Community Excuses To Not Play/Learn Dead or Alive.

[Force_of_Nature]

I think, it would be smart of Team Ninja(or whoever works with the Marketing of DOA games, maybe it is not even TN, but Koei that does that part), to keep the fanservice as it is, and just invest more on bringing the tournament, competitive side of DOA to the table.

To be fair to Team Ninja, they've done a pretty damn good job of investing into the competitive side of DOA with the Battle Royal series, DOA Festivals in Japan, dozens of balance patches over the past 4 years, the pot bonuses and prizes at numerous tournaments along with TN Creative Director Tom Lee's attendance at U.S. DOA majors.

 

[Forlorn Penguin]

One thing I find really dumb about the old fanservice excuse is that back in the Itagaki days, DOA actually had very little fanservice. For some reason he and/or TK/TN decided to largely promote the game with fanservice, yet almost nothing in the game actually offered that. You had very few, tame outfits (like a basic swimsuit or something that just shows off some leg or cleavage) and then a brief CG scene or two that shows off some conveniently censored nudity.

Basically the game didn't really even have any notable fanservice, yet it was promoted largely on that and created a bad image. People shunned it for something that wasn't even there. Nowadays though, there actually is a ton fanservice in the game with the inclusion of gravure videos, loads of smutty swimsuits and tons of other ecchi costumes, even including destructible outfits now.

Aside from that, it seems as though a lot of people don't like the triangle system or the idea of holds. Maybe the game's stronger than usual reliance of mind games caused by the triangle system puts people off (I've personally spoken with someone who hates it because of this). There's also the fact that there may be people out there who have nothing against the game, but simply don't want to bother trying to learn it since they likely won't have anyone to play it with due to its lack of popularity.

I assume that DOA4 also may have dealt some lasting damage. Everyone hated that game. Even DOA players hated it. And for a very long time it was all we had. During that seven year period, anyone who decided to give DOA a chance had to play DOA4 and were turned off by it. Many of those people are likely to keep that negative experience in mind when they think of DOA.

 

[THE_WORST_KOKORO]

Excuses To Not Play/Learn Dead or Alive

1.) Online.

 

[Matt Ponton]

The problem with fanservice, is not the fanservice itself, but the impression that it leaves a lot of the times that it is the only thing that a certain series can offer, and DOA is saddly one of those cases, where the game is sold as a fanservice game, even if it is a great fighting game series.

Yes, the problem with selling products (especially in the States/West) where your primary advertisement is "Sex" is that the general audience looks as "Selling sex" as the lowest common denominator. So if you're putting "Sex" as the primary advertisement, they think that's all there is to it otherwise you'd be advertising anything else.

I think, it would be smart of Team Ninja(or whoever works with the Marketing of DOA games, maybe it is not even TN, but Koei that does that part), to keep the fanservice as it is, and just invest more on bringing the tournament, competitive side of DOA to the table.

That's what they did at the start of DOA5... then the "fanservice" fans blew a gasket about it so they went back. The 'tournament, competitive side of DOA' isn't a big % of their fanbase. Contrary to other fighting games. The sad thing is that the other fighting games want those casual players, and what little competitive players they do have they don't want to lose by making their game too casual friendly (Ultras, Rage Arts, etc.).

One thing I find really dumb about the old fanservice excuse is that back in the Itagaki days, DOA actually had very little fanservice. For some reason he and/or TK/TN decided to largely promote the game with fanservice, yet almost nothing in the game actually offered that. You had very few, tame outfits (like a basic swimsuit or something that just shows off some leg or cleavage) and then a brief CG scene or two that shows off some conveniently censored nudity.

Spoiler: DOA1 Costumes

 

[Forlorn Penguin]

Spoiler: DOA1 Costumes

Yeah, those all look very tame compared to the stuff we have in 5. The most "fanservice-y" outfit from the Itagaki days that I can think of off the top of my head would be Tina's cow-print thong bikini from 2U with the two pistols in holsters on her waist.

I forgot about Alpha-152 and the naked Kasumi clone in the background of the DOATEC stages from DOA3 and 2U. Those can be considered fanservice too, but it wasn't possible to play as either of them without modding the game.

