At last dear play chums, I can stop whining and grizzling about the lack of 360 games. The beast has awoken and all 360 owners should be happily eschewing their friends in favour of drawing the curtains and clasping their clammy hands around everyone's favourite wireless controller.
Easter weekend is upon us, which means four-day weekend in England – whoo hoo! And apart from more drinking-in-the-pub-with-friends-time it means I'll actually be able to snatch more than 30 minutes to play games.
It has to be said that I've been more than slack this year on the old gaming front. Real life keeps getting in the way and as inexcusable as that is, sometimes it just can't be avoided. Committing to real life means shirking as a gamer and the guilt hangs heavy I can assure you dear play chums.
The end result of my slacking means I'm behind on my gaming homework. I'm only just getting to grips with DOA4! The mission this weekend is to purchase Tomb Raider and The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, although I've sampled both and know what delights await me (but not for much longer my little slippery, silvery disks of wonder!).
All that needs to be said is that I'm back on track and things are looking rosy in the lighter shade of green that is Xbox 360 land.
There's nothing like a DOA title to bugle the arrival of the next generation in gaming. All the pretty colours, blossoms, pumping rock music, high-pitched Japanese voices, and martial arts show-boating – everything you want from a DOA game.
Well, Team Ninja has done the series proud and perfected the physics of the jiggle. The jiggle factor is quite astounding and used to full effect. Clothing is soft and fluid, which allows for even more gratuitous panty shots and what would a DOA game be without those? I mean if I can't fight as a Japanese schoolgirl doing cartwheels and windmill kicks then life just ain’t worth living.
Titillation aside though, DOA4 really is a stunner. Chuck your opponent over the side of a rope bridge and leap down after her through the branches of a tree and then resume kicking their sorry ass in a stream of all things. So, have we totted up the feats of developer prowess in that little scenario? And when you see it actually happen, your jaw drops and you're still grinning when your opponent pile-drives you into the rocks because the way the water splashes up around your compacted spine is just divine.
And when you throw your opponent over a wall and through a net of helium balloons, which slowly float into the sky, then you know Team Ninja are just showing off. When it comes to DOA, we tend to take multi-levelled stages, great animation, destructible backgrounds, fluid clothing and subtle, varied lighting effects for granted. With this incarnation of the series all that and more is piled on.
Textures are laid on with a trowel – if you look they're all there. Some of the best satin effects, stone and leather textures, and water effects I've ever seen. The only thing Team Ninja still seems to be having trouble with is hair. Although, they've come way in creating movement, it's still flat and lifeless. And if you ask me they've gone a bit too far with the movement. Some of the girls with long hair are suffering from some kind of Medusa syndrome going on as their hair continually snakes over their shoulders. It's a hard nut to crack, but I'm sure one of these days they'll crack it with flair and grace – maybe ready for DOAX.
My only other gripe is the cutscenes. Some of them are just awful for a start. Don't get me wrong, they all look great, but sometimes you just think"huh!? Although they look great, the character models are so divorced from the in-game models that it's almost like watching a completely different character.
If Team Ninja insist on outsourcing the cutscenes to other companies, it would pay to get some sort of handle on what the characters end up looking like. But, they did get it completely right with Christie's end movie though and simultaneously took the DOA series closer to porn than it's ever been before.
Of course DOA is all about the fighting heh hem – boobs, panties and cherry blossom aside. The fighting is as great as it's always been. Nothing has changed on that front and that's just how it should be.
In short, I'm on a bit of a gaming high. The short play around I've had with Tomb Raider suggests that it's back to its glory days, DOA is pushing all the right buttons and when I'm done with that lot I've still got a lifetime to spend on Oblivion. Things really don't get much better than this!
Most played: Dead or Alive 4
Most wanted: more time