Team Ninja is their own worst enemy.

MasterHavik

Well-Known Member
Hey guys. A lot of you know me already. I am the Zack super fan MasterHavik. I'll cut to the chase and explain why I am making this thread. I want to, not only share my opinion, but finally get something off my chest the community needs to hear. I also feel we need to have this talk. What is the talk? Team Ninja is the reason DOA isn't bigger, not sjws, the fans, or the guy you saw last week giving you a dirty look. Okay, so what I mean by that? Well Team ninja has shown they want DOA to be serious and be a bigger game among the competitive audience cool. But they turn around and do bizarre changes to the system and character balance that makes you wonder if they are actually listening to the competitive players or throwing darts at the wall to see what works. Some things work out like the change to the 4 point hold over three point hold and the sidestep actually not being fucking awful for once. And some don't work like break blow(Think Ivy's prepatch CE in SC6) or SSA costing meter(I like this change but I need to keep it real.). I feel like they don't know how to fully take the next step. I feel this is the biggest issue when it comes to greatly changing the system around. You see, great games build off a base and they go from there. When you greatly change something from one to another it is not only jarring but not effective. Sonic games are known for this besides some games taking a base and building off it. DOA was doing that until DOA 5 and DOA 6. When you don't have base, you create a mess and have unfocused ideas. So while I think they're trying the game still hasn't hit a homerun yet in this department.

Now let's address the elephant in the room. Team Ninja likes to use fanservice as a selling point of DOA. I won't sit here and bore you with all the drama before the game came out, but I will say the people bitching about sexy girls are very annoying. They act very self-entitled and act like fanservice is the main reason DOA is anything. For anyone in the actual know, you know this is complete and utter bullshit because, spoiler alert, DOA isn't the first fighting game to have attractive women in it. You know this crowd is a problem if they legit don't know that DOA took off because of the triangle system and danger zones. DOA actually had some pretty damn good game mechanics a good amount of people overlook because they don't play the game on a serious level. I feel Team Ninja using fanservice as a marketing has backfire for them massively as the fanservice crowd is mad the game isn't sexy enough while the competitive crowd is mad that they have another loli on the roster and wants a fucking male fighter as dlc for once. Now don't get it twisted, I think the competitive crowd can be a little mean to the casuals and act like they only matter. That is the fault both parties. But really at the end of the day, I think Team Ninja is the one to blame for why DOA 6 has playerbase that is dropping off the map along with peopel not being able to buy costumes separately or the number of bugs they haven't bother to fix. Throw on DOA that is overpriced to high hell and you got yourself a mess.


Before I end this post, I'll address a counterargument I always hear when I bring up that DOA uses fanservice as a selling point and doesn't sell you the actual game. The counterargument is, "Well other games do it, so why does DOA get shit for it?!" Now someone could say the same for Mortal kombat. You know, but besides sex they sell gore. But the difference being is that they sell story mode, towers, and other things you do with the game. If DOA wants to make any progress in this area they need to start using fanservice as an extra and not the main reason you play. You need to sell the fighting. The game mechanics and the fun things you do offline. Mortal Kombat does that and has been able to get away with having half naked women in their games for decades. That is how all the fighters besides DOA get away with it. They just throw them in there and be done with it. DOA doesn't "get away" with it because they use it to sell the game. They have made that apart of their identity. One review of the game on YouTube said his friends call DOA the "boobie game". When you sell just fanservice, you make your product appear sallow when me and you both know DOA has more to offer but people just gonna hit buttons and not really take time to understand the triangle system and how to use danger zones. They just wanna see the flash and pop.

Conclusion

DOA can keep the costumes and sexy girls but try to not make them the main reason people should buy your game. I mean moneywise, the game has made its money. It is fine. The money they made from sells on PS4, XB1, and Steam have more than enough made them break even. The DLC is selling well and people brought that season pass(why?) so KT will see the number and think everything is okay. But if DOA wants to be more serious they need to sell the mechanics more than having NyoTengu getting eaten out by Bass. Looking back at that, I think we can safely say that did more harm than good. I don't think DOA 6 is a bad game. I do think it is half-baked product that is borderline asset reflip of DOA 5 though. Team Ninja is the only one that knows what to do if they want DOA 6 to last 7 years.
 
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Rikuto

P-P-P-P-P-P-POWER!
In my book, the two real problems.

1. Every game they greatly change the games flow by changing things nobody asks them to change, and this results in established players falling off because it plays too differently. It's very difficult to build a base that is cut in half at launch every new game because somebody at Team Ninja wants to express their creativity and put their personal stamp on something. It makes things worse when those ideas happen to suck.

2. The things they DO need to change to appeal to a wider audience, like the triangle system and nature of throws (and their inability to be broken), never get touched. Why? Because "That's how its always been" as if that reasoning somehow didn't also directly correlate to them underselling compared to other 3D fighters on the market. As if repeating the same mistake, and using a system of throws always losing to strikes would somehow result in the game doing better the next time around. (VF6 when? Probably never)
 

MasterHavik

Well-Known Member
In my book, the two real problems.

