Alright, let’s see what the October 2026 Steam Next Fest sees fit to present to me this time. A “Punch-Out!! inspired boxing game” in which you play as a chicken, huh? Developed and published by Uncanny Games, Fight Like a Chicken sees you play as Benny Bantam Jr., the son of a legendary boxer who finds himself forced to box his way through the criminal underworld to find his missing father. As a man whose only connection to the Colonel is a coincidentally shared surname, I think I’m more than qualified to assess exactly how to Fight Like a Chicken.

Don’t let the term “Punch-Out!! inspired” fool you into thinking you’ll have the same third-person camera angle in Fight Like a Chicken as you do in its claimed inspiration. Rather, boxing matches in Fight Like a Chicken use the same camera angle common in 2D fighting games. As you might expect, you have to manage both your remaining health and stamina. Running low on stamina will eventually leave you defenseless for a period of time, while running totally out of health results in an instant knockout without even the customary 10-count. The key is that you can see your opponent’s health and stamina meters, too.

Enemy boxers glow red right before they throw any punches stronger than a jab. That’s intended to serve as your cue to either dodge, deflect by blocking at the exact moment of impact, or throw a counter punch to interrupt them. I had quite a hard time trying to get the timing down to make the most of those cues. I’m not sure if that gave me trouble due to an accessibility issue, or latency between Fight Like a Chicken and my computer monitor, or what. Additional cues, like a sound and/or controller vibration, might help offset accessibility concerns.

If latency is indeed a problem, Fight Like a Chicken definitely needs to add a way to measure that latency and compensate for it. During actual boxing matches rather than tutorial sessions with your character’s trainer, I also saw three symbols below my character’s health and stamina bars that, as far as I can tell, may indicate that certain characters can’t be properly displayed for some reason. Fight Like a Chicken’s core gameplay loop shows some promise in its current state, but definitely needs more time in the metaphorical oven (or deep-fryer, as it were) before it’s in a presentable condition to launch.

Before I wrote this article, I used the feedback form linked within Fight Like a Chicken’s main menu to report every complaint I mentioned here to Uncanny Games directly. I hope my reports, combined with the screenshots I’ve included here, will help them continue to develop Fight Like a Chicken into the polished, enjoyable game I think it can be. Fight Like a Chicken’s release date is currently listed as “to be announced.” I hope that vagueness indicates that Uncanny Games knows a good deal more attention is needed before Fight Like a Chicken is ready for the championship bout.

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