Fighting games never were my strong suit. I didn't really get into the discipline of undergoing rote memorization of timing and combo strings, plus I do not compete with anybody aside from the A.I. Even so, I have at least two fighting titles that I'm confident with. One is Shiritsu Justice Gakuen, and the other is Dead Or Alive. What do they have in common? Aside from an easy-to-learn fighting engine, they also featured fanservice. JG specialized in panchira, while DOA had healthy servings of oppai.
Dead Or Alive not only spawned several fighting game sequels to it's name, but also a handful of titles devoted to nothing more than pure bikini and oppai peep shows. It all began with DOA Xtreme Beach Volleyball for the now-extinct vanilla Xbox, followed by DOA Xtreme 2 for the 360. Dead Or Alive Paradise serves as the third installment of these shameless DOA games, and is officially the first one ever released for a portable console.
Beach Volleyball: Where balls fly and boobs bounce. The perfect spectator sport for perverts.
Like with the first two games, the plot of DOAP is quite thin to say the least: For the third time in a row, Zack manages to trick the female fighters into thinking that a new Dead Or Alive tourney is being held at his island (didn't they learn anything from the last two instances?). Though feeling slighted at first, they just shrug it off and opt to enjoy their two-week vacation. After all, the island has plenty of activities to offer and other girls to meet and play with.
Apparently, skimpy spandex doesn't come cheap nowadays. But it'll become priceless once it gets on the skin of a cutie with a dynamite body.
DOAP can simply be categorized as a "vacances game" (some Japanese folks often use this French term for vacation). You'll be spending most of your time having your chosen girl frolic around the island, finding (and keeping) a partner for volleyball matches and challenging everyone else in one-on-one minigames. Winning these games earn you Zack Dollars, which you use to buy swimsuits, trinkets and food to keep for yourself or give as a gift to a prospective partner. Since it doesn't require much strategy, all the games are easy to pick up on, requiring only the barest minimum of gamer reflexes to excel.
Too many distractions... I'm liable to lose everything on this hand, sanity included.
Every night, your character gets a freebie compliments of Zack (whom I'll bet placed a crapload of cameras all over the island and is enjoying the view in more ways than one), as well as something from her current partner. You can opt to have her either sleep early, gamble a bit at the casino or oversleep... it IS a vacation after all. But beware, since doing the third option will make her partner angry, and your character will find herself alone the very next day.
Hitomi may have won the flag race, but Kasumi gave us the better view.
Aside from the T & A, DOAP retains the softcore yuri overtones that made the first two spinoffs popular: Save for Lisa who instantly becomes your partner/tour guide, you have to work on getting your character to win over the girl you want as your partner. An all-too-helpful "Girls Guide" allows you to see the likes and dislikes of each individual. If gifts don't work, then maybe it's the character you chose that's the problem. Remember, even in a lighthearted setting as this, rivalries and personal vendettas from the main DOA storylines still persist.
Know your enemy, and know yourself... Sun Tzu's philosophy still applies despite this not being a fighting game.
Though the minigames have a fairly short learning curve, the controls are a bit blah. If you're used to precise timing, you have to learn to throw that out the window and adjust to delays. The bouncing breast physics that the DOA series is famous for seems somewhat detached from reality (the animators responsible might have been doing stuff while on the job, and I honestly can't say that I blame them). Also, unlocking certain games, sequences, clips and features (The casino dealer Rio can also be added to the selectable roster) can prove tedious for casual players since they require a whole lot of activities to be done that go beyond a single two-week playthrough.
Butt-battle: Another hallmark of a satisfying spectator sport, with skin-to-skin contact and water involved. Bet some of you want to take the place of either girl right now...
Surprisingly enough, the EUR version actually came out earlier than the JP one. Despite my inherent dislike of localizations, I decided to give it a whirl (using a borrowed PSP with custom firmware, since I'm not about to taint my baby) while waiting for the one I actually pre-ordered. The overall translation was okay, but some of the voices were totally detestable. It's as if the VAs were trying in vain to imitate the original seiyuus, but ended up sounding like whiny tweens who inhaled some helium and then overdosed on uppers. Fact is fact: Western VAs can't be moe. It's no wonder they keep a somewhat low profile while seiyuus in Japan often enjoy celebrity status.
Thankfully, the dudes at Tecmo had enough sense to give people the option of actually changing the language audio to Japanese, without any excuses about text timing, interpretation/syntax issues and other technical bullcrap. Atlus USA and other pig-headed localization firms should seriously take a cue from them and give customers the freedom to choose. I was happy to find out later that the JP version doesn't have those pathetic English voices, and the only thing that you can change is the text language, which is all quite right. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
I wonder who does Kokoro's hair? It doesn't go wild even underwater...
While you can only reap the real benefits of this game if you take it seriously, DOAP can still serve as a fun break from RPGs and galges. You can love it, you can hate it, but it's still here. Shameless ogling and playing around can be good for you every once in a while.
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