Community Have Questions for Team NINJA?

There are several massive events on the horizon for our community and a lot of you have had some pretty legitimate questions come up regarding things. More of you have had some completely insane questions, so if you fall into that particular camp, pass right on by. For the rest of you, we've been able to work out something I'm going to avoid calling an interview for a variety of reasons. That non-interview will be with Team NINJA directly.

We could have just whipped up a quick Q&A and posted it as an article, but we wanted to try something a little different. Those of you who've been around for a long enough time may have seen something similar in the past, but this is a different situation we're working with in 2015. We're going to open this up to all of you guys to ask the questions here. Before you get too excited, though, let's lay some ground rules.

First, we have to respect the fact that the Team has a plan in place for the new character regarding the media. You have to wait to find out the new character's favorite dessert, I'm afraid. Stay away from any questions that are very likely promised to traditional media outlets exclusively. For reference, look back at the Radiou reveal. Second, stay away from questions that are about unrevealed gameplay changes to the game. We will find that stuff out when they choose to fill us all in. Third, use common sense. If you ask a question that is deliberately inflammatory, your question won't be passed along. If you ask about something that hasn't been announced regarding other titles (I'm looking at you, DoAX fans), that question will similarly not be moved on.

That leaves you guys with quite a bit to mine for questions. Ever wondered why the team locked intros and such to 30fps? Might be a good question to ask here. Ever thought to yourself, "Self, why were High Level Jumps removed from the game?" Seriously, go nuts with questions here. A few of us will then screen the questions and probably fix some spelling and grammar before working with Team NINJA on getting things rolling.

We are working with an incredibly busy lead up to the launch of our new game with a brand new character reveal this week. There will be a delay, here. But we will get things polished up and pass the ball. Once we have a time table nailed down we will start to feed things back to the community and go from there. Please do not post questions more than once. If you don't want to ask your question publicly for whatever reason, send myself, @Rikuto or @Mr. Wah a direct conversation with the question and request your name be omitted. We may ultimately remove names from the questions anyway so it might be a non-issue but we do have some shy members.

Post away, ladies and gents.

 

I got some questions.

1) Will you be adding any old win poses/intros from the past DoA games to the cast at all?

2) What are your thoughts about having an international tournament and sponsoring it for Last Round?

3) What are your initial thoughts on the characters that have progressed so far in 2014 competitively for DoA5U. And do you have any plans to change the ones who haven't been able to stand out as much competitively as to see more diversity when others are watching DoA5LR.

 

Why did you have change Jann lee's voice in DOA5 series?

I was told that they tried getting the guy but he declined in both instances. I believe he was busy with the resurgence of DBZ, but don't think it was his only reason for declining.

 

Kinda speaking for the Steam community right here.

1) Can you please specific if DOALR5 for PC will support the current gen or last gen?

2) Is it a fresh pc game built and optimized exclusively for PC?

3) TN kinda avoided to talk about the so-called "PC-argument" since the Steam preorder hits the shop.
Is this silence due to the "Console market comes first" strategy, or you just have to realize what actually say about the PC release?

4) Will the PC game get all the DLC u're planning to release on the consoles?

Thx and good work! I've already pre-ordered the game and I really look forward to play it on my PC.

 

It doesn't answer all of your questions, but from some of my sources they are actively working on the Steam version; the Online mode patch is an estimated time frame and not a specific date for similar reasons. That's why there's little information on the steam version. From what I gather on various sources about various things related to the PC version... they're trying to make it 1:1 (or better) with the next gen systems. There are PC players who have suggested various option ideas and such. I do not believe the team responsible for the DW ports is working on DOA5LR on Steam, but I have not been told specifically by Team NINJA whether that's true or not - it's just my belief based on what I know of Koei-Tecmo.

 

Pushing this back to the top of the front page for a bit more visibility through the rest of the weekend. Monday is the deadline.

 

1) Any push to get the game at EVO?

2) Has the team looked into rollback netcode, or any other sort of prediction based netcode that removes variable input delay?

Love these 2 questions. I would soo love to see Last Round at Evo 2015 when I go.

At one point the idea of DOA x VF was huge and brought together both communities briefly. It seems to have died down, however will you guys press to make this game a reality?

When working on future DOA games, could you guys consider more location tests from players not only in Japan but also NA and EU.