 

[Matt Ponton]

I forgot about Alpha-152 and the naked Kasumi clone in the background of the DOATEC stages from DOA3 and 2U. Those can be considered fanservice too, but it wasn't possible to play as either of them without modding the game.

Or on the demonstration attract screen in DOA2.

 

[Project Bokuho]

Yeah, the Xtreme spin-off and DOA4 (competitive wise) kind of ruined it for some.

Excuses To Not Play/Learn Dead or Alive

1.) Online.

Pretty much.

 

[GreatDarkHero]

Yeah, the Xtreme spin-off and DOA4 (competitive wise) kind of ruined it for some.


Pretty much.

Online can either be decent to extremely bad. -_- Not much even ground based on personal experiences

 

[KasumiLover]

One thing I find really dumb about the old fanservice excuse is that back in the Itagaki days, DOA actually had very little fanservice. For some reason he and/or TK/TN decided to largely promote the game with fanservice, yet almost nothing in the game actually offered that. You had very few, tame outfits (like a basic swimsuit or something that just shows off some leg or cleavage) and then a brief CG scene or two that shows off some conveniently censored nudity.

Basically the game didn't really even have any notable fanservice, yet it was promoted largely on that and created a bad image. People shunned it for something that wasn't even there. Nowadays though, there actually is a ton fanservice in the game with the inclusion of gravure videos, loads of smutty swimsuits and tons of other ecchi costumes, even including destructible outfits now.

Aside from that, it seems as though a lot of people don't like the triangle system or the idea of holds. Maybe the game's stronger than usual reliance of yomi caused by the triangle systems puts people off (I've personally spoken with someone who hates it because of this). There's also the fact that there may be people out there who have nothing against the game, but simply don't want to bother trying to learn it since they likely won't have anyone to play it with due to its lack of popularity.

I assume that DOA4 also may have dealt some lasting damage. Everyone hated that game. Even DOA players hated it. And for a very long time it was all we had. During that seven year period, anyone who decided to give DOA a chance had to play DOA4 and were turned off by it. Many of those people are likely to keep that negative experience in mind when they think of DOA.

Yeah, those all look very tame compared to the stuff we have in 5. The most "fanservice-y" outfit from the Itagaki days that I can think of off the top of my head would be Tina's cow-print thong bikini from 2U with the two pistols in holsters on her waist.

I forgot about Alpha-152 and the naked Kasumi clone in the background of the DOATEC stages from DOA3 and 2U. Those can be considered fanservice too, but it wasn't possible to play as either of them without modding the game.

I honestly don't feel like Alpha being naked is fanservice, she's pretty much a gel dural and she's genderless as well, I think her being naked is actually pretty practical, like why would the presumed weapon of mass destruction even need clothing, she would look ridiculous like how she does now in the school uniforms wearing clothes unless she was like the DOA5 phase 4 in story mode. And the naked Kasumi clone wasn't either, seeing them floating in that gel lifeless and in the womb position curled up(There's also a glitch in DOA3 where in training mode the clone can spawn in the top starting part of DOATEC HK in the distance floating) was actually unsettling and dark imo, I find nothing sexy about it at all. And don't even get me started on the secret intro where the clone was shown being put into the tube while it filled up with green liquid...creepy.

 

[deathofaninja]

Alpha wearing clothes is the fan service.

 

[The Spine]

There's always going to be a reason why people don't want to play a certain game and that's fine. If they try it and don't like it then there's nothing you can do. From personal experience, I really don't like Smash at all. Even though I have the game and resources to really get good and don't really have an excuse not to play, I still don't want to play the game.

 

[Manjimaru]

Making an incomplete version for PC, with online six months later, no lobbys, DLC extremely expensive and without including new stages, is not exactly the right way to attract new players, like pc gamers waiting to try DOA on PC.

A good STEAM version would have been a very good point for new people know how great is DOA 5 LR.

But...

 

[Forlorn Penguin]

Making an incomplete version for PC, with online six months later, no lobbys, DLC extremely expensive and without including new stages, is not exactly the right way to attract new players, like pc gamers waiting to try DOA on PC.

