Dead or Alive 3 for the Xbox:

Now this is how you showcase graphic power. And I'm not just talking about violence here, I'm talking about polygonal might. This button-masher doesn't really bring anything new to the genre in terms of game play, but the background art is incredibly beautiful. The depth and clarity of the environments is unmatched by anything I've seen in a console game, and the secondary animation effects (splashes, snow, etc) is very well done. This game really shows off the graphic power of the Xbox, and is a good choice for a launch title. The fact that quite a lot of those polygons go into modeling large perky breasts can't hurt sales either.

At first I found the detail distracting and the impression was that perhaps the striking animation was too slow compared to a game like Tekken. I eventually adapted to it though, and no longer think this is a problem. As in any fighting game, timing is everything, and the characters have a range of response time strengths and weaknesses.

Dead or Alive 3 offers your standard fighting modes, including training modes, 2 player modes, tag team and what they call story mode. Story mode lets you play a character through a number of fights until you come up against the big bad boss, Gonneria. Or something like that. Once you have beat the boss, you get rewarded with a noninteractive video sequence which is a story bit from the characters life. Overall these are well animated, with a few beautiful effects, very cinematic. There are a few noninteractives inserted between fights in story mode as well, but these are generally nice and quick and don't interrupt game flow.

So with all this beauty and bosom, is there anything about this game not to like? Yep. In this case it's more about what's missing than what doesn't work. First of all, you're still stuck on the single axis with the opponent. You can move left or right and hop up and down, but really this is still just a 2.5D fight game in a beautiful 3D set with the prerequisite 36DD cups.

Granted that's a minor complaint, true 3D movement wouldn't add a lot to this game, what bugged me more was a lack of characters. Most of them seem like duplicates, and I'd love to see some more variety like Tekken Tag, or even (to a lesser extent) Street Fighter EX3.

My main complaint however is the lack of grand reward. When you complete each characters boss fight in story mode, you get rewarded with the noninteractive video - this is good, but when you complete every single character, you get rewarded with... CREDITS?? C'mon we want a fantastic video clip, or the unlocking of a new character. Something to add value and reward your hard work. Something that goes beyond naked assassins showering. Lets strip down the texture maps. Show me the polygons. Something, anything other than credits.

These complaints aside, overall I dug this game, and none of the other Xbox launch titles I've seen show off the systems power to this extent.

Recommended for 14 year old boys and those of us that refuse to grow up.

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