Dead or Alive 2

"This game actually matches with Soul Calibur, but the lack of hidden secrets is a bit disappointing."

Originally, I thought Dead or Alive 2 isn’t that great as it sounds. I just know why it gets popular, because of the girls in the game and I’ve been hearing plenty of reviews about it and say it’s good, directing it to the unsuitable pictures for young age. Of course, I’m wrong once more. I decided to give it a try, after buying several other games together and a splash of surprise turned over me.

Graphics – 10
They’re simply fabulous and beautiful. Not the girls of course, but the totally re-decorated 3D rotating background and the incredibly wonderful graphics. You can see the characters modeled nicely with their own suitable clothes and suits. I just like the background a lot, as they’re filled with their own theme such as snowing, near a river, in a hotel-like place, church and others.

Of course, the admirable colours that are used correctly in their respectable places are very enchanting. Simple touches here and there makes this game looks very great, as well as the light source are also used well to make a great, flashing graphical effect. Another interesting graphical effect is to have snow falling down and other optional animations. The smooth graphics without a single slow-down is also another thing that makes the pictorial system in this game great, added with the sharp cut-scenes in the game.

Music – 10
The background music is totally great, ranging from different kinds of instruments used in different stages. Even one of the stages has a background music that really sounds like Vanessa Mae doing one of her best violin pieces. Honestly, the background music is absolutely cool to hear and pleasant to the ears. Not to left out the sound effects, it’s a great job how Namco had done it. How they punch, kick and perform all sorts of amazing moves have their own special sound effects and a sheer fall drop to the ground will result the realistic sound effects to appear. Cool.

The voices too are in Japanese but they don’t really make much difference, as a subtitle will follow for you to understand. Some of them seemed to be improper, like when the voice speaks only a few words while the whole subtitle is completely long. There is also the English narrator, which narrates you the title and other in-game modes. Overall, the voices are not disappointing and the many characters are summed up with the right and suitable voices based on their personalities.

Gameplay – 9
There are definitely lots of modes for you to play, to make it an enjoyable and fun experience for you to play. The Story mode will direct you to a… well, fighting game with a storyline. Each character will have their own story and history behind it, and they will match with each other ones and bring their reasons to fight. Basically, there are men too in Dead or Alive 2, mind you. This whole new fighting system in 3D will bring you to another realm of fighting world. The stages are much more detailed, and if you succeeded in performing something in the stage, like kicking your enemy down from a building, the character of your choice will jump down and follow after him. Such stages are what I call continuous, as it will not only give you the joy and triumph of your battle, but it will not change anything at all, except the new stage surroundings.

Many other modes include a survival-style mode, where you’ll have to fight all the characters in the game using only one, yes, only one character to fight and see how far and long you can last before you are defeated. Sparing, is of course a training ground for you to master the various moves available in the game, Team Battle for battles using a series of characters from your team knocking out other characters in your opponent’s team and Versus, where you can fight against your friend. Thankfully, you can play up to four characters here where you can have more the fun together.

Replay Value – 7
This game has many features of its own, but lack of extra things to keep you playing to unlock things. Its personal rival Soul Calibur has all the extra things that you need, that allow players to come back for more but sadly, Dead or Alive 2 had already costumes unlocked. There are no hidden characters or whatsoever, so if you’re looking for a fighting game with lots of replay value, you might be disappointed in this.

Overall – 9
Basically, you can see that Dead or Alive 2 actually can match against Soul Calibur if you put these two games side by side in a party. Both of them might draw an equal number of crowds, as these two are merely fighting games and nothing else. Of course, this game might have more attention than the other, maybe because of the girls, and with much hype and fans around the world rejoicing this. So, if you’re looking for a fighting game, don’t look further, you can try and consider this.

Alive
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+ Astonishing and breath-taking graphics.
+ Nice and lots of variety of background music in this game.
+ The ‘continuous’ stage feature is very cool to me.

Dead
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- No extra features or secrets to get you back for more.
- Some of the fights are a little too easy.
- Not for the young, absolutely.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/29/01, Updated 03/29/01