Leifang

From Infogalactic: the planetary knowledge core
Jump to: navigation, search
Leifang
Dead or Alive character
Leifang.jpg
Lei Fang in Dead or Alive 4
First game Dead or Alive (1996)
Created by Tomonobu Itagaki
Voiced by (English) Zinnia Su (DOAX2—DOAD)[1]
Cassandra Morris (DOA5)[2]
Voiced by (Japanese) Yumi Tōma[3]
Portrayed by Ying Wang (film)[4]
Fictional profile
Nationality Chinese
Fighting style T'ai chi ch'uan
Occupation College student

Leifang (Japanese: レイファン Hepburn: Reifan?), (born April 23; year unknown), often (and originally) written as Lei Fang, is a player character in the Dead or Alive fighting game series by Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo. She was introduced in the original Dead or Alive in 1996 and has appeared in the series' subsequent installments. She is a Chinese college student and martial artist who competes in the Dead or Alive tournaments to prove her superiority over fellow combatant Jann Lee. One of the Dead or Alive series' more popular characters, Leifang has appeared on series merchandise and the feature film DOA: Dead or Alive. She has received mainly positive public and critical reception for factors such as her sex appeal and in-game costumes.

Appearances

Leifang is a nineteen-year-old college student[5][note 1] born into a wealthy family. In the storyline of the original game, she is saved from a gang of street fighters by martial artist Jann Lee.[6] Rather than being thankful, she is instead obsessed over defeating Jann Lee in battle, as she is bitter over his intervention because she believes she was capable at the time of saving herself.[7] However, she loses to him in subsequent DOA tournaments except that of the 2005 fourth game.

She is depicted in the games as a personable woman of justice and bearing an independent spirit, and hopes that by honing her own martial arts skills, she can inspire others to do the same. Her youth and general life inexperience sometimes causes her to act impulsively.[note 2] Leifang has a close friend in karate master Hitomi, and since Dead or Alive 2 (1999), she has formed a friendly rivalry with wrestler Tina Armstrong, who believes that the meaning of power comes from physical strength.

Stuntwoman Ying Wang played Leifang in a minor role in the 2006 live-action film DOA: Dead or Alive. The character makes several appearances at the beginning of the film, until she is knocked out by Gen Fu.

Design and gameplay

Leifang is known for her signature queue hairstyle,[8] and has sported a variety of other hairstyles through her series appearances. Her Japanese voice actress is Yumi Tōma, who voiced Ling Xiaoyu from the Tekken series. Computer and Video Games likened Leifang to a kung fu movie actress while comparing her to Virtua Fighter character Pai Chan.[9]

Saturn Power judged Leifang as one of the first game's better characters due to her "great counters and lightning speed".[10] According to IGN.com's Hillary Goldstein, Leifang "has some of the best counters in DOA Ultimate, which helps since she isn't exactly a master of combos."[11] She was vastly improved by the developers for Dead or Alive 5, for which she was given a more advanced ability to parry opponents' attacks.[12] According to Anthony Chau of IGN, "Her elegant moves hide powerful attacks and while she's not the greatest in combination department, she's never been a combo-intensive character like Zack or Kasumi. Lei Fang's strength lies in ... high-priority moves and proficiency in countering."[13]

Merchandise and promotion

Several figures of the character were released by Bandai, Epoch, and other companies,[14] such as After Dark and Kotobukiya.[15][16] Other merchandise included dakimakura body pillow cases[17] and 3D mouse pads.[18] Dead or Alive developer Koei Tecmo offered Leifang as a free playable character in Dead or Alive 5 Last Round to Japanese customers from August to September 2015, in celebration of the game reaching four million downloads.[19] Leifang's wardrobe in Last Round included downloadable costumes of Telma from Koei Tecmo's Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess,[20] Estelle Bright from Nihon Falcom's The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel,[21] Hotaru Sakamiya from Square Enix's School Girl Strikers,[22] and Junko from Tatsunoko's Time Bokan.[23]

Reception

<templatestyles src="Template:Quote_box/styles.css" />

One of the original DOA girls, Lei Fang is the face of the Dead or Alive series, with the most recognizable braided pigtails in all of video gaming. We love Lei Fang because she dresses with some elegance, but also because counters are easily the most visually impressive attacks in DOAU and Lei Fang can deliver them time and time again.

—IGN in 2004[11]

The character has received mainly positive reception by gaming media. Dreamcast Magazine described Leifang as "a Chinese beauty in all senses of the word...as well as proving to be a bit of a femme fatale at the same time", while she was "an elegant fighter if ever there was one."[24] Computer and Video Games and Sega Saturn Magazine both compared Leifang to Pai Chan,[9][25] with the latter also holding her, Tina and Kasumi in the same class as Lara Croft.[25] Saturn Power opined that while most of "the DOA competitors seem either insipid or a mite too similar to Virtua Fighter stalwarts for comfort ... Lei-Fang and Jann Lee are okay."[10] Kotaku's Brian Ashcraft called her "everyone's favorite supreme ultimate fist college student."[26] Leifang was voted the Dead or Alive series' ninth-most popular female character in a fan poll held by Koei Tecmo in 2014 and 2015.[27][28]

GameDaily featured the "beautiful yet deadly" Leifang as their "Babe of the Week" on multiple occasions, and as one of their "bikini babes".[29][30] Leifang joined fellow DOA characters Kasumi, Ayane, and Hitomi in a four-way tie for tenth on the Spanish edition of IGN's 2011 selection of "video game hotties".[31] Maxim chose her as one of the top nine "video game vixens" in 2009.[32] China's NetEase included her among the 21 "game goddesses" in 2012.[33] In their 2013 selection of the "greatest boobs in gaming history", GameFront ranked Leifang thirteenth.[34] Steve Jenkins of CheatCodes.com ranked her as the 16th hottest "video game girl" of all time thst same year.[35] In 2015, Indonesian television Liputan 6 placed Leifang fifth on their list of sexiest Oriental women in video games,[36] while Vietnamese daily Thanh Niên ranked her as the 16th most sexy female video game character in general.[37] In "Xbox High Yearbook 2003", Official Xbox Magazine chose Leifang and Hitomi as a couple "most likely to have a 'college experience'."[38] Complex rated her Dead or Alive: Dimensions victory quote ("No matter how much you try, you still won't beat me") among their 2012 selection of a hundred "most humiliating" video game quotes.[39]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ The character was officially aged nineteen prior to the two-year timeline skip in 2012's Dead or Alive 5.
  2. ↑ This is particularly evident in Dead or Alive 4, where she fights with her friend Hitomi over a simple cabbage and kicks an elderly man off a train after he accidentally grabs her breasts.

References

  1. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ "Alive & Heaving". Dreamcast Magazine issue 5, page 39.
  25. ↑ 25.0 25.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  26. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  27. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  28. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  29. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  30. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  31. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  32. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  33. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  34. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  35. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  36. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  37. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  38. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  39. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

Retrieved from "https://infogalactic.com/w/index.php?title=Leifang&oldid=725990687"