The Dead or Alive series doesn't get enough credit for how much it has improved over the years. Playing DOA6 and then DOA2 close together is a real eye opener, for example, yet people still steadfastly hold on to DOA2 or 3 or even 4 as being the "best" when 5 and 6 totally blow them out of the water and it isn't even close. I've said it before, but gamers are freaking dumb and don't actually ever know what they want. Read more and watch Dead or Alive 2 gameplay here.
Dead or Alive 1 is a mess that is better left forgotten. The series' trademark boob physics are comically terrible in this one and the gameplay is mediocre. Dead or Alive 2 is much more polished, and less bouncy, and that was good enough back in the early 2000's. It hasn't aged particularly gracefully, however.
Everyone looks at Dead or Alive and only sees bouncy boobs and assumes the gameplay is simple and shallow and hasn't improved. They're wrong, of course. The boobs are smaller and less bouncy now and the gameplay is night and day if you compare DOA2 and DOA6. DOA2 is really stiff and clunky and actually is shallow. DOA6 is smooth and the animation seamlessly flows together and it plays great. It isn't a complex mountain of inputs like a Tekken, but it isn't a braindead simple game like some people want to believe.
For this video I played the Dreamcast version of DOA2. I would have played the slightly improved PS2 version, but it runs like a pig on PCSX2, so that didn't work out. Unfortunately, I didn't play especially well. Like I've said, DOA5 and 6 have spoiled me and trying to go back to DOA2 where everything feels wildly different was harder than I expected. Ah well. It's a video and when you're trying to pump out a video on a different game every day for a year, you gotta take what you get.