1. Every game they greatly change the games flow by changing things nobody asks them to change, and this results in established players falling off because it plays too differently. It's very difficult to build a base that is cut in half at launch every new game because somebody at Team Ninja wants to express their creativity and put their personal stamp on something. It makes things worse when those ideas happen to suck.

2. The things they DO need to change to appeal to a wider audience, like the triangle system and nature of throws (and their inability to be broken), never get touched. Why? Because "That's how its always been" as if that reasoning somehow didn't also directly correlate to them underselling compared to other 3D fighters on the market. As if repeating the same mistake, and using a system of throws always losing to strikes would somehow result in the game doing better the next time around. (VF6 when? Probably never)
Let me ask you a question. Why do you think the fanservice side think the mroe serious side is toxic and nto real gamers? I find this to be very bad and very self-entitled when at the end of the day we are all gamers. Now to the rest of your post.

1. Yeah as I said in my first post I think DOA is suffering what 3D sonic has been going through. Granted they have better results than them but my point still stands. All this change just to be different and cool reminds me of how overly unique Nintendo tries to be.

2. Yeah that is why people think it is just masher. I get you on this point.
 

Kasumi-Phase-X

Well-Known Member
Team Ninja is the reason DOA isn't bigger, not sjws, the fans, or the guy you saw last week giving you a dirty look. Okay, so what I mean by that? Well Team ninja has shown they want DOA to be serious and be a bigger game among the competitive audience cool.

Sure Team Ninja is the reason DOA isn't bigger mainly due to its poor direction that Shimbori went with, from the famitsu & IGN (along with other interviews which wasn't helping much) which kicked off the whole drama. From these following comments he made from various interviews for some examples:

As a visual image ofShinborias a whole, this time I am planning to draw a character for "coolness".After all,there is an opinion that"DOA" series is "It is embarrassing that girls are too sexy and play."Indeed, when I went to last year's "EVO 2017" (the World Tournament of Fighting Fighting Games held in Las Vegas every year), the fans gave me the opinion that "I want you to make it a bit cooler game."There are also such things, this time,we value the parenthesis so thateveryone inthe players can be proud of being a player of"DOA".

https://www.freestepdodge.com/threads/doa6-famitsu-interviews-shimbori.7060/

“We wanted to make a more cool and mature Dead or Alive this time, and to that end we made a conscious decision to make the characters less sexualized,” Shimbori told IGN.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/0...-on-can-team-ninja-balance-familiar-and-fresh

“Toning down the sexual expression doesn’t relate to esports,” Shimbori said. “It’s more of a world trend. We’re considering how to make this franchise well-received everywhere.”

https://archive.fo/BKMYB#selection-1589.0-1589.178

Yes, definitely. One of the major aims was to tone down the features of the women which caused some trouble in the past. Our aim is to show this as a real fighting game. To do this, we are using a new engine for the game. This has helped the push on the visuals, the engine letting the game look more realistic.

https://wccftech.com/dead-or-alive-6-gamescom-interview/#disqus_thread

“To be honest, we did a bit too much with some costumes in the past. And this no longer corresponds to the time in which we live. What you saw today [ he shows one of Christie’s suits, biker, the screenshot of the preview ] is the farthest we’ll go in terms of sexualization. And it’s still very sexy!”

“No. As I told you, it is a real desire on our part to stick to the social criteria to respect to be accepted at present. And unfortunately, too sexy games are no longer accepted today.

“[…] Again, no, it was not our concern. We were just guided by a certain moral sense” (translated)

http://www.gameblog.fr/interview_1187_rencontre-avec-yohei-shimbori-directeur-et-producteur-de-la-

“There have been a lot of changes in the world in recent years, and I decided that we should reflect those changes by resetting our approach to sexual imagery, after Dead or Alive 5,”

https://www.polygon.com/2019/1/22/18192019/dead-or-alive-6-sexualized-characters

What he did was wind up repeating what DOA5 did before their DLC lineup:

"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."

"We want to show something that's more high class, that adult males of our generation could look at a woman [character] and be impressed with her as a woman, not just as a pin-up," he continues. "That's what we wanted to tell our fans."

https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news...ayashi_on_more_realistic_respectful_games.php

The Ninja Gaiden 3 feedback did have one surprising effect on the development of Dead or Alive 5, Shimbori says. "We were getting feedback from the overseas offices to tone down the sexuality -- to tone down the sexiness of the game, and of the characters,"

https://gamasutra.com/view/news/178358/Team_Ninja_learns_to_fear_its_fans.php#.UGc1BPl24hV

Shimbori was involved with DOA5 as Director, he should've learn from that experience. It was one thing for trying it during DOA5 development, but this direction of toning sex appeal down should been scrapped from any future installments from the main series. Maybe Shimbori as director (plus producer for DOA6) is why DOA just isn't that big since he keeps going with this whole "less sexual" along with trying to appeal to everyone while pleasing no one. Those concepts of being "cool and less sexual" would be better off as entire new IP. All he need to do was take some examples from Yakuza Creator (Toshihiro Nagoshi):

“First and foremost, we think about the Japanese audience and then we start thinking about Asian audiences,” Nagoshi said. “We make sure we create a game that’s good and fun for them. Hopefully, this game will reach as many audiences in the West as possible.”

