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While Brian was off shredding his skin against the other GameSpot editors in the interest of proving his office-wide MMA dominance, here in the Aussie office we decided to go for a more subtle approach.

Previously, we've tackled (pun intended) UFC Undisputed 2009's multiplayer gameplay, sized up the fighting controls, and taken the more than 80-character-strong rosters to the mat. Although the multiplayer stands out as a particular strong point, it's hard not to act on the appeal of the single-player Career cage fighting when there's no physical risks associated to you the player. We got our hands on an almost-finished build of the Xbox 360 version of the game and tried to build ourselves a name in the octagon.

The first thing you'll do when you decide you want to sign away your natural good looks and symmetrical facial-bone structure for a mouth guard and legions of roaring fans is to customise the way that you appear onscreen. UFC 2009 offers plenty of choice here, and you're able to either pick from a selection of premade character types or build one from the ground up. Our version included 13 different torso appearances, ranging from stomachs with chiselled washboard abs to the less-physically-defined beer gut. Although the templates are a good way to jump straight into the gameplay, if you want to take the time to play god and craft your perfect physical specimen, the customisation options are certainly available to you. There's even an entire subset of menus dedicated to naming your character, choosing a nickname that the announcers will call you by, your hometown, your fighting location, and your character's age. These are all purely cosmetic decisions, so making a character the maximum 45 years of age has no impact on your stamina or strength once you start doing matches.

Proportional height and weight sliders mean that you can choose a behemoth hulking around the ring or a nimble character with a lower centre of gravity, though our brief amount of time with the code means that we're still unsure if your size and martial-arts style are linked, such as picking a smaller-stature body type and specialising in ground grappling. Skin tone, hair type, head and brow size, eyes and nose, cheeks, and mouth can all be tweaked and prodded until you're happy, and there are separate menus to pick your tattoos, clothing style (including yellow form-fitting short-shorts if you so desire), and branded outfits as you unlock them through the Career mode.