Dead Fantasy III: The Epic Final Fantasy, DOA Cat Fight Continues

@Ferkner: This is actually one movie split into three for some reason. There's a lot missing from it from what I saw at the convention.

Gamers: The Mother-in-Laws of the industry. Nothing ever impresses us, or is good enough for us.

@bobtheduck:
Prally the same way a pair of tweezers weighs the same as a bottle of beer in fallout3.

Lachette

I don't get it. What's the point of this supposed to be?

Ferkner

@silverat7: Welcome to Kotaku. People here seem to think that this site and themselves are better than everyone else.

Ferkner

Oh I gotta watch this when I get home. I really enjoyed the first two.

Strider-No.9

@Resso:
you deserve that comment NOT being approved.

@Scazza: Tifa should have highly bejeweled knuckles. And where are the Three KotR materia, linked with the Final Strike + Counter Attack + HP absorb and a Final Strike linked with Revive.

My problem with the production? 33% credits. Sounds like Lazy filler.

@zhangzheng: Unbelievable, someone who understands martial arts.

Shinta

@Jourdal: Because Wing Chun is brutal. I was really glad they threw in the arm breaks.

Shinta

@Ad-hominem: I'm not sure how you can call it poorly choreographed. He focuses on complex choreography over almost anything else.

Shinta

@Scazza: It was pretty clear to me that when Hitomi had her vision damaged she switched to Wing Chun since they train to fight based off of feel, and they also train blindfolded. They weren't using the same styles.

It seemed like the ending for me, for one of the fights atleast. If you watch them all together, you have the two with extravagant fight scenes, then it ends with one of the pairs getting sectioned off and just brutally finishing it. I thought it was neat.

Shinta

I like the third one a bit more than the first two to be honest.

wait wait wait! so who really won the fight? tifa? cus she was the last person i saw standing...

Vintage

@SamL_: Thanks for the tip! Just watched them, and 4 and 5 are both pretty dope.

Wow, can't believe everyone is hating on it so much. I still really liked it. I mean, despite it being considerably shorter and I this time just focusing on a single fight. The animation is still staying true and consistent to his previous work. But I guess I'm just easily impressed, but seriously this is pretty all so impressive, coming from one person and a computer.

@Scazza: Ever see Advent Children? Materia is inserted in the arm.

Kyle Templeton

Why does everyone on this site have a chip on their shoulder? When I go to other sites everyone seems normal but on here there's nothing but bitching and whining.

silverat7

@Ad-hominem: Trolltastic

You know what this reminds me of..

Those animated stick fights we always used to see everywhere on the internet.. except hot women in 3D.. I like this much better! :)

--Core--

It's like I'm really playing the Dreamcast!

I've had a co worker try to bug me to death to watch this for a couple of weeks now.

While I admire the artistry I just can't make myself watch this. I just feel like it really has gotten to the point where Final Fantasy 7 and DOA have turned into cliche's that their only real use is to make hentai out of either.

I love Final Fantasy7, I love DOA when it wasn't trying to be virtua fighter. Just enough is enough.

Listening to the DMC3 music made me wish it was Dante in there, doing some sexist beat down. Now I wanna play DMC3 again.. :(

Demoneyejin

@Scazza:
Haven't you seen FF7 Advent Children? Those 3 guys had materias in their arms just like Tifa.

@Jourdal: With her FISTS

WFROSE

I have been waiting for this episode for a year now. It is finally out and every site I have seen it on (Youtube, Gametrailers, Joystiq, etc....) Monty Oum has been praised for his amazing work. So imagine how i felt when I came to visit my Kotaku and saw that one of the editors posted it, only to find out all the bashing it has been given from my fellow Kotakuites. For those of you bashing this amazing animator who does this ON HIS FREE TIME........
I am ashamed of you. What is that pencil ico....OMFG an edit button!!?

Wow, that was......mediocre :/
Dunno what else to say. I the idea is really awesome but the execution?

I liked how the first 2 were so over the top yet maintained....something believable.
But this? Why the overly long starry intro? Where is the connection with the first 2 clips?
ALso, I think the animation was really bad at certain points, like the models had no physics at all.

Maybe it was intended that way I don't know, but I'm just not feeling it with video.

