’s Def Jam: Icon) were wrestling-based brawlers, combining strikes and environmental hazards with AKI Corporation’s finely tuned grappling mechanics to create a combat system that was, for its time, dynamic and brutal. Pro Wrestling, But Make It Hip-Hopįor the uninitiated, back in the early ‘00s, AKI Corporation, a company that specialized in wrestling games - and was probably best known for developing the impeccable WWF No Mercy - teamed up with Electronic Arts to release a series of fighting games based around then-contemporary hip-hop culture that would become the Def Jam series of fighting games.
And why not? It’s an attractive proposition, being able to market to fans of everyone involved, instead of just one specific niche, and that’s why all these big companies are trying to one-up each other with their next huge project.īut despite their huge budgets, impressive character lineups, and beefy marketing teams, none of these crossover events, past, present, or future, will ever come close to the brilliance that was 2004’s Def Jam: Fight for NY. to that horrific commercial where all of the other brand mascots show up to mourn the dead Peanut Man and celebrate the terrifying baby that crawled out of his corpse, huge corporations are trying to take advantage of fan loyalty by orchestrating these massive, ambitious crossover events. Of course, there has always been a rich history of crossovers in the history of TV, movies, and video games, but in this new, strange, late-capitalist world where a total of three or four companies have divvied up the rights to seemingly all of our favorite pieces of entertainment, a sort of crossover arms race has developed.įrom The Avengers to Suicide Squad to Super Smash Bros. “The most ambitious crossover event of all-time.” The claim was so ubiquitous in the marketing for Marvel’s The Avengers: Infinity War that it has since become a meme.