Make the DOA OST like it used to be in previous games. 3 had the best imo but DOA5 the music was rather boring, 5U stage bgm were huge improvements however.

 

Any parts (In parenthesis) are aimed at FSD, not part of the question at Team Ninja.

1) Is there any chance of adjusting old costumes to have the toggle options they didn't have first time around, such as being able to toggle off hats where we couldn't before?

2) Is there any chance at all of Nicole being reinvented like NyoTengu, Raidou, and Phase 4, as a "new" character, so we can have her back without worrying about Halo copyrights? I'd love to have my tank of a filipino back (RACHEL IS NOT THE SAME. Its equivalent to asking for Leon back when we only had Bayman)

3) What are your thoughts and plans on the new characters Mila and Rig, after release of the original DOA5? Its obvious decided to take a different direction with Mila later on, in regards to DLC, and even more evident with the new hairstyle, so will she be adjusted into a new persona for DOA6?

4) What was the thought process that to choosing the "dirty" main menus, over the classic "clean" menus of past DOA's?

5) Have you considered taking the same approach as Tekken to netcode, in that they simply added input delay to offline as well to mask the difference?

6) Were the similarities between Mila and Leon intentional? Any connection there? Will they get an official tag team throw?

7) Are you guys going to bring back Arcade endings for DOA6, or was that simply a design choice to remove it?

8) Are you considering using the remainder of the submitted designs from the Costume Contest as future DLC?

9) With all the Ninja Gaiden content making it into Dead or Alive, any chance of more Dead or Alive content and characters making into future Ninja Gaiden games, like Bayman and Leon being playable in Ninja Gaiden 4 or something?

10) Have you considered removing the "wheelspin" from Power Launchers and replacing it with a standard "high launch" animation like Rig and Ryu have? I say this not to anger you, but the spinning does look rather silly and out of place during gameplay.

11) What was the reasoning for lightening up Lisa's (and Zack's) skin tones?

12) Was Mila's ethnicity decided before or after her character was designed? I ask this, because overall, she seems more American than Spanish. (Really hoping this question doesn't result in Ethnic Stereotype outfits in future games but I'm honestly curious)

13) Would it be possible to speed up Leon a little bit so he can actually take advantage of his guard breaks? Or make more of his grabs as "offensive holds" to simulate his raw strength?

14) In any new stages to come in the future, what are the chances of going back to more vibrant "colder" colors, like blues, greens, silvers, etc, like past games, over the DOA5 habit of duller "warm" colors like Reds, Blacks, and Browns?

15) Can you adjust lobby timers to pause while the people next in line are trying to type a message? I've found it hard to even get a "gg" out when its only like 5 seconds till next match starts.

Pushing this back to the top of the front page for a bit more visibility through the rest of the weekend. Monday is the deadline.

Appreciate it, I didn't even know about this.

 

What are the gameplay changes in LR¿ I don't think you're asking for 40$ extra just for a "graphical upgrade", 2 characters, 2 stages and a few hairstyles.

Before Ultimate came out, we were already aware of most of the nerfs... *ahem* I mean gameplay balance changes they were adding, along with the Power Launcher mechanic, the new ground game, etc. In LR's case, most of the videos are showing little to nothing on gameplay. And I can't find any solid info on these forums on it, which is worrying.

 

1) Do you guys plan on giving the characters GREAT or GREATEST poses back? Or even for future installmebts?
2) What do you guys plan on doing with the ground game (considering how plain it is.)
3)Can we expect classic DOA intros back?
4) Are we getting Arcade endings in fufuture installments?
5) Am I going crazy?

 

1) "There is a possibility that new content will not be available for those platforms [PS3/360] in the future". Does this affect future patches and stages, which have been delivered as DLC so far?

2) Is arcade also upgrading to Last Round? Will it be last gen or current gen?

 

1. Why did you guy reduce the animation in DOA5?
2. How come DOA5 don't have a intro Opening and endings for all the characters like in the previous DOA games?
3. Have you guys consider adding, custom creations mode in the future DOA games?
4. In Arcade mode, Time attack mode, Survival mode etc, why can't friends tag with you. Why only on versus mode?
5. How come the newer characters don't have a story section on DOA5LR?
6. What made you guys decide to make DOA5LR for the new console?
7. Will DOA5LR get any more stages in the future?
8 Are you guys thinking of making DOA6 any time soon after DOA5LR?
9. How come you never contribute Leifang Wealthy side, since she's rich?
10. Also in DOA5 and DOA5U, why haven't you guys given Leifang her favorite color Lemon Yellow?

