Recently, Eurogamer.net scored an interview with Sega?s AM2 team regarding the recently launched Virtua Fighter 5. The interview revealed many details about the new characters, the new Offensive Move mechanics, and online play among many topics. While I?m not big fan of Virtua Fighter 5, I found few discussion topics very interesting.

AM2 was asked if they had concerns regarding Tekken 5 launching around the same time in downloadable format. AM2 answered ?We have no particular concerns. Though the methods of the sales are different, I believe both titles are dominant products that will activate the PS3 market. I expect the synergetic effect will boost the beat-’em-up genre.?
It?s interesting to see two similar games released in two different channels. I don?t think we are far away from seeing a full retail release game being offered as downloadable game. While I don?t believe downloading will completely replace brick and mortal retail packages, I think it offers another method of purchase.

Another interesting topic was the lack of online play for Virtua Fighter 5.
When asked about the lack of online play AM2 responded with ?Our stance toward the online gameplay has not been changed from what it was before. VF5 runs at 60fps. It would be nice if there were an environment where we could communicate with no problem at all under this condition, but unfortunately, there are various barriers for the network gaming. We wish we had an Internet environment that would convince the players who develop frame-by-frame offense and defence. The Japanese advanced players play battles that can be determined within one frame! We were interested in dowloadable extra service and PlayStore, but we decided not to adopt them this time. Instead, we decided to include every possible item we can offer since we could secure sufficient space due to the introduction of Blu-ray Disc.?

The omission is due to technical difficulties involved in online play. While I can understand the reason behind the omission, I somehow wish they?d found the solution to this problem. Maybe offer a ?gimped? version as downloadable content?

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Filed under: Games, Interviews, Main, V