@omgJOHN: I'm one of the biggest Final Fantasy fans on the face of the earth, and I find these videos embarrassing tbh. I remember someone linked me to the first one, and I pretty much wanted to forget that it ever existed. I haven't watched a single one since that fateful day.

@omgJOHN: Don't worry, I'm sure that all the other deuchbags think exactly like you.

Krumm

You can already watch 3, 4 , 5 on youtube :D They have been posted for the last 3 weeks

SamL_

@Kanji08: I'll give you the music bit. I personally think it's cheesy, but you're free to like whatever. He's free to work however he wants, but give this vid to a decent editor and I'm pretty sure they'd be able to make it work with just about anything.


Not once did I speak of visual quality. I was speaking of the animation quality - as in the actual movement in the video. Limited tools my ass, the tools have nothing to do with the quality of the animation. And if he's focusing on what the tools can do he's doing it wrong anyway. The tools are there as a way to accomplish a goal. Why do you think 75% of the people who work at Pixar had no previous 3D or animation experience before getting hired? Understanding the human form in motion is far more important that the toolset you use.

I don't care if he renders out IMAX quality or for web, or whether he's working with a 500 poly object or a 500,000 poly object. He could render with Mental Ray, Vray, or Maya software for all I care. Those things are largely irrelevant when talking about the quality of the movement of the human form. And the animation in this video was meh. The characters weren't weighted well, the movements were often stiff and lifeless. I understand that it's one guy, and so I can cut the animation some slack. It's not godawful, but it's also nothing incredible. It seems like if he spent more time one one section, he'd have an overall more impressive video.

And whoop-de-doo, he got a job in an industry notorious for shitty animation for videos that demonstrate mediocre animation. The whole industry focuses on cranking out higher poly objects and textures in even larger environments, and we're left with poor overall animation.

Like I said before, I think he's talented. But I'd be much more impressed if he spent more time refining a quarter of that fight into something that moved and flowed better than cramming a bunch of ideas into one vid and leaving us with "Oh, that looks cool, but it could look better."

@Scazza: I believe he's using FFVII: Advent Children's materia interpretation in that it is stored in the characters' limbs rather than in the equipment. Can't say I really like this but it's not like he pulled it out of his sleeve.

Tatticus

@Scazza: I was thinking the same thing, about the materia... Where the hell is she keeping it? And HOW ON EARTH CAN SHE POSSIBLY CARRY THAT MANY AT ONCE?

@Scazza: Monty is following a system more in line with Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children as evidenced by Tifa's look and Materia being stored in the body, not weapons.

What's wrong with characters using the same martial art style? if they only know one form, what's the problem?

Though three is short, it is far from over, the fight that takes place in three is immediately continued in part V, which should be out in the coming days. Part IV, the odd one out, sets up the scene for very big surprise.

If you don't want to wait for the HD videos, which I strongly recommend, head over to YouTube to see pars III thru V.

American_N_Japan

@Ad-hominem: It's a fan service video. 2 popular game characters engaged in a completely over-the-top action sequence. Sometimes I think people try too hard to critique a medium for something it's not even trying to achieve, rather than just sitting back and enjoying it for what it is.

And on that note, that's why Transformers 2 is the best movie of '09 so far. Sit back and enjoy the action. Who the fuck needs substance when the style is so good?

Kanji08

@omgJOHN: You do have something of a point. Midway gave the guy a job after Haloid. Kind of ridiculous. I wonder if now that Warner Bros. owns Midway and he stole most of the fight moves in Haloid from the Matrix movies (which are made by WB)if he's gonna get any nasty memos from the higher ups. :)

@SiddhimaEnceladus: These machinima videos landed him quite a nice job as a Game Developer at Namco. What have you done in your spare time that's ever amounted to anything other than a higher number on your gamerscore?

Kanji08

@Sir-Lucius has no pictchar!: 1.) Musical taste is purely opinion. Just cuz you don't like it doesn't make it bad. I personally think the Devil May Cry 3 theme song fits wonderfully for a battle scene. Secondly, he bases his videos off songs rather than picking songs for his videos. So it's not like he can just copy-paste a more appealing track on top of his video since specific motions and actions are timed with the music.

