Promoter Eddie Hearn has promised to give fans a new boxing video game despite his idea being rejected by market leaders EA Sports.
EA Sports, the people behind the popular five-game series ‘Fight Night Champion’ – which was last released in 2011, were approached by Hearn recently.
Despite backing from a huge portion of the sport’s community, EA Sports told Hearn they would be on board due to an ongoing deal with the UFC and Dana White.
The company moved on from boxing to the Mixed Martial Arts platform after the last installment of Fight Night.
UFC was then released worldwide in the summer of 2014. Since then, UFC 2 and 3 have kept the EA Sports exclusivity of combat titles firmly with White.
Unfazed by this fact, Hearn has vowed to plow on with his plans to get a new Xbox and Playstation title out into the public domain.
“I wanted to create a video game where fighters play each other virtually. We had a nice chat with EA Sports but I was told they are focusing on the UFC,” Hearn told Sirius XM’s The Ak and Barak Show.
Adding that he’d seek to include all the top boxers out there, not just his own, the Essex man pointed out: “This game wouldn’t be restricted to Matchroom/DAZN fighters.
“We’ll get there when it comes to the game. I think it would be huge.”
Moving on to discuss White and the UFC boss attempting to stage events during the COVID-19 pandemic, Hearn didn’t go in too hard.
ICYMI: @EddieHearn joined @BoxingwithAk and @TheBoxingBully to give his take on Dana White continuing to pursue UFC events during the #COVID19 pandemic.
His answer below and the full interview FREE here via the @siriusxm app: https://t.co/ogeoFVvxEL pic.twitter.com/YecuApkuJF
— SiriusXM Boxing (@SiriusXMBoxing) April 19, 2020
“I can relate to Dana White in a lot of ways. I’ve been told no a lot of times. I’ve tried to push forward,” he stated.
FIGHT CAMP
Hearn is in the planning phase of a ‘Fight Camp’ series to bring Matchroom Boxing back on both sides of the Atlantic this summer.
Housing a set of boxers together with coronavirus testing to compete in an arena without fans has been noted as the only way to stage shows whilst the crisis continues.
After some hope of avoiding having no atmosphere, Hearn finally seems to have admitted defeat.
