#979

Описание: A playthrough of the final boss Tengu in the Dreamcast port of Tecmo/Team Ninja’s Dead or Alive 2.

Dead or Alive 2 was where the DOA series really started to take off. DOA2 was a game I sort of admired from afar for a number of years, only finally playing when I bought my Dreamcast in 2012 and started to get back into fighting games after a long hiatus from them.

Released originally on Sega’s Naomi arcade board, the game looks phenomenal, which is saying something as DOA1 looked pretty damn great itself. While VF3 had some nice-looking stages, it had nothing on the innovations which DOA2 made. Character models look fantastic and more fully-formed than before (pun-intended, especially for this series). The colours of the game are much more vibrant, and in general it’s just an incredibly enticing game from first glance. But then you have the design. DOA2 marks the major innovation for the series over most others; layered stages. DOA2’s stages are not only in 3D arenas, but also have stage transitions which lead to an entirely new part of the stage. This means that stages are not only huge, but incredibly intricate in terms of design with each stage having various different areas to fight in, each with their own advantages and disadvantages. For years it’s remained one of the core staples of the series, and it’s easy to see why. Dynamic arenas (as opposed to just stages) just make a fighting game a lot more fun and intense; the fighting gains a sense of realness and intensity which you don’t quite get from a regular walled off arena. Well, it’s real until you see someone brush off a 50-foot fall, only sustaining minor damage from it. Indeed, knocking your opponent into a stage transition also partially damages them, meaning that players have to be more aware of their footing as one good strike might see their character being plummeted out of a building, off of a cliff, and numerous others.

The regular arenas and danger zones from the original game are gone (meaning you can no longer being ringed out), but in their place certain stages have stage hazards such as electrified fences. These not only deal additional damage to a character knocked into them, but also allow the attacking character to continue their combo as a result for even more extensive damage.

On the whole, DOA2 is a relatively casual fighter, and one which is definitely good for newer fighting game players to get into. It’s just a damn enticing game to play, and really pretty fun for the better part. There’s only really one issue with the gameplay, which I’ll also get into more with future games in the series. Holds. For anyone getting into/back into fighting games, holds will drive you absolutely mad. The timing for doing them yourself doesn’t feel dramatically natural (your reflexes to utilise one correctly have to be very quick), and the AI will effortlessly use them against you at will the majority of the time, often interrupting your combos and strikes. The timing for them seems to vary from game to game, too. For newer players, this is absolutely infuriating and often feels incredibly cheap, especially when it’s done by an AI who can (and usually will) do it at will for the sake of it. While it gets more tolerable (though never really less annoying) in later games, here the concept feels generally quite basic on the whole. Holds were in the first game as well, but this is where I think they really start to become apparent as a feature which defines the series. Their execution is a little awkward as well (back plus the block button at the same time) which means they take a while to get used to if you even really have the patience for them.

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