2.) It's a fan made video by 1 guy. He's not trying to render Advent Children quality visuals for a simple machinima video. If you actually looked anything up on Monty Oum instead of blindly hating on him, you'd know he intentionally uses limited tools of which he knows the full extent on what he can achieve with the hardware, rather than using more powerful, but obviously more complicated software.

3.) He got a job as a game developer at Namco from these vids. I don't think he needs some random poster on Kotaku to tell him what will and won't be beneficial to his future.

Kanji08

@Scazza: Without commenting on the quality of the video, I'll say the following:

I'm not sure you can say 'Not to nit pick...' then cavalierly proceed to pick nits! But in all fairness, to retaliate with some nit picking of my own, I think the materia came out of her arm rather than her throat. Given that Tifa didn't have weapons per se and used her fists to fight, I imagine that's about as sensible a place as any to have materia fall out of, if you're giving thought to that sort of thing.

@Jourdal: I know what you mean. I'm actually surprised by the amount of backlash this video has gotten here and while I honor other people's opinions, it is hard to take them seriously when most of them are just saying it's boring, how it doesn't make much sense or how bad the animations are.
The creator of this does this by himself and the "critics" are being harsh for what it isn't supposed to be.

@omgJOHN: where i come from, you are sippin' on what they call "hater-ade." you're throwing "fanboy" around like people should be ashamed of liking this. it sickens ME to see someone so high on their own damn pedestal.

Not as good as his other vids, but still very well done, especially considering how DFII ended.

@omgJOHN: Yes! I agree! Its COMPLETELY wrong to be a fan of ANYTHING and you're a tool if you use your considerable modeling and animation skills to make well choreographed fast paced fight scenes!

I mean seriously the NERVE of some people!

................

Jashin Slayer

This kind of thing aggravates me. He clearly has talent, yet he's completely misusing it. Create an animation literally half that length that reeeeallly pops, and then we'll be talking. It's better to have 30 seconds of amazing animation on your reel than 3 minutes of crappy-mediocre animation. And for all the flash, style, and flair his videos have, they all suffer from poor animation due to the length.
>
I get that he has a lot of ideas but focusing on higher quality over higher quantity will benefit him in the long run. And for god's sake hire someone will taste in music to do auido for the next vid.

@soulsiphon says My name is NOT Rookie, Venkman!!: I can't forgive them for that though. I don't want to see Final Fantasy characters die.

SacGamer

@Boom-Chicka-Ah: Why does everyone hate DMC3 music? It's some of the most adrenaline-inducing music I've heard T_T

Resso

I wonder how many of the people bashing/complaining can actually do something half as good as this...

Jourdal

Boooooring. If I wanted something that looked like super smash bros fighting I'd go play that. The magic was an unusual touch, but hitting her made her drop the materia? What?

Then part way though after Tifa nails hitomi she gives her time to just sit there? Why? Thats not tension creating thats just stupid.

Lonesnipa

I know the guy has moved onto bigger and better stuff, but I have to say, it was very very disappointing compared to the first 2. For one, the thing is short, and most of the video was made up of the starry intro and the end scene.

Also what happened to the extravagance of the first 2? Now we have a really contained fight scene with only two characters that look to be using the exact same fighting styles.

And not to nit pick, but the materia dropping was very cheesy, and in FF7, the materia was stored in weapons and accessories, not stuck in her throat.

@omgJOHN: oh and the last blow reminded me of Black Star from Soul Eater

@TaggarT6: Yeah Monty Oum is great when doing these things.

@Ad-hominem: Whoa?! No offence sir, but he is giving us some awesome experiences for free, it may be reashed things from other forms of media, but he does it well enough to give a lot of people enjoyment.

I find it hard to believe you would downright put down someone who uses his free time to do this for us and even more so critque something that was intentionally made to people that enjoys "chessy cartoons."

It is obvious this was not catered towards your taste, but it did for mine. I do not care for no new characters or the "borrowed" fight scenes. As I have said before, Mr Oum did it well enough for me to enjoy it and make me anticipate for the next one.

As for your last question, he said it in the Invisible Walls podcast last week that he does it for the fans and for his own enjoyment he gets from the reactions of the people watching them.

I never comment but this is one of the dumbest things I've ever seen. I think a more appropriate song for the video would have been George Thorogood's "Get a haircut and get a real job".

