So...hot women in a game = lesser gameplay.

Is this suddenly an accepted equation in the game industry? It seems so. Reviewers and other critics, for whatever reason, have taken to the above equation like a physicist to E = MC(squared). They automatically assume that the developers spent 95% of their waking days designing the women and ignoring every other aspect of the project. Why is this?

I will give you all a personal guarantee- Dead or Alive 3 would' ve scored, on average, a full point higher on reviews if the breasts weren' t so enhanced. Same goes for FF X-2 if there was a male in one of the three major roles. " Fan service" is one thing (' cough' BMX XXX ' cough' ), a fantastic game with attractive women is something else altogether.

I' ve read reviews that spend HALF the words complaining about the " focus" on girls in games like FF X-2. What in God' s name is going on? Are these reviewers straight, or what? How this detracts from the gameplay is beyond me. I for one try to evaluate the game on the same deciding factors; character design is only one of them. I would suggest that all those out there suffering from the " machismo" syndrome that suggests that no game can be good with a female in a lead role, or those that belief that all games with attractive women have attractive women as the FOCAL POINT, do us all a favor and shut your traps.

If you can' t analyze a game, don' t. If you can' t see past ridiculously misproportioned individuals (as if the women are any more misproportioned than the impossibly muscular heroes), and evaluate the game on its merits like usual, then just DON' T.

Okey-dokey. End rant.

I Agree!

While Tecmo at some point (Saturn - DEAD OR ALIVE) did use female characters as a focal point, I agree that many reviewers just can' t seem to look past the " sex sells" gimmicks and offer an objective view on the gameplay without bringing their own personal moral policeMEN into the works.

I think ONE of the problems with reviewers that tend to complain about female characters in games is that they take one experience where a female character was used as some sort of sex symbol in a subpar game and then apply it to other games that use female characters as lead character. But yet they refuse to do the same will male characters in games running around with bulging pecks and bulging you know whats. That sort of thing makes them look as if they drive down the one-way streets of ignorance Boulevard VERY often.

I KNOW that ' some' companies like Tecmo Do tend to promote their " hot" female characters but when they can back it up with solid gameplay then I don' t see what the problem is..

I LOVE the Dead or Alive fighting games because of the fighting engine, because of the cool reversals and counters you can perform, because of the cool music, kicka$$ graphics, and interactivity of the levels. If the girls look hot, that' s just an extra bonus really, nothing to really dwell on when writing about the game.

On the flipside, when the ' hot' looking girls are the best part about a game, that' s when Houston can say we have a problem.

I think a GREAT example of such is Tecmo' s DOA Extreme Beach Volleyball vs. Sega AM2' s Beach Spikers. Beach Spikers, in my opinion, is the BEST Volleyball game I' ve ever had the pleasure of playing. The girls are modeled extremely well, beautifully detailed, and the gameplay is as addicting as Virtua Tennis was! Which in itself was like virtual crack!! As far as I remember about my brief exposure to the game, Extreme Beach Volleyball' s strongest aspect were the girls, the gameplay took a backseat. But it just goes to show that not all games with female characters in the main roles place more emphasis on the girls than the gameplay itself. I think Beach Spikers is a perfect example of that.

At the same time how do those same reviewers know that Ryo from Shenmue wasn' t used as some sort of sex symbol to lure more girls onto the gaming scene? Or Sonic, a male character who runs around with no pants or shirt on, isn' t Sonic Team' s attempt to turn him into a sex symbol.

GOD How I wish kickazz import games like the Choaniki/Super Big Brother series made their way to these shores. The ambiguously gay duo elements of these shooters would truly drive these reviewers up a friggin wall!

I know this is a bit off-topic, but because you mentioned DoA: XBV, I thought I should say a little something-

I love DoA: XBV. I really do. Reviewers everywhere seemed to have missed the entire purpose of that game. When it was first released, the lead designer released the following statement:

" We want the player to feel completely relaxed; just like they' re on vacation. It' s a game set in a beautiful tropical paradise, and you can just kick back and take it easy. Rest by the pool, play some fun mini-games, go shopping, get a few volleyball games going; just do whatever you want."

