Dead or Alive 3

For the film, see Dead or Alive: Final.
Dead or Alive 3
North American cover art featuring Jann Lee (front) and Hitomi (background)
Developer(s)Team Ninja
Publisher(s)
Director(s)
Producer(s)
  • Tomonobu Itagaki
  • Yasushi Maeda
Designer(s)Katsunori Ehara
Programmer(s)
  • Mitsuo Osada
  • Takeshi Sawatari
Writer(s)Hiroaki Matsui
Composer(s)
  • Makoto Hosoi
  • Takashi Inamori
  • Ryo Koike
SeriesDead or Alive
Platform(s)Xbox
Release
  • NA: November 15, 2001
  • JP: February 22, 2002
  • EU: March 14, 2002
Genre(s)Fighting
Mode(s)Single-player, multiplayer

Dead or Alive 3[a] is a 2001 fighting game developed by Team Ninja and published by Tecmo for the Xbox console as one of its launch titles. It is the third main entry in the Dead or Alive fighting series following Dead or Alive 2 (1999). Dead or Alive 3 improved upon the gameplay and graphics in beautiful detail compared to that of its predecessors.

The game's story focuses on DOATEC's attempt to create the ultimate human weapon through their Omega Project by capturing and transforming the Mugen Tenshin Ninja Clan's Hajin Mon leader, Genra, into an evil superhuman called Omega. The ninjas enter the third Dead or Alive tournament to defeat Omega.

Dead or Alive 3 was critically acclaimed and a commercial success upon release, selling over 1 million units worldwide in the first five months after its release,[1] and went on to sell over 2 million units,[2][3] becoming the best selling game in the franchise and one of the top 10 best selling Xbox games. The game won several awards and was nominated for many others. The European and Japanese versions were released months later, featuring additional content and gameplay updates that are not featured in the North American version. Dead or Alive 3 later became backwards compatible on Xbox 360. In 2021, all versions of Dead or Alive 3 were made available to download from Xbox Live worldwide, and were later made backward compatible on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S.[4] Dead or Alive 3 was followed by Dead or Alive Ultimate in 2004 and then its sequel Dead or Alive 4 in 2005.


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  1. ^ Varanini, Giancarlo (May 6, 2002). "Dead or Alive 3 reaches 1 million". GameSpot. Archived from the original on May 31, 2002. Retrieved October 19, 2021.
  2. ^ Romano, Sal (January 17, 2021). "Dead or Alive and modern Ninja Gaiden creator Tomonobu Itagaki establishes Itagaki Games [Update]". Gematsu. Archived from the original on January 17, 2021.
  3. ^ Itagaki, Tomonobu (January 16, 2021). "Full Tomonobu Itagaki 2021 Bloomberg Interview (shared via Facebook)". Facebook. Archived from the original on January 18, 2021.
  4. ^ "Microsoft's Xbox backward compatibility program returns with 76 new games". The Verge. 15 November 2021. Retrieved 2021-11-24.