It's a fact that very few people remember, or have even heard of the Neo-Geo title Gowcaiser. Released by Technos, the title was a spiritual predecessor to Tecmo's Dead or Alive series with its gratuitous amounts of fanservice. Oh yes... the game also had some sort of a plot, but that wasn't overly important. Even so, it seems that somebody thought it would be a good idea to make the title into an OVA series to bleed the title further. The result is a nonsensical mess of a story that will leave viewers lowering their heads in shame.

Being based on a fighting game, the creative staff was likely stuck with the task of making EVERY storyline for the game's characters fit into the film (a la Street Fighter II). Unfortunately, while this could work on paper, it is an absolute disaster in motion. The many storylines fail to have any development or even any background. Therefore, viewers are often left confused, and completely unaware of what is happening. The entirety of the series feel sloppy overall, with many questions that never get answered. Sadly, it seems as if the entire feature just degrades into alternating pieces of fanservice and action, while the story itself remains as shallow as ever. If anything, this film continues to prove the time-tested adage: fighting games just do not translate well into anime.

In the future, all women will be required to wear as little as humanly possible.	The male roles serve mostly as fanservice for rabid fangirls.

While the plot is far from good, the character designs tend to hit the other end of the spectrum. The characters themselves are quite stylish, if not a bit predictable. Many of the characters seem as though they would seem at home in a fighting game... most notably Tomonobu Itagaki's monstrosity, Dead or Alive 3. The males are all delicate-looking pretty boys, yet they are not all musclebound hulks at the same time. The male characters range from Isato Caizer, a musclebound martial artist, to Kyosuke - a leaner, yet more intense character. The females are all very well-endowed. In fact, one character in particular seems to hold more saline than the Pacific Ocean in her massive chest. Many of the costumes are quite elaborate, which is especially apparent on Isato's battle armor, or Shaia's ...erm, straps. The character designer has done a wonderful job of bringing the digital fighters of Gowcaizer to life on the celluloid screen, with costumes that are almost perfectly converted from the original game and manual artwork.

To accentuate the sharp character designs, fluid animation keeps the visual end's higher standard from being tarnished. However, it seems that the action scenes, and the female characters' breasts, received the most attention. The action scenes are very lavish, with a quick pace and beautiful animation. Out of battle, the series seems to have the standard OVA quality set for animation. Everything is clean and fluid, with little choppiness.

Sadly, the music left quite a bit of room for improvement. Much of the film's soundtrack sounds as if it were ripped from a cheap arcade ROM as it relies heavily on synthesizer beats and MIDI tunes over actual instruments. When compared to the higher-quality opening and closing theme songs, the background music seems rudimentary. However, given the atmosphere of the show, the music is somewhat fitting, if not very disappointing.

Central Park Media spared no expense in giving Gowcaizer a decent DVD release. The transfer is clean with no defects, and the sound is clear on both tracks. For extras, there are the now-standard Trailer and Art Gallery. Also making the extras list are the Japanese promotional clip, and a "music video." Oddly enough, the term "music video" does not seem exactly fitting for the piece, as it seems to be more of an extended advertisement than anything else.

If anything, Gowcaizer serves as the perfect example of why fighting games should not be made into anime. This jumbled mess of a series will seem like a waste of time to all but the most die-hard fans of the video game.

Distributor: Central Park Media
Creator: GAGA Communications/Urban Plant, Ltd.
Released: 2002

Plot: D+
Character Design: B-
Animation Quality: A-
Music: C
Overall: C-