Free Step Dodge

In a recent article on Kotaku, Evan Narcisse asked Yohei Shimbori and Yosuke Hayashi about their thoughts of fighting games and competitive play. The responses were interesting. I've included the full article since honestly the article is so short that it really is just two quotes:

Evan Narcisse said:

When I asked Team Ninja lead Yosuke Hayashi and Dead or Alive 5 director Yohei if they'd implemented any changes to the game specifically in anticipation of its reception by the fighting game community, they answered that that's not how they approach design. "We want to appeal to all levels of skill," said Shimbori. Right now, the dev team is working on game balance, he elaborated, to make DOA5 a fun game first. Shimbori mused that any adoption by the tournament scene comes later and...

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Kayane recently posted her impressions on her experiences with Dead or Alive 5's E3 build and the IGN Pro League itself. In it, she talks a bit about her history with the Dead or Alive series and what her future plans are for it. Although she made a name for her self in Street Fighter and Soul Calibur, what many people don't know is that she started her competitive gaming addiction with Dead or Alive. Her favorites were Kasumi and Ayane, and that's where her name came from after blending the two together.

Kayane said:

Then, I focused more on Soul Calibur which was my first fighting game and made me love the genre, and didn’t participate to more DOA tournaments, also because the french scene didn’t have many tournaments for this game. SC Community has always been very active in France. I wish DOA could have such a strong community as well here.

I have always been a DOA fan, playing DOA3 and DOA Ultimate, DOA4 DOA dimensions…I heard about this CGS tournament with pro gamers...

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According to an article on Kotaku, a small comment is made that the Power Blows will be allowed in the tag mode of the game. This is certainly interesting to hear, as the tag system has not really been talked about. I still would like to hear more about possible changes to the tag system from not only Dead or Alive 4 but also Dead or Alive Dimensions.

UPDATE: GameSpot has given further clarification on the subject. Not only will Power Blows be in Dead or Alive 5 Tag mode, but they will also be Tag Power Blows. This is a very interesting take on it and brings in a nice way to implement the power blows into its system.

GameSpot said:

One fighter connects with a power blow, but instead of knocking the opponent into the environment, they knock them toward their...

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Andriasang has reported that the Dead or Alive Japanese release will be accompanied by a Collector's Edition version of the game. The price is hefty at ¥11,340 (~$130 USD), with the regular edition being priced at a 'more modest' ¥8,190 (~$100 USD). The details consist of the following package material:

• Official Visual (Picture) book
• Soundtrack CD
• Eight (8) Poster Cards
• Ten (10) Special Character Metal Plates
• DLC Code for Twelve (12) "Premium Sexy Costumes"
• The initial printing will have exclusive Ayane & Kasumi 'Premium Sexy Costumes' not a part of the other twelve (Available in both the Normal and Collectors Edition versions)

The twelve costumes will be available at a later date for purchase on their respective marketplaces.

Japan will also be receiving the game on September 27th, practically one day after the American release...

I've decided to provide a list of changes to Dead or Alive 5 that have been announced during the first day of E3. Here, I am merely focusing on system changes from not only the Dead or Alive 5 Alpha Demo, but from Dead or Alive 4 as well. There's been a lot of footage shown so far and this would be a good place to see all the changes. These will not include any character changes such as movelist or attack properties as that's a bit difficult to get. Something of note: the danger zones appeared to be locked off from being used through the "Power Blow" so zones such as the car in Scramble appeared to be usable but this could have just been for the E3 demo purposes.



Power Blow System Changes...

Tecmo-Koei has released it's E3 press release today. The contents of the press release go on to talk about the E3 IPL event as well as finally giving a release date for Dead or Alive 5.

The release date has been currently set to September 25th.

Tecmo Koei said:

TECMO KOEI REVEALS DEAD OR ALIVE 5 LAUNCH DATE
New Generation of DEAD OR ALIVE on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 to Enter the Arena on September 25 Following Conclusion of
DOA5 IPL Tournament Series Kicking Off at E3 2012​

BURLINGAME, Calif. – JUNE 5, 2012 – TECMO KOEI America today announced that the new generation of DEAD OR ALIVE combat, DEAD OR ALIVE 5, will be available in stores and online retailers on September 25, 2012. After taking a hiatus, the widely recognized series returns with a new look and feel while retaining the legacy that established the series as a core fighting contender. Created by Team NINJA, DEAD OR ALIVE 5 will be published by TECMO KOEI America for the PlayStation®3 computer...

