The Fight: Lights Out reviewed on PlayStation 3 by James Hamer-Morton. Game supplied for review by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe

After 92 kilo-calories of real life excursion, according to the game, I was aching. And it's that that's both the biggest positive and negative of The Fight: Lights Out.

Sure, you'll have to buy two PlayStation Move controllers to get the most out of the game (one will work, but we definitely recommend both for the proper experience), but The Fight: Lights Out promises an accurate fighting simulation for the PS3. Holding a controller in each hand, essentially, you'll be swinging your fists around to take down your opponents in a one on one brawler, using them to block and punch as you would in a real fight.

A full, in character tutorial, given by the excellent Danny Trejo is entertaining in itself if you buy into its false machismo, especially when Trejo holds up his glowing Move controllers, but it reinforces the limitations of the system with its constant reinforcement that you shouldn't move your feet.

Sure, it's obvious why... if you walk forward, the game wouldn't know where your torso was, and the punching system wouldn't work properly, but it's an experience that relies on you knowing how to best use it before you get even a little bit out of it.

Depending on the time of day, and natural light in my room, the head tracking system varied between terrible (unusable) and good (basically perfect), however I rarely noticed a difference in game.

Before even playing the game for real, after trying the tutorials out, you'll have to create a character. There are enough options to be happy with your creation without it feeling too much like 'head A, body B and legs C' and after assigning a number of skill points to different statistics, you'll be able to start the fighting. The standard strength, chin, heart, stamina stats are pretty obvious, but it's the technique and the speed that seem to control how close your fighter is to the actual speed and swings that you can pull off effectively, so discounting them leads to a very sloppy feeling fighter.

Playing the game itself can be pretty fun. The 'career' gives you a load of locations to play through, and a pyramid of gradually improving fighters to beat in each location. If you keep your feet lodged in position, as the game drills into you, the accuracy is pretty great. The way you throw your punches really reflects the onscreen character, and while you may need to change the default camera angle, as long as you're facing the PlayStation Eye, it's rare that you can blame the game for your own failings. Unfortunately, moving around in whatever is passing for a 'ring' in each stage is a little bit of an issue; holding down the 'Move' button and tilting the controller in the direction you want to walk, but it's a problem I can't see a better solution for at this time (with this technology).

The structure of the game remains pretty simple, but to proceed you simply need to beat each enemy, which earns you money depending on how well you did, which must be used to heal your wounds and allow you to use various training methods to add more points to each statistic. Each fight can also be 'nailed' which is basically a separate objective to try to achieve such as having a high hit percentage, or knocking your enemy out within a time limit, but it's all the same really.

Despite this repetition, it won't take long before you are worn out and have to take a break (or a day off the game if you're really out of practise – no, really), and while this can shorten your game sessions (and therefore reduce any boredom with the game), it clearly shows that The Fight: Lights Out can be useful as a fitness tool. Forget Wii Fit's apparent fitness training disguised as minigames, The Fight takes the idea and disguises it as a full game for hardcore gamers, and if you can take it for that, it does it very well.

Sure the game itself could do with a little more variety, and when you feel fitter than your fighter, who sometimes can't keep up because of his stats it can get a little frustrating, but there's a lot of good in The Fight: Lights Out for those that want to mix a bit of PS Eye wizardry with a secret fitness trainer. And hit people. It's flawed, but is certainly something I'll be going back to play more of, and not only to show off the technology to my friends.