SiddhimaEnceladus

@(Zombie) Goldwings:

Me either....FF characters kill summons..DOA characters lounge and play volleyball...i mean WTF?

Jourdal

My god... this thing is... terrible... They wanted to make something the fands would fight hawt and sexy and it ended up being poorly done and the music is TERRIBLE..

@omgJOHN: the only thing i could recognize from another action scene was the first slow motion punch scene (tekken 6 op).

this was the worst of the 3....the characters were really stiff and almost half the video was the prolouge >.<

Kougeru Matsuoka

@omgJOHN: I also decried this as a stilted, bizarre string of fight moves torn from anime and action movies. Sort of the Micheal Bay of machinima. The guy's raw motivation is impressive, but without some kind of formal learning, he's trying to head straight for Advent Children without first progressing through 'this is how follow through and weight transfer works'.

Similar to a lot of budding artists that want to draw in the 'manga/anime' style without first studying actual human forms, *then* discerning a personal style after they have internalized the basics.

I saw Haloid, and enjoyed it for the cheesy cartoon that it was.
Then I saw Dead Fantasy, which was essentially a re-hash of Haloid, but with new characters. I appreciated it too, why not? They were fun and exciting.
Then, Dead Fantasy II came out, and all I had to ask was "Why?". It didn't bring anything new to the table, it's age was showing, and it went on for far too long.


And, now, Dead Fantasy III comes out. This entry highlights exactly how pathetic the series has gotten. Without significant new characters, or over-the-top action, the awful character animations, choppy rendering, and poorly-choreographed (When not blatantly "borrowed" from other series) fight scenes stand out. I'm pretty sure no sane person can figure out why he's still making these.

Ad-hominem

@TaggarT6: From Monhty's "Haloid" Gametrailers page:

Internet: WHYYYYYY did you make Master chief a girl!?!?!? Master chief’s not a girl?!?!?! WHAT TEH HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU YOU FAG?!?!?!

Me: In the Halo story according to the books there were actually 32 Spartan soldiers, including women. If you look closely you can actually see the number 458 on the "Master Chick's" suit. 458 being the number of the Spartan that made a Cameo in the Dead or Alive series. Not much thinking went into it further than that though. Plus hot lesbians are awesome.

@MDog: I KNEW IT.

Alternate

@SacGamer: you should watch the first two if you are unfamiliar. Tifa is more impressive overall than seeing this one vid would make it seem.

soulsiphon says My name is NOT Rookie, Venkman!!

Just saw part 2 of that segment from a bootleg video and I have to say I don't what happens to Tifa :'(

@Ryan_Long: says the kotaku commenter.

soulsiphon says My name is NOT Rookie, Venkman!!

My two favorite ladies in the heat of battle against one another, no matter what the out come i win =)

_Ted_

ugly

BvomAKG

It wasn't a female spartan. It was Master Chief versus Samus. Then they team up and fall in looove.

firelogic

@omgJOHN:

I'd hate to see how angry you get if you ever drop your toast on the floor. They're entertaining and a good result from a lot of hard work, get over yourself.

drag

How the hell did Hitomi beat Tifa...

Jourdal

wow the music was pretty annoying to listen to during the fight.

@TaggarT6:

Indeed. Every fan-boys wet dream come true... except for the whole 'still being digital' thing.

@supo:

I'm relatively certain that this isn't the whole video, there's definitely more fighting with Tifa in the snow and more after that too.

drag

@omgJOHN: I will agree that haloid was shit. the rest of your argument is unwarranted, unnecessary hating. these shorts are very well animated, considering he does all by himself, and his lesser know Icarus short is, at least in my opinion, a work of art.

laencythe

I like Monty's videos but still pissed at him for that sad excuse for a combat system in Afro Samurai.

cippycup

I really don't agree with the winner here.

OH MY GOD, I've been waiting for this for months. Thanks for the heads up.

@supo: The quality of his CG is getting better too, probably another cause of the shorter duration.

AuraWind

very nice wing chun showing from hitomi

zhangzheng

@TaggarT6: Just go with it.

Who else spotted Crimson Viper's Burning Kick near the middle?

