Dead or Alive 3

"Does the third in the series offer anything new?"

If you're a lucky owner of an xbox game system, you have a few ''must have games'' staring you in the face. Dead or Alive 3 IS one of them. The series started on the playstation/saturn, carried over to dreamcast/ps2 and is finally on the xbox. Before you say ''is this game just rehash of doa1 and doa2?'' read this review.

Graphics: 10/10
I thought the dreamcast version of doa2 had totally awesome graphics. DoA 3 has even better graphics than the one for dreamcast. The characters are **this** close to looking real, they move like they were motion captured, well, to put it simply, the graphics are perfect! Lots of guys will buy it for the obvious reason, and if you are one of them wanting the game for this reason, you're in for a treat.

Gameplay: 10/10
When I played the previous DoA, I never got into it because there was nothing to unlock. There are a few things to unlock in this one, and thats how I got hooked. There is something in training mode called ''exercise'', I'm not sure if this was in the other DoA games, but this really helped me out. I learned how to counter, which is something that makes the game 100x more fun to play. Once you learn the basic controls for one character, you can play them all, and have a lot of fun doing so. While no ''fire balls'' are in the game other than the boss', you wont need em. Great gameplay to accompany the great graphics.

Sound: 8/10
Why couldn't we use our ripped music in this game? I dont know, but if we could have, it would get a 10 for sound. The music is ok, nothing special like the sounds from street fighter 2 (I still hum those tunes). I guess the moves make ok sounds, life like. Eh, sound isn't the most important thing IMO anyway about a game.

Story: 9/10
There are stories for everyone after you beat the game. Some endings are funny, some are sad, and some have nudity. If you have children, do not beat the game in front of them.

Replay?
How on earth can anyone know the replay value until the company tells us if they're going to sell the update disc things. Well, this and Halo are my only xbox games, so I play this one a lot. I like the game, and right now, I'd give it a 9/10 on replay.

Overall: 9/10
With great graphics, great gameplay, good story, and fun to watch, Dead or Alive 3 brings nothing new to the fighting game table. Even though it's really a rehash of the other DoA games, its still a GREAT rehash! If you could put your own music in the game, it would be perfect, but who really cares. This is the perfect game to pick up and play for 20 min.

So, should you rent this game or buy it? If you have $54.11 hanging around, go pick it up. If you like the other DoA games, pick it up. If you like to stare at good looking 3D women, pick it up.

If you don't like DoA games, give this one a rent. You might be pleasantly surprized cough**christie's ending**cough.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 12/02/01, Updated 01/17/02