Tenkaichi Needs Work
The in game transformations, which were in previous budokai games, have been removed completely. No longer the intense feeling of trying to charge up your Ki high enough to reach SSJ 4 before your enemy attacks, no more transformations to give you a little edge over your opponent and no more realism …. to the TV show (Goku and Vegeta can remain in SSJ4 forever, even though their Ki is low).
What I found was really irritating and “stupid”, were the separate fusion characters in this game. Fused characters were always seen (in previous budokai’s) as the most powerful characters that did massive damage and only lasted for short periods. In Tenkaichi the fused characters maintain their state throughout the entire battle and never transform back into the normal characters.
The Oozaru (Great Ape) character is also another disappointment in this title. I was expecting to see a character that would practically fill the screen and resemble the one from the TV series; instead the “mighty” Oozaru has been reduced to a character that’s only 4 times the size of the average character. I also thought that Spike was a little lazy with this character, every DBZ fan knows that a Saiyan can’t change into this form without the full moon or some sort of light that simulates it. The developers didn’t even think about applying this element to the game, maybe a technique that must first be performed before transforming into this form (oh sorry, no in game transformation).
Another irritation of the game is the control system. The dashing system still needs some work (the character goes were ever it wants to go), the blocking system is terrible and dodging normal and special attacks has become a difficult task. Blocking a combo and dodging special attacks are nearly impossible. The system of Budokai 3 was simple; if you had enough Ki you could dodge an attack, nice and simple. The player now has to time precisely when the attack will hit them, just to step a few centimetres to the side.
Spike put no effort when trying to upgrade characters in this title, sure they added more attributes like “speed” and “favourite techniques” but all what they did was put in items that would push up abilities to 3 or 6 points. They didn’t use a level cap, like in Budokai 3, where you upgraded the character the way that you liked (high strength, low ki, high defence etc.).
Also the fighting area is not as huge as the developers promised, you would think that they added this new free flight system so that you could fight over enormous areas like from the Cell Ring to the Rocky Mountains or from the Rocky Mountains to the Red Ribbon Army Base. They provide a small area with a few obstacles where you could hardly hide away from your enemy and the water areas …….. pointless. Characters can breathe forever underwater, you CAN’T HIDE in the water (like in the TV series) and there is no slow down with combat when in the water. This was put in to make the game look more ….. pretty.
Hopefully, if another budokai is made in the future, they will improve the combat system, area sizes and put in 90 SEPARATE characters instead of different transformed states. I also pray that Dimps continues with the series because budokai 3 used a simple system that made sense and worked properly.
The game is still enjoyable even with all of its faults, but those of you, who have DBZ Budokai 3, keep it, hold it, love it.