He added that “there’s that order to things when we’re developing and that mindset is something that I don’t think will change even as we go on,” mostly because if they “start thinking about different audiences, catering to all these different people, it will really lessen the appeal of what we’re making here.”

https://nichegamer.com/2019/06/19/y...a-first-catering-too-much-lessens-our-appeal/

Idea is Shimbori shouldn't even try to think about different audiences like serious crowd who found "girls too sexy", try to cater their main audience.

Team Ninja likes to use fanservice as a selling point of DOA.

With DOA6, fanservice wasn't fully used (besides the collectors edition & EVO core values situation) as their selling point through out their development with their videos (not counting DLC), and all these interviews I mention. If you were using fanservice, Shimbori wouldn't be coming out with "wanting our game to be cooler", "sexual content is less acceptable", "were trying to sell it to many stores as possible", or whatever reason Shimbori says in these interviews. Better usage of fanservice would be this for example:


What DOA could do is highlight the costumes (mainly very sexy outfits & swimsuits to demonstrate beside their main outfits both old & new), selection of female details, and optional breast physics.

Also another thing about your comment about "I think Team Ninja is the one to blame for why DOA 6 has playerbase", even if DOA or whatever fighter didn't use fanservice as a selling point. What if you'd still deal with the not being able to buy costumes separately, having bugs that weren't fixed, and game being overpriced despite never selling fanservice?

but I will say the people bitching about sexy girls are very annoying.

Honestly with all the stuff that came from these interviews, it should be no wonder why people would complain despite what others may find the people find complaining about sexy girls annoying. It should be reminded that toning stuff down from established characters/franchise is going to be met with complaints whether you like it or not. Imagine MK did something similar to its Gore & Violence, I guarantee the people who enjoy that kind of content would be complaining alot.

DOA actually had some pretty damn good game mechanics a good amount of people overlook because they don't play the game on a serious level.

Thats really going to depend on who you asking, what if people found the game mechanics sucked (not Me I enjoy it) the only thing DOA6 did was add Auto Combo, Slow Down Camera, & Meter. Maybe the reason DOA doesn't get the respect compare to other fighters. According to the one comment I found in this videos comment section when replying AshXXMayftw (within replies):


All your doing with toning fanservice down is just wasting time.

Now someone could say the same for Mortal kombat. You know, but besides sex they sell gore. But the difference being is that they sell story mode, towers, and other things you do with the game. If DOA wants to make any progress in this area they need to start using fanservice as an extra and not the main reason you play. You need to sell the fighting.

That comment sounds more like all DOA need is single player content (which DOA6 has, unless it needs extra gimmicks like MK, and some micro-transaction), even MK didn't had the best fighting especially from its 3D era. DOA maybe need to have easy inputs and some dial combos like MK. If DOA was an extra (since were on MK), the fanservice would be at the end before the title like how MK sells its fatalities. But on a serious note I agree DOA should be use as an extra since there are other games besides DOA, but in order for this to happen Team Ninja need to just leave fanservice like how DOA5 handle its from its Updates & DLC.

One review of the game on YouTube said his friends call DOA the "boobie game". When you sell just fanservice, you make your product appear sallow when me and you both know DOA has more to offer but people just gonna hit buttons and not really take time to understand the triangle system and how to use danger zones.

That opinion of some YouTuber's friends is as relevant as the one who thinks DOA mechanics suck in the comment section of another YouTuber. Even if you weren't selling fanservice, what if people still button mash and didn't take time to understand the game?

DOA can keep the costumes and sexy girls but try to not make them the main reason people should buy your game. I mean moneywise, the game has made its money. It is fine. The money they made from sells on PS4, XB1, and Steam have more than enough made them break even. The DLC is selling well and people brought that season pass(why?) so KT will see the number and think everything is okay.

I 100% agree with that comment, all we need to do is just leave the costumes & sexy girls alone.

PS. I think Season Passes are valuable since I'm getting an entire set plus some extras that come with it.

But if DOA wants to be more serious they need to sell the mechanics more than having NyoTengu getting eaten out by Bass. Looking back at that, I think we can safely say that did more harm than good.

Even if that event didn't happen, DOA6 pre orders were not doing good compare to DOAX3 Scarlet pre orders in Japanese region.

dansgMq.png


Which I posted on this topic: https://www.freestepdodge.com/threads/official-dead-or-alive-xtreme-thread.6696/page-194

Feb 13, 2019 #3,877
 
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Jyu_Viole_Grace

Well-Known Member
Yep, for a really long time (like 9 months) the "toning down" thing felt like the main selling point of DOA 6. They pushed it too much and of course when you say you will change something that's the main visual appeal for years (like it or not), backlash will happen. It's like they really thought that removing the eye candy would bring them sales lol

That's why this controversy existed in first place. If they would have said nothing about a "new direction" for so long and just promoted the game normally, no one would complain about it but marketing never was their stroing point. They're totally out of touch with market and they keep trusting their American branch after what happened with DOA 5 ...
 