A good STEAM version would have been a very good point for new people know how great is DOA 5 LR.

But...

That's true. The PC port is bad and because of that, you have this on the Steam page:

And then scrolling down below that you'll see a ton of "Not Recommended" reviews. That's obviously not good for attracting new players.

 

[UpSideDownGRUNT]

Making an incomplete version for PC, with online six months later, no lobbys, DLC extremely expensive and without including new stages, is not exactly the right way to attract new players, like pc gamers waiting to try DOA on PC.

A good STEAM version would have been a very good point for new people know how great is DOA 5 LR.

But...

Thing is pc version was doomed from the start, first of all it was never intended to be on PC and is actually a reworked port of the Arcade version(hence no lobbies or stages), dlc has to be grouped in to themes because of the way steam does dlc slots making the xbox one/ps4 method impossible, and the entire fact that it was rushed last minute hence there was no formal announcement or news for several months.

EDIT:
I only ever see people play the PC version for two very specific reasons.

1. Online netcode
2. Mods: costume, aesthetics or "others"

 

[KasumiLover]

There's also the fact that there's a fucking bot that anyone can use and edit to play and win the game unfairly for them, people try to downplay it but it's still there, I'm not gonna play a game with something like that in it on PC...hot mods aren't even worth it except for maybe offline screencaps.

 

[Brute]

That's what they did at the start of DOA5... then the "fanservice" fans blew a gasket about it so they went back.

It's worth noting that while I would have purchased and played the game regardless, if DOA5 vanilla's launch image was at the level of fanservice it is now (later in 5LR's time), it's quite likely that I never would have joined this site or made it out to any offline events. The reason that I decided to seriously invest in its gameplay at the time was because Team Ninja had convinced me that they were also seriously invested in its gameplay. Nowadays I'm no longer convinced that's the case, and while there are still great structures in play from the efforts that were made in the past, I can hardly blame anyone who perceives that the gameplay is not the focus of the series right now, because it isn't.

Fair or not, the image matters a great deal where recruitment of new players is concerned.

 

[Lulu]

Excuses To Not Play/Learn Dead or Alive

1.) Online.

LoL..... Might Aswell Just End this thread right here and Call it a Day....

Maybe the game's stronger than usual reliance of mind games caused by the triangle system puts people off (I've personally spoken with someone who hates it because of this). There's also the fact that there may be people out there who have nothing against the game, but simply don't want to bother trying to learn it since they likely won't have anyone to play it with due to its lack of popularity.

Yeah thats one I've come across too..... I think people's prior experiences with other fighting games can greatly infuence how they feel about DoA's Mechanics.

I reckon someone whos whos had major success in the games with a weaker emphasis on mind games isn't going to warm up to DoA.... after all.... they already have a game that works in their favour..... meanwhile the victims of those same types of games may instantly Rejoice when they Play DoA and Discover: "You Can Hold ??!! ".

 

[deathofaninja]

It's worth noting that while I would have purchased and played the game regardless, if DOA5 vanilla's launch image was at the level of fanservice it is now (later in 5LR's time), it's quite likely that I never would have joined this site or made it out to any offline events. The reason that I decided to seriously invest in its gameplay at the time was because Team Ninja had convinced me that they were also seriously invested in its gameplay. Nowadays I'm no longer convinced that's the case, and while there are still great structures in play from the efforts that were made in the past, I can hardly blame anyone who perceives that the gameplay is not the focus of the series right now, because it isn't.

Fair or not, the image matters a great deal where recruitment of new players is concerned.

Why are you convinced the gameplay is the issue? I mean I have my reasons -- the biggest gripe being the ground game; this is where I see the most bugs and have the biggest issues. The reason I continue to play is not just because of the characters, but because the good matches I do have are worth the investment.

The steam version sucked, but I applaud them for doing it at all. They've made the game accessible to more people and the game still holds mixed reviews despite the intense backlash which could mean that people are still hopeful.

 

[Brute]

Why are you convinced the gameplay is the issue?

I'm not.

 

[deathofaninja]

I'm not.

Oh good.