 

1.) Will we be able to do the Tutorial with another character besides Hitomi/ can we choose who we do the tutorial with??

2.) Will there seperate story mode endings for each character?

3.) Can you change the Raijin to the Izuna Drop inputs??

4.) Can you bring back Hayate's DOA3 C2 with Blue and Green as alt and his DOA4 C2 in both colours??

 

1) Would you consider Story DLC, even if it had to be at a premium to cover seiyū and mo-cap costs?

2) Would you consider an 'exclude costume' flag on the selection screen? (Not everyone wants to see endless bikinis during online play.)

3) What graphical options will there be in the PC version? Will there be any increase in texture quality, or will that be limited to PS4 generation consoles as it was with Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors?

 

What is Team Ninja's least favourite babe ?
How is Eliot unique, how was he designed in terms of individuality ?

 

4) Would the company consider releasing DLC sales data, as a percentage of total DLC sales, listed by region? Some of us would be interested to see which costumes are most popular in each part of the world.

 

1. How do you design the fighting animations for characters such as the ninjas and Nyotengu that use fighting styles created for the game? For example do you have staff that specifically design martial arts things and do mo-cap or do the directors and animators design them by hand? I like the attention to detail in the DoA animations.

2. Have you ever considered expanding the camera options in spectator and replay modes? Because DoA is 3d I sometimes wonder what the fights would look like if I could move the camera more and view them from different angles. For the stages that are like boxing rings if you could move the camera you could watch them from the perspective you would get when watching a fighting event on tv so I think it could be interesting if you could move the camera freely.

 

Can ya make DLC similar to the ones in Vanilla? Just small packs of 4 characters, they weren't rushed as badly and the China Pack and What a Character were my favourites.
Why can't there be extra story mode chapters? You've released like 5 characters and they're just...there, with a biography. Dat ain't enough. I want to see more interaction with the characters too, old and new, please?
Can ya release more male characters and make DLC for them more often? Even make an all guys DLC pack if you can

(a majority of people will disagree with me, I know it lol)

 

Are there any plans to revive the Genra moveset, much like Raidou and Nyotengu have brought back the other older boss movesets? If so, would they be attached to a new character a la Nyotengu, or via character revival like Raidou?

Given the added presence of NG in DOA5, have there been talks of including a new character to promote NG4?

Given that we won't see proper story appearances for any of the 5U/LR added characters until DOA6, I was wondering if their character arcs were already planned out, and if so, how many games ahead are being planned?

 

1- Can the sidestepping be improved to be more useful or balance the tracking moves more?
2- Sometimes grapples are ready happen but the opponent makes a move in the last second and the grapple despite touching the opponent doesn't go through or gets interrupted. Is there something to be done to make the grapple more functional on these situations?
3- What are some features that were scrapped from previous DOA games and why they didn't make it?
4- Will you release mod tools for Steam Version?
5- Can the guys in DOA get some more fan servicey outfits to even the odds?

 

Why did you change the approach on DOA5 from serious fighter to the extreme focus on sexuality?

This, note emphasis

What do they hope to achieve with Last Round as far as community growth goes?
Why is the multiplayer not available right away on Steam? I have an idea, but I'm asked this question frequently and would like a more concrete answer.
Christie is clearly a Fox type of character. She does take skill to use, but she clearly has slower characters like Bayman and Leon completely dominated. How does Team NINJA plan to go about character balance in DOA5? With heavy weights especially...?

These also

When designing the competitive elements of the game, which kinds of player skill do you best hope to test? For example, is primary focus given to the depth and variety of mind games? The execution skills of the players? Knowledge of the game's mechanics and functions? etc.

This too, and finally

Any push to get the game at EVO?
Has the team looked into rollback netcode, or any other sort of prediction based netcode that removes variable input delay?

At one point the idea of DOA x VF was huge and brought together both communities briefly. It seems to have died down, however will you guys press to make this game a reality?

You all asked these questions better then I could.