Phase 4

Phase 4 is a clone of Kasumi created by MIST for the Kasumi Alpha Phase 4 project. She made her first playable appearance in a 2014 update of Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate Arcade.

History
Phase 4 is a product of Victor Donovan's Project Alpha. She is a prototype of the final model, ordered to fight as a test before mass production.

In the prologue of the story mode at the ruined battlefield, Phase 4 attacked Bayman and his soldiers at blinding speed. However, she hesitated to kill them, then she starts tearing up and disappears, leaving Bayman alive with two vicious scars on his torso and face.

Appearance

 * See also: Phase 4's costumes

Physically she looks exactly like Kasumi (aside from seemingly having her hair and eyes appear as if a half shade darker, than the original Kasumi; this can be observed with any costume esposing her head at least on some video settings in PC version) but is draped in a black cloak. She always keeps her face hidden by her hood. Whenever using her powers she is surrounded by black and greenish aura.

Aside from her cloak, she also wears ninja jumpsuits, much like Kasumi Alpha wore before she became Alpha-152. But unlike Alpha, she wears fishnet shirts underneath, much like Ayane, instead of wearing the full black skin-tight shirts from older installments. Her other outfits make her look like Kasumi, but she wears darker, more moody colors than her, favoring black, green, and other less bright colors. Her clothes are quite simple and modest, and she currently doesn't have many overtly feminine outfits, preferring kunoichi jumpsuits and pants over skirts and dresses.

To avoid creating confusion, alternate colors or extra accessories are added or removed from Phase 4, so the player can tell the difference, since they look exactly alike. While Kasumi's default hairstyle is a ponytail tied up with a yellow ribbon, Phase 4 wears her hair loose by default. She can wear the ponytail or braid in combat, but she can't wear Kasumi's new blue ribbon ponytail.

In certain DLCs she is given new outfit exclusive hairstyles and colors; She has worn her loose hair white, black, and even blonde in her Senran Kagura, Gust, and Schoolgirl Strikers DLC, as well as reddish pink in her ponytail with a new bow in her Fairy Tail DLC. She also wears her hair in a covered Chinese chignon bun in her Mandarin DLC dress, and wears her loose hair in low front pigtails in her Falcom DLC.

Personality
Despite almost killing people, including Bayman, unlike other Kasumi clones, Phase 4 has her own free mind and possesses feelings of her own as a human being, an explanation as to why she hesitates to kill people and wants to live as a normal person. If one looks closely, she acts like an earlier Kasumi; she doesn't wish to fight, is soft-spoken, and overall has a more sad personality. She doesn't smile very often, and her intros and winposes are quiet and short. Her killing Bayman's soldiers and scarring him while showing remorse afterwards is quite reminiscent to how Kasumi was forced to kill and fight ninjas of her own clan while on the run to survive.

While Phase 4 has her own free mind, she does not, unfortunately, have her own free will, as MIST went through extensive testing procedures to ensure that she does not go beyond her programming. Phase 4 knows this, and it adds to her inner turmoil.

She appears to carry herself with a more masculine tone than Kasumi, as she lacks the graceful, beautiful movements and teleports of the true Kasumi, instead opting for more aggressive type attacks such as rapid kicks. She also warns her opponent that she doesn't want to hurt them, but that she will, and upon winning, she harshly tells them to stay out of her way. She sometimes will question her reason for fighting, asking if it's her sole reason to live.

Etymology
Her name is a reference to being the final stage of Kasumi α Clone distribution. As a clone of Kasumi she's in an indeterminate state just like the original, not knowing if she'll ever be free, or will exist forever as Donovan's ultimate weapon.

Bayman
She attacked Bayman and his soldiers, but not out of malice, only due to being ordered to do so. Even then, she spared him and warned him to stay away.

Kasumi
Although it isn't clear if they've met, Kasumi and Phase 4 do share a Tag Battle intro and outro, where they teleport in together, and upon beating the enemy, states in unison with Kasumi that their actions are Mugen Tenshin.

