Few fighting game franchises have survived in recent years, necessitating a makeover or reboot of the very core of the game to be successful in today’s crowded market. One of the few games to keep its signature style and attitude intact, has to be the Dead or Alive series of games.
Team Ninja is hard at work on the fifth game set in the top-heavy universe of Dead or Alive, and this time, they want to strike a balance between easy to learn gameplay and challenging progression.
“We’re looking for simple, but deep fighting entertainment,” Yosuke Hayashi told Siliconera. “We’re not looking to be a technical hardcore fighter. We want a game that a lot of people can have fun with, but people who want that depth can find it.”
Team Ninja has been quite cryptic regarding details for their upcoming brawler, but they’ve also been quite open about their intentions to rock the fighting game genre. “To be completely honest, after Dead or Alive 4 we weren’t sure what the future was going to be,” Hayashi said.
“For all of the fighting games that came out we looked at them, but there was something wrong. They looked great with updated graphics and had online gameplay, but the gameplay itself hasn’t changed. It’s still the gameplay we’ve had for years”.
“We started to think how can we change the genre. What could we add new and put that into the fighting game? And that’s how that idea came out.” Commenting about the potential of the game and its visual engine, Hayashi said that DOA5 use everything possible in the hardware of current consoles, and will “push the genre”.
Provided that Team Ninja keeps certain physics in the final game, as well as allows for a playable version of super-awesome actor Eric Roberts character form the terrible DOA film, I’ll be happy with whatever the studio brings out.
Last Updated: November 29, 2011
