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| Game: |
Dead or Alive Ultimate |
| Genre: |
Fighting |
| Developer: |
Tecmo |
| Publisher: |
Microsoft Games |
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| Related Links: |
Coming Soon. |
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Tecmo are well known for their delays with games, but if the quality of their past hits are anything to go by then I think we can all agree that the wait is most definitely worth it. Dead or Alive 3 on Xbox was a flagship exclusive launch title and an obvious strategy for capturing the hearts of the Japanese as well as us Westerners. As one of the few Japanese companies that support the American console its great to see that Tecmo have stood proud alongside Xbox and provided gamers with some excellent titles.
Will its last release being a major success and perhaps a wake up call to the many casual gamers out there, Ninja Gaiden delivered on all fronts as the classic arcade hit was reborn for a new generation of gamers. With Tecmo’s continued support in the form of the rather excellent Hurricane pack and now the forth coming Dead Or Alive Ultimate one can only be impressed by the level of dedication that Tecmo staff display.
Sadly Xbox missed out on Dead Or Alive’s previous games where PSone, Dreamcast and PS2 were the only available consoles at the time. Addressing Xbox owners directly in a move that is aimed to appeal to fans and non fans, Tecmo’s release of DOA: Ultimate is a very welcome move at that. Let’s take a look at the game and what it has to offer.
For those who don’t know, DOA Ultimate features a new and improved Dead Or Alive 2 hardcore which first appeared on the PS2, plus and an all new rendition of the Sega Saturn version of Dead Or Alive. You might scoff at the fact that these are simply updated ports of games which appeared on other systems however you couldn’t be further from the truth as these have both been reworked to suit Xbox games players.
What Tecmo have managed to do here is totally revamp the PS2 game by adding more detail, new costumes, new moves and locations. As this is a game of Dead Or Alive 2 then Xbox owners should forget about seeing newcomers such as Christie in the game. However Tecmo did confirm that Hitomi would make an appearance in the game. What’s more, for those of you who have subscribed to Xbox Live will be able to challenge other players online. It is here where the true impact of the changes to the game will surface. For starters players won’t need to feel alone whilst playing as one on one is an option but not necessarily the norm. In a clever move and one I hope wont affect game play is the fact that up to 6 other players will be able to join a server and watch, chat about the two players who are fighting. Depending on the game mode 8 players will be able to face off in Team Battle mode, Kumite mode, winner stays on and Tournament modes. This adding much more of a community flavour compared to Capcom’s efforts. Whether the game will go the whole hog and offer the same level of 3.0 support, as witnessed in Rainbow Six 3: Black Arrow is yet to be seen and boggles the mind at the possibilities there. Whether Downloadable Content will be supported as well is yet to be confirmed as it would be great to be able to acquire new costumes or even extra fighters if possible.
For us gamers this does raise the issue of how is it all going to pan out on Live and perhaps the reasons behind the games delay is due to this. For Tecmo this has been as the name suggests, an ultimate goal to produce the worlds first online 3D fighter. With Capcom VS SNK being an online 2D fighting game plagued by lag issues, many eyebrows were raised (mine included) when DOA: Ultimate or DOA: Online as it was called back then was announced. Can they actually pull it off? Well we shall have to wait and see in October when the game is set for release stateside. Live aside, the games single player and the fact that the original console version is included as well makes for a very special package indeed, even more so if you are a fan. Either way I can’t wait for this game as its going to be good anyways, especially as Xbox is rather lacking fighting games.
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