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Onryoki

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Sure Team Ninja is the reason DOA isn't bigger mainly due to its poor direction that Shimbori went with, from the famitsu & IGN (along with other interviews which wasn't helping much) which kicked off the whole drama. From these following comments he made from various interviews for some examples:

As a visual image ofShinborias a whole, this time I am planning to draw a character for "coolness".After all,there is an opinion that"DOA" series is "It is embarrassing that girls are too sexy and play."Indeed, when I went to last year's "EVO 2017" (the World Tournament of Fighting Fighting Games held in Las Vegas every year), the fans gave me the opinion that "I want you to make it a bit cooler game."There are also such things, this time,we value the parenthesis so thateveryone inthe players can be proud of being a player of"DOA".

https://www.freestepdodge.com/threads/doa6-famitsu-interviews-shimbori.7060/

“We wanted to make a more cool and mature Dead or Alive this time, and to that end we made a conscious decision to make the characters less sexualized,” Shimbori told IGN.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/0...-on-can-team-ninja-balance-familiar-and-fresh

“Toning down the sexual expression doesn’t relate to esports,” Shimbori said. “It’s more of a world trend. We’re considering how to make this franchise well-received everywhere.”

https://archive.fo/BKMYB#selection-1589.0-1589.178

Yes, definitely. One of the major aims was to tone down the features of the women which caused some trouble in the past. Our aim is to show this as a real fighting game. To do this, we are using a new engine for the game. This has helped the push on the visuals, the engine letting the game look more realistic.

https://wccftech.com/dead-or-alive-6-gamescom-interview/#disqus_thread

“To be honest, we did a bit too much with some costumes in the past. And this no longer corresponds to the time in which we live. What you saw today [ he shows one of Christie’s suits, biker, the screenshot of the preview ] is the farthest we’ll go in terms of sexualization. And it’s still very sexy!”

“No. As I told you, it is a real desire on our part to stick to the social criteria to respect to be accepted at present. And unfortunately, too sexy games are no longer accepted today.

“[…] Again, no, it was not our concern. We were just guided by a certain moral sense” (translated)

http://www.gameblog.fr/interview_1187_rencontre-avec-yohei-shimbori-directeur-et-producteur-de-la-

“There have been a lot of changes in the world in recent years, and I decided that we should reflect those changes by resetting our approach to sexual imagery, after Dead or Alive 5,”

https://www.polygon.com/2019/1/22/18192019/dead-or-alive-6-sexualized-characters

What he did was wind up repeating what DOA5 did before their DLC lineup:

"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."

"We want to show something that's more high class, that adult males of our generation could look at a woman [character] and be impressed with her as a woman, not just as a pin-up," he continues. "That's what we wanted to tell our fans."

https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news...ayashi_on_more_realistic_respectful_games.php

The Ninja Gaiden 3 feedback did have one surprising effect on the development of Dead or Alive 5, Shimbori says. "We were getting feedback from the overseas offices to tone down the sexuality -- to tone down the sexiness of the game, and of the characters,"

https://gamasutra.com/view/news/178358/Team_Ninja_learns_to_fear_its_fans.php#.UGc1BPl24hV

Shimbori was involved with DOA5 as Director, he should've learn from that experience. It was one thing for trying it during DOA5 development, but this direction of toning sex appeal down should been scrapped from any future installments from the main series. Maybe Shimbori as director (plus producer for DOA6) is why DOA just isn't that big since he keeps going with this whole "less sexual" along with trying to appeal to everyone while pleasing no one. Those concepts of being "cool and less sexual" would be better off as entire new IP. All he need to do was take some examples from Yakuza Creator (Toshihiro Nagoshi):

“First and foremost, we think about the Japanese audience and then we start thinking about Asian audiences,” Nagoshi said. “We make sure we create a game that’s good and fun for them. Hopefully, this game will reach as many audiences in the West as possible.”

He added that “there’s that order to things when we’re developing and that mindset is something that I don’t think will change even as we go on,” mostly because if they “start thinking about different audiences, catering to all these different people, it will really lessen the appeal of what we’re making here.”

https://nichegamer.com/2019/06/19/y...a-first-catering-too-much-lessens-our-appeal/

Idea is Shimbori shouldn't even try to think about different audiences like serious crowd who found "girls too sexy", try to cater their main audience.



With DOA6, fanservice wasn't fully used (besides the collectors edition & EVO core values situation) as their selling point through out their development with their videos (not counting DLC), and all these interviews I mention. If you were using fanservice, Shimbori wouldn't be coming out with "wanting our game to be cooler", "sexual content is less acceptable", "were trying to sell it to many stores as possible", or whatever reason Shimbori says in these interviews. Better usage of fanservice would be this for example:


What DOA could do is highlight the costumes (mainly very sexy outfits & swimsuits to demonstrate beside their main outfits both old & new), selection of female details, and optional breast physics.