To the developers, it was a unique " niche" game with a lot of style, and a volleyball game SECOND. I still love playing volleyball, but with my burned set of favorite tunes, my collectable bathing suits, and beautiful landscape, I really do feel perfectly relaxed. Sure, the gameplay isn' t perfect, but it' s fun at least. You can never lose once you' ve mastered it (I haven' t lost in God knows how long), but who cares?

Yes, the women are absurdly hot. Yes, it' s one of the reasons why I play the game (vacation wonderland or not, I ain' t playing with guys in speedos ' cuz I happen to be heterosexual). But DoA: XBV is one of those rare occasions where there can be an emphasis on the women, but with an OVERALL HIGHER purpose involved. At least, that' s how I view that game, and it' s how the developers probably wanted us to view it as well.

Surely this is a more about substandard reviewers who fail to review games in alingment with competing titles because they can' t look past the issue of great boobies, rather than any kind of trend that applies to revierwers universally. A broad selection of revierers rated DOAX, including Edge at one one of the spectrum and IGN at the other, perhaps.

Although personally I think DOA (fighting series' ) gameplay is massively overrated. It' s very beautiful, instinctive and straightforward but lacks any kind of depth, from my experience with the game and its rivals, like VF. It' s by far the best-looking series of recent generations since VF3 stunned on arcade Model 3, but gameplay wise it' s nothing more than an admittedly pure and clean 3D fighter - and nothing spectacular. I am a complete VF fanboy though so don' t listen to me. ;-)

Although personally I think DOA (fighting series' ) gameplay is massively overrated. It' s very beautiful, instinctive and straightforward but lacks any kind of depth, from my experience with the game and its rivals, like VF. It' s by far the best-looking series of recent generations since VF3 stunned on arcade Model 3, but gameplay wise it' s nothing more than an admittedly pure and clean 3D fighter - and nothing spectacular. I am a complete VF fanboy though so don' t listen to me. ;-)

As far as 3D fighting games goes my favorite has always been the Virtua Fighter series. I love Virtua Fighter 3 the most, followed by the original Virtua Fighter, and then Virtua 4, followed by Virtua Fighter 2.

Fighting Vipers takes second place.

Third place is a tie between Dead or Alive 2 and Beastorizer (aka Bloody Roar)

(Tekken isn' t even a blip on my radar. There are only two arcade games I' ve ever walked away from while the first round was still in progress- Tekken Tag Tournament and Capcom' s JoJo' s Venture)

I liked TEKKEN 3 and tag tournament for PS2 but TEKKEN 4 was the reason i started to hate TEKKEN.

DOA is my second best fighting series its right behind the best ever SOUL CALIBUR.

Virtua Fighter 3 on Dreamcast was one of the worst fighting games i played.VF4 was OK for the PS2,but it still cant compare to DOA 3 or Soul Calibur Series.

Virtua Fighter 3 on Dreamcast was one of the worst fighting games i played.VF4 was OK for the PS2,but it still cant compare to DOA 3 or Soul Calibur Series.

Sorry but this blasphemy cannot be tolerated!

VF3 was the " worst" of the series but still remarkable. Any version of VF4 is simply the best fighting game ever made, you just have to know how to play it properly to get the most out of it. I suggest you invest more time into VF4 before passing it off as " OK" !!

Virtua Fighter 3 on Dreamcast was one of the worst fighting games i played.VF4 was OK for the PS2,but it still cant compare to DOA 3 or Soul Calibur Series.

I disagree :).

I LOVED Virtua Fighter 3 in the arcades. The Dreamcast Virtua Fighter 3: Team Battle was a great conversion I feel. The Dreamcast controllers didn' t exactly work too well with the game BUT regardless, I felt it was such a great game that I once played it continuously from morning to evening.

I adore the original Virtua Fighter as well, I still play it in the arcades and on the Saturn. As far as Virtua Fighter 4 goes, It' s a great fighting game but I wasn' t exactly thrilled that they made it flashier and dumbed it down a bit BUT if it' ll bring more players into the fray, then so be it.

I didn' t find Dead or Alive 3 to be as good as part 2 but that' s just me.

Soul Calibur never did anything for me. Kill me if you must, but that' s a real button masher right there! I beat the game in 6-7 minutes just button mashing my way through.

Also the reason why I don' t care for Soul Calibur is because it' s a weapons-based fighter and I don' t like those types of fighting games. unarmed combat is where it' s at for me, which is why you' ll NEVER see me praise the Samurai Showdown series.