Martial arts action movies are some of the most difficult to successfully translate to the video game format. While countless attempts have been made over the last few decades, games very rarely make the player feel like they're an all-knowing, all-powerful martial arts master as opposed to just someone mashing buttons to perform the same three combos over and over again. But that's how Sifu made its mark on the gaming landscape last year, managing to finally deliver a game that put that high-octane martial arts action directly in the hands of players.
Though its unforgivable nature turned away many, those that stuck at Sifu quickly discovered one of the most fluid and satisfying hand-to-hand combat systems in all of gaming, allowing players to pull off a bevy of moves that look as though they'd been ripped straight out of a kung fu action movie. It was clear that Sifu was heavily inspired by classic martial arts movies of both the past and present, and in the game's recent Arenas update, those inspirations are much clearer.
Sifu's Arena Mode Pays Homage to Some of Cinema's Greatest Action Hits
Sifu's base game is littered with references to its cinematic inspirations. Even just Sifu's opening mission, The Squats, has at least two references to iconic action movies. While the player makes their way through an apartment building enemies start pouring out of doorways to assault them. The way the camera moves during this sequence and the behavior of the enemies is extremely reminiscent of the 2011 instant classic The Raid. Later on in the same mission, the player will find themselves fighting their way through a corridor filled with foes, all while the camera stays on a fixed sideways perspective, a clear reference to 2003's Oldboy.
These Easter eggs and references run throughout Sifu's campaign, but for the most part, they remain fairly subtle. Unless fans were going in expecting a reference, they probably wouldn't notice it was there. But while Sifu's base game kept its references subtle, Sifu's brand-new Arenas mode decides to do away with the facade completely, and give fans missions directly based on iconic action cinema fight scenes.
Though Sifu has received several updates over the last year, the Arenas update overshadows them all. Along with some additional outfits, some new enemy visual designs, some new tutorials, and a handful of new modifiers, Sifu's Arenas update adds a fresh challenge mode to the game. This titular challenge mode sees players fight their way through hordes of enemies across nine different maps. Each map has five designated challenges, meaning that there are 45 challenges in Sifu's Arenas update. While most of these challenges' objectives are simply to survive a few waves of enemies, some challenges have unique modifiers that can drastically change the parameters of the fight, and some of these modifiers are direct references to action cinema.
The final mission in the first set of Arenas challenges is called "I Know Kung Fu," and anyone in the know about pop-culture will immediately recognize the reference to the incredibly influential The Matrix. Upon starting the level, players will come face to face with a group of identical henchmen, each wearing a suit and glasses, a clear reference to Hugo Weaving's Agent Smith. The player is wearing a black leather trench coat similar to Neo's, and the fight takes place in a rainy alleyway, akin to the final fight scene of The Matrix Revolutions. To top it all off, a modifier is in play, activating a slow-motion effect when the player blocks, imitating The Matrix's famed bullet-time. And that's not the only reference in Sifu's Arenas mode, with clothing that references Drive, more sequences ripped straight out of The Raid, and much more. It's clear that Sifu's developers have a deep passion for action cinema, and Sifu's Arenas mode finally lets them unleash all of that in a series of missions that act like love letters to the genre.
Sifu is available on PC, PS4, PS5, and Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