@Tiagomnh: I've seen 4 and 5 at anime expo. 4 was AMAZING and 5 was ok. End of 5 was kinda shittay

wazzzup16

@Vespene: SRSLY.

wazzzup16

@WFROSE: Yeah but it's Dead or Alive... remember the commercial? "She kicks high"

the first one was cool, but after a while they start to really remind me of the stickman fights on newgrounds.

solidsnak

The first two seem much better thought out. This was a slight downgrade, none the less nice.

This is such incredible fanboy wankery. I could barely stand to watch the first one, and that Haloid thing was complete bullshit.
It sickens me to see someone basically steal someone elses characters, right out rip off movie action scenes and have this thing heralded as the second coming of Christ.

And why is it that it seems like I'm the only one that realizes this?

@MajinMexican: I have to say I liked this one a lot better than the other two, but then again I prefer intricate trapping and grappling to flashy projectile hurling. I would have liked to have seen more leg traps though, rather than high kicks.

WFROSE

Yeah this video was pretty good but short compared to his 2nd one. But it makes sense, we'll probably see a couple other short vids seeing how the 2nd dead fantasy ended.

Good work Monty!

supo

Isn't machinima a movie you make ingame while this dead fantasy is made with 3d animation program?

OMG i love this video

+RedMotMan+

@Tiagomnh:
Commenting system is lacking....

I used to like reading comments here

Yeah I agree with you McWhertor, I and II were a lot better, but it's nice to finally get a third one.

I loved the fight with Rinoa when she had her wings, it was sooo sweet

Is that DMC music? o.o

Don't want to be picky. But the Devil May Cry 3 theme wasn't by Coal Chamber, like this video seems to suggest.

this is the nerdiest thing i have ever seen in my life

These things would interest me, if it didn't feature my favorite Final Fantasy characters getting brutalized. The only video I've seen of this series was of what looked like Tifa getting killed. For that, the maker of these videos can just go to hell.

SacGamer

After seeing the first two, I see why he was hired.

stretch

When Hitomi knocked Tifa out of the building, she used Black Star Big Wave from Soul Eater anime.

PPCK

Erm ... hasn't the series gone a lot further than this already? I remember seeing a preview of later parts (maybe up to 5?) a while ago, which were awesome.

drag

Actually, Dead Fantasy III, IV, and V can be viewed on youtube. V ends in... =( watch it!

CarlinaLubrano

Kind of getting bored of these. The first one was the awesome for what it was the. The 2nd one was fun but just seemed to drag on and on.. and now there's a 3rd one...

I've been looking forward to this for a long time, just letting it load in HD now.

DaveStrife

@Tiagomnh: What the hell? It doubles ma youtubez when I edit. Fix it Crecente!

awesome, been waiting for the third version to come out hopefully it's worth the wait

Looks like I know what I'm gunna be doing when I get home... I get the feeling this'll have some NSFW moments.

Cool...this is by the same guy who did the Halo/Metroid cross over where a female Spartan and Samus duke it out John woo style until they have to team up to take out some mutual baddies.

Then they lez out.

Some more footage here peeps. Sux0r quality but enjoy! There's also a DFIV trailer around featuring Yuna and Cloud.

If only Advent Children used these choreographers... *sigh

If you think this is fan service, wait till you see part 5 lol

Go Tifa! :3

Solertia

@bobtheduck: Well, if you watched Advent Children, which I'm sure many classic FF7 fans didn't, as I know many of my friends did not, the three antagonists carried their materia in their arms or chests. Naturally, Monty took this concept and ramped it up.

But really, guys, shame on you for arguing such semantics in response to a fan-made movie. Moreover, This one video is so short because, as he's stated on his website, he's breaking up the final Dead Fantasy's into smaller chunks since he has a videogame development job right now that eats up most of his time.

And, honestly, for how good this is, I can't criticize the man for giving us a CG fan vid of this quality FOR FREE.

@TaggarT6:

did they lez out? I don't think we saw the same video. Or you're spending too much time with your imagination....and other things...

DataScream

Probably because in Advent Children Materia was stored in the body

Ryak

@Scazza: In advent children the characters do absorb materia into their bodies for use sometimes.

Solidusian Fury

Isn't 'machinima' using existing game engines to create original content? I don't believe this is machinima. Cool, yes. Machinima, no.

the song sounds like the one from DMC

@Scazza: If you watch Advent Children, the main villians store it in there body parts probably got the idea from there.....