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According to the updated Dead or Alive 5 official website, it appears that DOA5 will have more than one version released. The website states that you can preorder the "standard edition" from various retailers. Honestly, I find this shockingly expected. I look forward to hearing what other editions are announced and their offerings. Hopefully they won't have gameplay altering exclusive DLC (such as characters or stages) as that's always a low blow. Dead or Alive 5 is scheduled for release in September of 2012.

What items would you want in a premium or limited edition version of Dead or Alive 5?



Source: Dead or Alive 5 Official Website

It looks like Yosuke Hayashi was interviewed over on GameSpot about the Fighting genre (again). He comes off with at least a new analogy to Fighting games in regard to Boxing and talks about the non-traditional features in fighting games and their purpose. It's a nice read for an otherwise lack of news lately (come on Team NINJA, I want a Bass/Lei Fang reveal!!!!).

It's an interesting read as Seth Killian (Capcom community manager) and Mike Zaimont (Skullgirls creator) also weigh in on the genre as well.

GameSpot said:

Yosuke Hayashi, Leader, Team NINJA
Why do people enjoy fighting games?

I would say that competing against others is human nature. The most primitive form of competition is through fighting. In this way, fighting games are very close to the human instinct, and they don't need to be described in words. So it's for this reason that I believe fighting games are loved and played across the globe.

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DOA5 - HOTZONE (CHRISTIE VS BAYMAN)

How important are nontraditional modes...

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There are only 3 days left to give your feedback on the DOA 5 Demo. Be sure to follow the link and give your thoughts to Team Ninja to help make DOA 5 the best in the series.

http://teamninja-studio.com/doa5/top.html

A new trailer was released from Tecmo Koei, revealing not only a new stage but the return of everybody's two favorite assassins. In what is sure to shock many, Bayman is not wearing his stapled barret and Christie is apparently sporting a bra. Once Mr.Wah returns from his vacation, I'm sure he'll give you a more detailed breakdown however I'll do my best to point how the new stuff.

As we take a look at the new stage, we see the new stage is a battlezone is some rural part of a city. Soldiers are shooting at each other and firing off missles. Enter Bayman, who is sporting a new haircut and Christie, who is still looking rather hot wearing a open blouse shirt showing off her cleaveage and sporting a bra of all things. As the fight begins Bayman shows off some new tools like a forward tank roll that goes into a throw, then follows up with P+K into a throw. We also see his staple back throw is still there as he pulls it off flawlessly. Bayman...

Wow where did the time go? Can you believe that it has already been 2 years since Free Step Dodge was created? Well for one thing I am extremely proud of the accomplishments that we have done in such a short time. Granted, we still have some things that still need to be worked on. It's amazing that our humble site looks like it does today when it started off like this (see photo below).


Matt (Mr. Wah), Chris (virtuaPAI), myself and the rest of the moderation team want to thank all of you for coming to FSD and doing your best to support the Dead or Alive community. We are still a long ways off from even being as strong as we can be but that is something we are always working on. Strengthing and maintaining our small niche community is a top priority here, as well as providing one of the best hardcore Dead or Alive sites around.

However, it can't just be the website that sets the precedent of...

Over at Dead or Alive 5's Official Page, Team NINJA has posted a mini-manual to the demo including some of the system properties, character bios, and a small section of the character's move lists.

In addition, they have provided the link to give them feedback on what you think of the demo or system shown in it. So if you are(n't) happy with something, feel free to voice your opinion to them as they are providing a line of communication to provide your thoughts.

The Dead or Alive 5 Alpha Demo comes inside the Ninja Gaiden 3 Collector's Edition packaging as a downloadable code. Ninja Gaiden 3 will be out in America this Tuesday, March 20th, and in Europe on Friday, March 23rd.

Source: Dead or Alive 5

Hayashi was recently interviewed by Gamereactor for primarily Ninja Gaiden 3 information. However, Hayashi also answered questions about Dead or Alive 5. Specifically, the sex appeal, the alpha demo releasing with Ninja Gaiden 3, receiving community feedback, and the fighting game resurgence and its relation to Team NINJA. A transcript is posted below, but if you'd like to listen yourself just jump over to the interview and start listening at 5:30.

Yosuke Hayashi: If you look at sex for example, the Dead or Alive girls have always been known for that. So... okay let me ask you one thing right now: When you look at this concept of sex, when you go and meet a woman, do you go and look at her breasts - do you judge a woman...

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ScattereDreams has put up a tutorial video of Dead or Alive 4's Helena. He specifically covers her bokuho stance options and mix-ups, as well as her cancel as a form of back-dash cancelling. There's a lot of text at times so you might want to pause it every so often just to make sure you can take it in.

You can discuss the video or Helena's strategies from bokuho over at the original topic.

