Impressive
I was incredibly reluctant about purchasing this game, a big factor being that Gamespot gave it a pretty terrible review and I didn’t want to sift through a million reviews weeding out the extreme DBZ fan boys who love everything bearing the name, and those that hate DBZ so much they just write “it sucks” a billion times in a single review. Seeing as its really the only fighting game for the Wii right now, and the character roster is larger than any other fighting game ever created, I pretty much told myself, whatever, I’ll just get it.
And I have not been disappointed. Fighting games are the games I enjoy the most, so my standards for what fighting games are good is fairly high. At first when I started to play the controls were a bit odd and I didn’t really grasp the concept of blocking and countering all that well, and at times when I would try to rush in I would accidentally try to grab leaving me vulnerable, and then inevitably getting beat up. Also in this game you fight with the camera behind your character instead of a standard side view. This is actually implemented extremely well.
After a few minutes in training and getting accustomed to all the moves and how the control scheme worked I figured I was ready to undertake the adventure portion of the game. The adventure mode is enormous. You fight various opponents and watch as the story unfolds. Now, if you have never watched the series, it’s not really a big deal; but, the way the game progresses, it will feel pretty flaccid and sped along. This is mainly due to how much information and content they cram into the adventure campaign. If you have watched the series you will find the story set at a nice pace, considering you can fill in the small gaps by yourself. The character roster is just incredible. If you like variety in your fighting games, this game is for you. There are over 120 characters to choose from, so it will take a while to get sick of all of them.
The stages are sweet, you have complete control over where you can go and everything is pretty much destructible. It’s quite a bit of fun smashing your opponents through cars and mountain sides and then busting a special attack as they lay on the ground. Also some of the stages are fairly lack luster, but then some of the other stages are insanely cool, so it’s kind of hit and miss, but all in all the stages are very well done. The animations are great, but at times can get repetitive. When you completely destroy a battle field using an ultimate attack, it shows a really bland scene of a portion of the planet exploding. But other than that everything is pretty awesome.
The music is OK, it’s a little boring or out-of-place at times. It’s definitely one of the weaker aspects of the game.
The graphics of the game are great, they are cell shaded, and contain quite a bit of detail. All the character models look great. There are many different modes in the game to keep you occupied for a while, tournament mode being my personal favorite. This game also contains RPG elements, much like the ones found in DBZ: B3.
You gain items (Z Items) which you can equip to make your character stronger. These items also gain experience and when they level they increase the ability of the item. You can also fuse items together to unlock hidden characters, more powerful items, and other things. In conclusion, there is almost more content that I can really write about. The game has a deep fighting system without being overly complicated. It is marred by a few flaws, but not enough for me to tell someone not to buy this game. Even if you hate DBZ, but enjoy fighting games, you will find your moneys worth. A few things I whish they would have added:
Fighting online
Instead of digitally animated cut scenes, they should have put in original scenes from the show. A few of the stages could have had more detail.