Also another thing about your comment about "I think Team Ninja is the one to blame for why DOA 6 has playerbase", even if DOA or whatever fighter didn't use fanservice as a selling point. What if you'd still deal with the not being able to buy costumes separately, having bugs that weren't fixed, and game being overpriced despite never selling fanservice?



Honestly with all the stuff that came from these interviews, it should be no wonder why people would complain despite what others may find the people find complaining about sexy girls annoying. It should be reminded that toning stuff down from established characters/franchise is going to be met with complaints whether you like it or not. Imagine MK did something similar to its Gore & Violence, I guarantee the people who enjoy that kind of content would be complaining alot.



Thats really going to depend on who you asking, what if people found the game mechanics sucked (not Me I enjoy it) the only thing DOA6 did was add Auto Combo, Slow Down Camera, & Meter. Maybe the reason DOA doesn't get the respect compare to other fighters. According to the one comment I found in this videos comment section when replying AshXXMayftw (within replies):


All your doing with toning fanservice down is just wasting time.



That comment sounds more like all DOA need is single player content (which DOA6 has, unless it needs extra gimmicks like MK, and some micro-transaction), even MK didn't had the best fighting especially from its 3D era. DOA maybe need to have easy inputs and some dial combos like MK. If DOA was an extra (since were on MK), the fanservice would be at the end before the title like how MK sells its fatalities. But on a serious note I agree DOA should be use as an extra since there are other games besides DOA, but in order for this to happen Team Ninja need to just leave fanservice like how DOA5 handle its from its Updates & DLC.



That opinion of some YouTuber's friends is as relevant as the one who thinks DOA mechanics suck in the comment section of another YouTuber. Even if you weren't selling fanservice, what if people still button mash and didn't take time to understand the game?



I 100% agree with that comment, all we need to do is just leave the costumes & sexy girls alone.

PS. I think Season Passes are valuable since I'm getting an entire set plus some extras that come with it.



Even if that event didn't happen, DOA6 pre orders were not doing good compare to DOAX3 Scarlet pre orders in Japanese region.

View attachment 28739

Which I posted on this topic: https://www.freestepdodge.com/threads/official-dead-or-alive-xtreme-thread.6696/page-194

Feb 13, 2019 #3,877
TL; DR we all know you want “sexy” (Skimpy fetish whore-like) costumes to satisfy your thirst.
86F89227-F61E-4F79-84D9-6DA933513D5E.jpeg


Anyway, Shimbori created a DOA he wanted and not a DOA that the community wanted. Personally I am happy with the “toning down” because I am tired of the swimsuits and skimpy fetish costumes that looked stupid on majority of the characters. I think DOA should just stick to original designs that make the characters look better.
 
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DyByHands

Well-Known Member
Yep, for a really long time (like 9 months) the "toning down" thing felt like the main selling point of DOA 6. They pushed it too much and of course when you say you will change something that's the main visual appeal for years (like it or not), backlash will happen. It's like they really thought that removing the eye candy would bring them sales lol

That's why this controversy existed in first place. If they would have said nothing about a "new direction" for so long and just promoted the game normally, no one would complain about it but marketing never was their stroing point. They're totally out of touch with market and they keep trusting their American branch after what happened with DOA 5 ...

While I get what your saying, they had backlash from the very first teaser trailer they released, before they ever even said anything, because Kasumi’s breasts werent the focus. From day 1 the fans were talking about toned down fan service before they ever did.
 

Jyu_Viole_Grace

Well-Known Member
While I get what your saying, they had backlash from the very first teaser trailer they released, before they ever even said anything, because Kasumi’s breasts werent the focus. From day 1 the fans were talking about toned down fan service before they ever did.

If you only radically changes the female character, people will wonder why.

Now look at Mai/Kula trailer. For first time they used Kasumi's legacy outfit as her representative costume, which gives you a idea that now they understand what was wrong with their marketing.

I mean, for me the game has the right amount of fanservice but their pre-release marketing planning was the worst one they could take.
 

Force_of_Nature

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
Great post @MasterHavik. You touched on a lot of points with regards to how Tecmo & Team NINJA have been sabotaging DOA's potential success and growth for almost decades. I will say straight up that DOA's greatest folly is that the series has had the most ass-backwards marketing a game could have. For instance:



In all seriousness, what in the blue fuck was Tecmo & Team NINJA thinking releasing commercials like this in the West? What good was exactly to come of essentially alienating and labeling potential DOA fans as mouth-breathing perverts? All this pre-dominantly achieved was dumping DOA's reputation in the shitter and making it uncool to rep DOA. DOA just became the joke of the FGC. Like Havik was implying, if you sell your games on "tits and ass" and pretty much nothing else, all the mainstream public will do is associate your game with tits and ass and pretty much nothing else. Really, DOA1. OK. It needed a hook to differentiate itself from VF & Tekken, but by DOA2, the focus on sexuality was really not necessary, especially with the amazing multi-tiered stages, beautiful graphics and awesome-looking combat on display. Even with DOA5/U/LR & DOA6, because TN & KT have promoted the sex appeal so much in the past (and still do it even now to an extent), it's become very difficult for the general public to get past it and appreciate the deep gameplay found within.