In addition to recent tweets by Team NINJA referencing another guest character only referred to as "him", Andriasang has posted an interview from this week's Famitsu with Hayashi. Hayashi revealed that Akira may not be the only guest character in Dead or Alive 5. No word on if these other guest characters are also from Virtua Fighter 5 or from an entirely different series altogether, but we'll just have to stay tuned to find out.



Additionally, Hayashi mentioned in the interview that he was the one who pushed hard for Sega to allow them to include Akira into Dead or Alive 5. Oh, and in case you were wondering, Akira's commands are basically unchanged according to Hayashi.

Andriasang said:

The big news in crossover fighting earlier this week was that Virtua Fighter 5's Akira would be...

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As part of the news that went out yesterday with the spiffy new trailer, Sega and Tecmo Koei Europe announced that the European version of Dead or Alive 5 will be published by Sega.

Contrary to popular belief confusion, the title will still be published in the Americas and Asia under Tecmo Koei America and Koei Tecmo respectively. Sega's announcement is for Europe only due to the costs required for marketing and localization in Europe. For example, Nintendo published Dead or Alive Dimensions in Europe.

Additionally, the current release date has been set for a worldwide release in September of 2012. The date is subject to change of course, but that is their current projected date.

The new DOA5 trailer appears to not only show off some new animations with Ayane and Kasumi, but also shows off a new character. That is, a new character to the franchise. You might notice the character displayed from another title that shares the same numeration: Akira from Virtua Fighter 5.

The stage Ayane, Akira, and Kasumi fight on certainly looks like an "entertaining" take on Virtua Fighter 5's raft level.

Also, it looks like wall crumples (at least in this particular stage) put the opponent in the air? Guaranteeing follow-ups again (similar to Dead or Alive 3)? No word yet on any of these gameplay changes as any of this might just be for show, but I'm honestly hoping it's not just for show.

I've done a frame by frame analysis of the new trailer featuring Ayane, Kasumi, and the new entrant Akira. Unfortunately, no 60 frames per second video exists at this time. The only version available is...

A new trailer was released today for Dead or Alive 5 which showed off series regular Kasumi as well as a surprising guest character, Akira from Virtua Fighter. The trailer starts off by giving a quick rundown of a new stage, a wooden river raft area inside of a cave. The raft is initially stationery but once you knock your opponent into one of the walls it causes the raft to move downstream and it eventually goes outside, is broken apart and just hangs short of falling off of a waterfall. Dead or Alive has always been known for its large, multi-tiered stages and knowledge of your surroundings has generally played an important role during high-level matches. Dead or Alive 5 seems to up the ante by not just giving you large, static environments but by making parts of the stage actually break and change in real-time. When the raft reaches its destination at...

Ever wonder if game developers, studios, and/or publishers are storing the games they make for preservation of the future or not? Well John Andersen over at Gamasutra has, and asked various different developers from all over the globe in the past two years about what methods they utilize (if any) to storing their data.

Yosuke Hayashi responded as Team NINJA/Tecmo for their practice in Part 2 of the column. Below is a transcript of Hayashi's words, but if you're interested in seeing what other developers do and why this is important then I suggest you read over Part 1 and Part 2:

John Andersen said:

Yosuke Hayashi, leader of Tecmo Koei's Team Ninja, supports...

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GameSpot has put up a recording of Itagaki's panel where he discussed his story of finding Aerosmith and being deceived by Tecmo when developing Dead or Alive 2. It's about a 30 minute presentation that was titled "What we talk about when we talk about games". He even talks about deciding on switching to Xbox from the PlayStation 2. Stating he would leave the company if the business decided to go with the weaker PS2 platform, and his fight to use Aerosmith in both Dead or Alive 3 and Dead or Alive 4 as a tribute to the band who saved his life and his family. He asks that anyone do what they want to do to make them and everyone happy, not just for self-satisfaction or monetary gain but to make something that can change an audience's life. If you'd like to listen to the entire video, head on over to GameSpot.

In a recent interview with Gamasutra.com, Yosuke Hayashi discussed the team's direction for both Ninja Gaiden and Dead or Alive.

Specifically, in regard to Dead or Alive he discussed how they want to make the series "high class". It's certainly a departure from the traditional Team NINJA, but only time will tell if it was worth the change:

Gamasutra said:

"We've always had the sex factor in the game; in the past, the female characters had to have big breasts, they had to have scanty dress," says Hayashi. "In DoA 5 especially, we're trying to focus on the real women that surround us; the voice of a female, the mannerisms. We are being realistic about it."

If Team Ninja's goal truly is to dignify the Dead or Alive franchise a bit, then it seems the team risks alienating some fans who may have just tuned in for the flesh parade. But...

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