Collector's EditionsFeatured

Dead or Alive 5 Collector’s Edition

Dead or Alive 5 Collector’s Edition
Released: 2012
Platform: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Regions: Europe, US

Dead or Alive 5 was released for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in 2012. Aside from the regular version, a collector’s edition was released as well, coming in a tin case and containing several extras. The western version is almost identical to the Japanese one, except that CE has some additional content but does not include the poster.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition

The tin box itself is surprisingly large and looks pretty stylish: a dark, brushed steel effect littered with shiny drops, and in the middle a large, red 5 with embossed edges.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Embossed

The art book is one of the main attractions of this edition. It comes in hard cover and has beautiful, full page renders of all the characters. Other things, like costumes and stages are included as well.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook-Contents

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook-Mila

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook-Stages

A bit of background information is printed on the corner of each page. It provides some insight into the design process of the characters, containing some nice anecdotes, such as the one for Kasumi. This tells us the designer was so worried about her redesign, he didn’t eat for several days before the first reveal.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook-Description

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook-Kasumi

Also included is a large poster, containing most of the characters from the game and the slogan ‘I’m a Fighter’. The thing is, the poster has been folded up several times, creating a roster of white fold lines, pretty much destroying the poster. Oh well.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Poster

The game comes with a download code for a set of ‘premium swimsuits’. Let’s not forget about that.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Artbook-Swimsuit-Code

And, of course, the game itself.

Dead-or-Alive-5

This is also a rare breed these days: a game manual that’s more than a few warnings printed in black and white. It actually contains some game strategies and comes in full color.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Manual

This is a nice surprise: the soundtrack that comes with this Collector’s Edition is actually printed on a separate disc. Usually they are just offered as digital files. And not only that, it’s even got its own jewel case, neatly tucked inside the bottom layer of the box.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Soundtrack

The cd holds 20 tracks, which is not a bad number at all.

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Soundtrack-BackAll in all not a bad collector’s edition. There are quite a lot of extras and they didn’t try to cut costs on everything: a hard cover for the artbook, an actual cd case and the large size of the box are some examples that deserve credit, and there’s not much to complain about. Good job, Tecmo!

Dead-or-Alive-5-Collector's-Edition-Open