Rikuto hit the nail on the head too for the most part. Mechanically, DOA5/6 are solid, but they also require tweaks to smooth out the gameplay experience, to make them more accepted within the FGC (e.g. Sidestep system, triangle system/throw breaks etc.) A qualm I have with the current Team NINJA with regard to DOA5 & DOA6 is that they have a vision for how they want DOA to be, but they half-ass this vision, get utterly surprised when their vision doesn't become beloved, then cowardly fall back on shilling to the filthy otaku/softcore porn crowd. One thing I give Itagaki credit is that he had a vision for DOA and stood by it. Basically the current TN succumbs to the bitching and moaning of the wrong people when they do choose to listen for feedback. However, I agree that Team NINJA needs to seriously take a look at something like Tekken, Mortal Kombat, etc. and understand why those game series are much more successful than DOA by miles.

One thing I do notice from the current Team NINJA is that I'm fairly certain that they do not properly understand why DOA is not more popular and do not fully appreciate why most of the FGC does not want to play DOA competitively.
 

Jyu_Viole_Grace

Well-Known Member
When you say "west" I guess you mean USA, because I'm from EU and I have never seen a DOA TV advertisement in my life.

Also, I think people don't understand the market, because people still don't understand why Virtua Fighter is dead unlike Mortal Kombat or Tekken. Virtua Fighter was only gameplay, Tekken and Mortal Kombat have their own traits to appeal people. Just removing the eye candy won't bring millions of people to play DOA, market doesn't work like that.
 
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Force_of_Nature

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Standard Donor
Well, North America at least (America in particular gets squeemish at the thought of BOOBS). What I mean with understanding why Tekken & Mortal Kombat are popular is based around two things: Tekken's gameplay appeals to a much larger demographic than DOA's gameplay, along with it being marketed A LOT better (marketing in particular is an area that DOA needs to improve on IMMENSELY). Mortal Kombat's gameplay is kinda ass, but it's marketed A LOT better and like Havik mentioned, it gets promoted as offering a lot more content to appeal to casuals beyond just the blood & guts. Do not get me wrong, I don't think DOA should get rid of the boobs, it just needs for its sake to not make it the fucking focus of its marketing 95% of the time. Though, ironically they did try and "tone" down the sexuality for DOA5 & DOA6, but they half-assed it, didn't stay by their vision and reverted back to promoting the tits & ass elements.

Basically DOA needs a combination of Tekken & MK's marketing, along with some gameplay tweaks to make the game more appealing to the competitive FGC crowd. But more so than anything, it's needs to be promoted miles better. We're on DOA6 now and they still don't get why most people don't play DOA.
 

Jyu_Viole_Grace

Well-Known Member
Well, North America at least (America in particular gets squeemish at the thought of BOOBS). What I mean with understanding why Tekken & Mortal Kombat are popular is based around two things: Tekken's gameplay appeals to a much larger demographic than DOA's gameplay, along with it being marketed A LOT better (marketing in particular is an area that DOA needs to improve on IMMENSELY). Mortal Kombat's gameplay is kinda ass, but it's marketed A LOT better and like Havik mentioned, it gets promoted as offering a lot more content to appeal to casuals beyond just the blood & guts. Do not get me wrong, I don't think DOA should get rid of the boobs, it just needs for its sake to not make it the fucking focus of its marketing 95% of the time. Though, ironically they did try and "tone" down the sexuality for DOA5 & DOA6, but they half-assed it, didn't stay by their vision and reverted back to promoting the tits & ass elements.

Basically DOA needs a combination of Tekken & MK's marketing, along with some gameplay tweaks to make the game more appealing to the competitive FGC crowd. But more so than anything, it's needs to be promoted miles better. We're on DOA6 now and they still don't get why most people don't play DOA.

What I think DOA needs, even more than bringing new players to tournaments, is making better numbers in stores.

For that what they need to focus in visuals (graphics + art style), because that's what people will be looking at first glance.

When I went to stores stands people were amazed with DOA 3 and they weren't talking about it as "the titty game", it was more like "the best looking FG I have ever seen" but ... it was a Xbox game and Xbox in EU wasn't a popular brand unlike Playstation or Nintendo.

DOA 5 was a way better looking game than DOA 6 at it's release and it had more content, that's why DOA 6 can't reach DOA 5 numbers.

Most people play Smash due it's characters, Mortal Kombat because the gore, Tekken because the characters and the humour (Tekken endings are the most popular in the genre), Street Fighter due being "the first FG" ... If I look at these game sales and then at these games competitive player numbers, it's about the 5% of the consumers in the better case. If you want more competitive players, you have to improve your sales, mainly because competitie players tend to go where there's money.