Gameplay

 * See also: Phase 4's command lists

Phase 4's gameplay is somewhat similar to Kasumi's, with her possessing many of the same moves, but with some alterations and a lot of reductions. However, this unusually serves to make her far less straightforward to use than the original Kasumi. She is heavily teleport dependent, meaning that she will often dart about the stage in a similar fashion to her progenitor, but Phase 4 has more moves to teleport cancel out of and more follow-up attacks from her teleports. Proper use of her unique moves allows her to juggle enemies for longer and construct longer and more damaging combos than the original Kasumi. However, her reduced number of combos relative to Kasumi makes for a weaker mix-up game, as well as making her much less of a pressure character, and she is thus reliant on her tricky teleport moves both to inflict damage and keep opponents on the defensive.

Her teleport moves take some getting used to; while she has several moves that can lead into a teleport attack, most of them require you teleport as soon as the first strike hits, and the opponent can't be blocking. The time-frame that the teleport can be done in is extremely strict. One mistake can ruin the entire combo, and while double-tapping the teleport button can help, it takes up time for the other attack commands. One suggestion is to use the audio cue of the first strike landing, but this can still take a lot of practice. As a result, she's one of the most difficult characters in the game to learn, definitely not suited for beginners, and while intermediates can pull off shorter combos and still get by, experts will most likely get the most out of her.

She can also use an air-throw, and can backflip, but her backflips can't lead into any wall-attacks like the real Kasumi. If a player has practiced with her, and overcome her disadvantages, she can prove to be quite difficult to defeat. Overall, she is a much riskier character than Kasumi, but potentially more powerful.

Dead or Alive 5 Last Round granted her the ability to teleport on block, but only with her Shunpu-Rensen kick. She also received a brand new "reset" throw from Kasumi (Senpu), which is a somewhat weak throw attack that leaves the opponent standing up but places you at an advantage.

Stats
The following are Phase 4's official stats as listed in the games.

Dead or Alive series

 * Dead or Alive 5 (5+) (non-playable, 2012-13)
 * Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate Arcade (playable, 2014)
 * Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate (playable DLC, 2014)
 * Dead or Alive 5 Last Round (playable, 2015)

Fighting quotes

 * Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate
 * Dead or Alive 5 Last Round

Music themes
The following are the music themes used for Phase 4 throughout the series.

Trivia

 * Phase 4 is the third playable Kasumi clone, following Kasumi α (later Alpha-152) and False Kasumi.
 * Her voice actresses are the same as Kasumi's, but the voice-overs are modified into a slightly lower pitch. She also uses old voice clips from Dead or Alive 2 Ultimate, as well as Kasumi's KO scream from Dimensions for the Japanese voice-over.
 * Some of Phase 4's alternate costumes were previously owned by Kasumi α. This seems fitting since she is also a clone of Kasumi.
 * If one looks closely, Phase 4 is noted to have longer, thicker eyelashes than Kasumi does, possibly as a way to further differentiate the two.
 * Originally in her debut, she did not have any tag interactions and did not speak when called in which could've been intentional. She also had the same tag out win pose as Kasumi, bar her leg being somewhat adjusted and she would briefly pause and remain still before resuming her idle win stance. In Last Round, she now speaks when tagged in using lower pitched voice clips from Kasumi, and she now uses her own win pose when the player wins but she is not the one who was actively tagged in. She also now shares tag throws with Kasumi and Alpha-152.
 * Phase 4 is the only non-guest female fighter besides Alpha-152 to not get her own PlayStation theme. Consequentially, because she doesn't appear in the voting page, she is currently the only character to not be given the chance to appear at all in Dead or Alive Xtreme 3, due to being Kasumi's clone.
 * Phase 4's Power Blow is sometimes compared to Chun-Li from Street Fighter's famous kicks, Hyakuretsukyaku.