This thread makes me sad. How can anyone defend DOA4 againt VF5?
The DOA4 engine is just an upgraded version of the DOAU engine, with better (excellent even) textures, very big levels, but still the same horrible horrible lighting and barely better shadowing. On the build that was demoed last week the ring level was buggy and wouldn't show up, but it was still playable, a completely black background with 2 characters fighting on it. That's because the level itself and the characters are two separate things in the game engine, and that's just wrong.
Obviously VF5 has a brand new engine with everything you'd expect from a next gen title, self shadowing, rim lighting, HDR (not sure?). The characters don't look just pasted on the level, but they seem to be right there and just blend perfectly with everything else. On the few direct feed we have seen the texturing and some of the level modeling seemed weaker than DOA4's, but for me VF5 is just much better thanks to the lighting/shadowing.