Now loking at these tv commercials. Is that how they should market DOA? obviously not, it's pure cringe. But how DOA 6 was promoted isn't either the right choice.

They have to focus in releasing a good game first (visuals, content, good gameplay, good online). Then people will enjoy it and maybe they will think about improving and then going to tournaments.

Even Tekken had rough periods (Tekken 4, 6 and TTT 2) but they did their best with Tekken 7 and now look where they are. Same with Mortal Kombat, almost a dead franchise but they also did their best with MK 9 and look how popular it's nowadays.

Both Koei and Team Ninja have to do their best with this franchise and release a game with the "maybe this will be the last one, so we will do everything we got" mentality. That's the only way to bring DOA to the radar again.
 

Force_of_Nature

Well-Known Member
Standard Donor
What I think DOA needs, even more than bringing new players to tournaments, is making better numbers in stores.

For that what they need to focus in visuals (graphics + art style), because that's what people will be looking at first glance.

When I went to stores stands people were amazed with DOA 3 and they weren't talking about it as "the titty game", it was more like "the best looking FG I have ever seen" but ... it was a Xbox game and Xbox in EU wasn't a popular brand unlike Playstation or Nintendo.

DOA 5 was a way better looking game than DOA 6 at it's release and it had more content, that's why DOA 6 can't reach DOA 5 numbers.

Most people play Smash due it's characters, Mortal Kombat because the gore, Tekken because the characters and the humour (Tekken endings are the most popular in the genre), Street Fighter due being "the first FG" ... If I look at these game sales and then at these games competitive player numbers, it's about the 5% of the consumers in the better case. If you want more competitive players, you have to improve your sales, mainly because competitie players tend to go where there's money.

Now loking at these tv commercials. Is that how they should market DOA? obviously not, it's pure cringe. But how DOA 6 was promoted isn't either the right choice.

They have to focus in releasing a good game first (visuals, content, good gameplay, good online). Then people will enjoy it and maybe they will think about improving and then going to tournaments.

Even Tekken had rough periods (Tekken 4, 6 and TTT 2) but they did their best with Tekken 7 and now look where they are. Same with Mortal Kombat, almost a dead franchise but they also did their best with MK 9 and look how popular it's nowadays.

Both Koei and Team Ninja have to do their best with this franchise and release a game with the "maybe this will be the last one, so we will do everything we got" mentality. That's the only way to bring DOA to the radar again.

Yes, definitely. I agree with this. A lot of DOA6's promotional issues got exacerbated by how half-assed the final product was. Basically, with the release state of DOA6, it was bad to the point that it would be hard for even DOA's small fanbase to defend it. I mean, having your bloody $93 season pass ready before lobbies, is just asking for a potential PR disaster. You can't defend that shit. How exactly were KT/TN expecting DOA6 to sell well?

But going forward, DOA will very likely need to be rebooted with how much of a beating its reputation has taken over the years. DOA definitely needs to find ways to increase sales along with of course just getting more people playing the game in general (for instance, the Core Fighters Free-2-Play for DOA5U was a step in the right direction, that helped increase DOA5's exposure). And, yeah, it's no surprise that DOA3 is more or less the best selling DOA fighting game. Despite the godawful "She Kicks High" commercial, the game was promoted well and was a great showpiece on the Xbox (not to mention that the game arguably has the best tone for a DOA game).

As for graphics, DOA6 actually looks pretty fantastic. Team NINJA got that part down well. Easily the best looking 3D fighter by a long shot. Relative lack of stages is a bit of an issue however. Game definitely needs more content to garner more interest. The moreso than anything, DOA's perception holds the franchise back a lot.
 
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DestructionBomb

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Standard Donor
To be fair, a reboot at times can follow a similar procedure that came to this conclusion in the first place. You'd literally have to make a game that doesn't ooze from Itagaki's personal view with fighting games. The moment people hear "DOA", you already know to expect.

It's why I still think TN should have a second IP while keeping DOA. You can learn good things from another game to add into DOA for a test sample. DOA is too far behind to get rid of that stigma and probably never will get rid of it except just blindly support it.
 

DyByHands

Well-Known Member
And, yeah, it's no surprise that DOA3 is more or less the best selling DOA fighting game. Despite the godawful "She Kicks High" commercial, the game was promoted well and was a great showpiece on the Xbox (not to mention that the game arguably has the best tone for a DOA game).

Just to add, and maybe I am remembering wrong, but doesnt doa3 have like 0 bikinis / swimsuits? And it was still a success.
It just makes me hate the X series’ influence on the games.
 

KasumiLover

xX_APO_Prince_Xx
Premium Donor
Yes, definitely. I agree with this. A lot of DOA6's promotional issues got exacerbated by how half-assed the final product was. Basically, with the release state of DOA6, it was bad to the point that it would be hard for even DOA's small fanbase to defend it. I mean, having your bloody $93 season pass ready for lobbies, is just asking for a potential PR disaster. You can't defend that shit. How exactly were KT/TN expecting DOA6 to sell well?

But going forward, DOA will very likely need to be rebooted with how much of a beating its reputation has taken over the years. DOA definitely needs to find ways to increase sales along with of course just getting more people playing the game in general (for instance, the Core Fighters Free-2-Play for DOA5U was a step in the right direction, that helped increase DOA5's exposure). And, yeah, it's no surprise that DOA3 is more or less the best selling DOA fighting game. Despite the godawful "She Kicks High" commercial, the game was promoted well and was a great showpiece on the Xbox (not to mention that the game arguably has the best tone for a DOA game).

As for graphics, DOA6 actually looks pretty fantastic. Team NINJA got that part down well. Easily the best looking 3D fighter by a long shot. Relative lack of stages is a bit of an issue however. Game definitely needs more content to garner more interest. The moreso than anything, DOA's perception holds the franchise back a lot.
I don't think a reboot or anything at this point will help DOA's reputation tbh, I think they should focus more in improving the gameplay and content for the core fanbase since there will always be negative stigma surrounding DOA, like the common go to being that only people play it for the girls and fapping(despite DOA having a pretty knit competitive scene and quite a few gays and bis play the game, like I know more gay Kasumi players than straight ones tbh xD)

Hopefully in season 2 they'll improve and learn from their mistakes and maybe make some gameplay adjustments around the way as well too since DOA6 is already the best looking fighter atm(for now anyways since it has its own issues) but at this point I feel like you either love or hate DOA6 with what's it's done in the past 3 months
 

DestructionBomb

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Standard Donor
I feel like you either love or hate DOA6 with what's it's done in the past 3 months

But that is mildly shallow. It's like people always automatically just accept to what's given to them. On top that majority of the players don't play anything else but this series so they just accept to what's handed down to them since the player base refuses to evolve.

I also agree that a reboot wouldn't fix any of that when a reboot (at times) just prolongs the game to reach the same inevitable outcome once more. With the addition that the series was based off Itagaki's vision and his personified view to fighting games, along with DOAX series that did more harm than good when it came to the serious tone of the DOA fighting genre. Personally I don't mind DOAX being a thing because it creates an entirely different barrier for a completely different game (more games the better right?, it makes perfect sense to keep the massive fan service there and I'd support it), but then you'd also have players from that side that wants to indoctrinate the fighting game version to be vastly similar to DOAX where it's like why? - Itagaki's method to it backfired without even realizing it.

TN has to come up with a situation where it brings in the audience with a method that isn't typical clickbait and scapegoating, while getting those players out of their comfort zone to try the game. Fighting games is one of the hardest games to get into when other genres are far more popular, so the best course of action is to gather players from other fighting games instead. To do that, you'd have to come up with similar approaches to how other popular fighters do it and why are they are so popular from it to begin with. What makes SF kick despite having a shitty start, what makes Tekken gain 100+ viewers daily, what is it from UNiEST that keeps the community together etc.
 
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KasumiLover

xX_APO_Prince_Xx
Premium Donor
But that is mildly shallow. It's like people always automatically just accept to what's given to them. On top that majority of the players don't play anything else but this series so they just accept to what's handed down to them since the player base refuses to evolve.

I also agree that a reboot wouldn't fix any of that when a reboot (at times) just prolongs the game to reach the same inevitable outcome once more. With the addition that the series was based off Itagaki's vision and his personified view to fighting games, along with DOAX series that did more harm than good when it came to the serious tone of the DOA fighting genre. Personally I don't mind DOAX being a thing because it creates an entirely different barrier for a completely different game (more games the better right?, it makes perfect sense to keep the massive fan service there and I'd support it), but then you'd also have players from that side that wants to indoctrinate the fighting game version to be vastly similar to DOAX where it's like why? - Itagaki's method to it backfired without even realizing it.

TN has to come up with a situation where it brings in the audience with a method that isn't typical clickbait and scapegoating, while getting those players out of their comfort zone to try the game. Fighting games is one of the hardest games to get into when other genres are far more popular, so the best course of action is to gather players from other fighting games instead. To do that, you'd have to come up with similar approaches to how other popular fighters do it and why are they are so popular from it to begin with. What makes SF kick despite having a shitty start, what makes Tekken gain 100+ viewers daily, what is it from UNiEST that keeps the community together etc.
It is shallow but I don't really think it's right either, I'm kind of divided since I love and hate what DOA6 has done but most of my liking for it is mainly since we even have a DOA6 title although it's rushed. And I agree with the xtreme stuff although I still have yet to even play an extreme game xD(I'm not really interested in the series as much as I was when I was like 16-17 which I suppose is to be expected)

And idk if SF and Tekken really use approaches tbh. They'll always gain numbers and such since they're considered the mainstream fighters so they'll always have a vast fanbase and player base backing it. DOA6 doesn't have those numbers unfortunately but it could grow if they didn't repeat alot of the same mistakes they've been doing with the pricing of DLC and gameplay changes and issues that seem to pop up after every patch
 
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