Hey, there everyone. It’s me monster and I’m back with another game review, finally!

This time it’s for Dragon Ball Z: Budokai for the Playstation 2.

Now, as many of you know. I am a huge dragon ball fan. And, I hold the series very close to my heart. Now to celebrate the new movie that came out, I am going to review the game, that is the first in a golden age of dragon ball games.

Since dragon ball has so many games, it can be hard to keep up, heck there is a new dragon ball game coming out next month.

But… when it comes to dragon ball games, I like to go to the PS2 era.. Dragon ball Z budokai tenkaichi 3, budokai 3.. And of course this game.

Let’s dive right in to this review!

Story: 10/10 Pretty much perfect

You could say that I am biased, since this follows the first 3 sagas of dragon ball, but I disagree.

Dragon ball’s story is just very well played out, It’s atmosphere is great, and the characters are very well thought out.

Now, not only does it use Dragon Ball Z’s story, it also has an amazing story mode.

Key parts of the series are recreated with the in-game engine, and they look great.  Very much like what you would see in the show, Not the manga, though.

If you didn’t know..

Dragon Ball Z is a sequel to Dragon Ball, it is about an alien warrior fighting against universal tyrants, and androids.

Goku, the alien warrior at the beginning finds out in fact that he is an alien, and now he is asked by his alien brother who just arrived on earth for Goku to Join Raditz his team so that they can conquer planets together. We later find out that this was in-fact for Frieza, an evil tyrant that had long ago destroyed planet vegeta, The planet that goku and raditz came from with nearly everyone on it.

Raditz has 2 comrades, Nappa and Vegeta, Vegeta is the prince of all saiyans.

Goku, refuses to kill innocent people so he and Goku’s rival Piccolo have to team up to defeat raditz, who had just kidnapped Gohan – Son of Goku.

Now, they have a fight, and they go to namek to fight the evil tyrant frieza, and much more that I won’t spoil.

The story is awesome, and the game mode is perfect, a 10/10

Gameplay 6/10

That’s a pretty harsh score, however..

This is still a fighting game, and I have to judge it like that.

The problem with this game is how you pull of normal energy attacks like a Kamehameha. You have to hit the air a few times before you can even throw one, which really sucks.

The game is fun to an extent, and I did beat the game without any real ‘’I want to play something else’’.

However, unlike other dragon ball Z games I didn’t find myself in versus mode  a lot, I would play a fight from time to time, but really when I beat the story mod I rarely came back to it, now that could be because there are better dragon ball games around now, but still.

The characters do play differently which is very good, they all feel differently.

I think that the main problem with this game is, that if you take the DBZ license and put something about robots, this is just a very basic fighting game.

There isn’t something unique about the gameplay, now the controls are not bad. They respond good and I have not had any problems, but this game does not stand out like other dragon ball games.

It tries to capture the show in its gameplay, and it does a fairly OK job.

The gameplay is entertaining for what it is, but don’t look for very in-depth combo’s in this game. 6/10

Depth 8/10

So, I have to look at this for a fighting game, and for a fighting game, there is a lot to do!

You have the story mode, which is pretty long, it covers the saiyan, frieza and android sagas.

There are also some funny what if’s, which includes our favourite world champion Hercule Satan, Just to name one.

But, this game is best enjoyed in the versus mode with your friends. There are a lot of characters, they play differently, however some characters feel similar, maybe too similar. The heavy fighters play similar to other heavy fighers, and small fighters play similar to small fighters.

This could turn some people off, but it’s really not that bad.

You also have the world tournament mode, a mode where you choose your character and try to win the tournament, you can win Zeni and you can buy capsules with the Zeni, which is this game’s currency

The Hercule Satan mode is a mode which is kind of like an arcade mode for the game, you can unlock it through capsules.

Capsules are this game’s item equipment, you can unlock capsules by playing the story mode and using the before mentioned Zeni. You can put them on your favourite character to play as, and fight against your friend’s custom character.

That makes this game a lot of fun, and adds to the depth. It’s very enjoyable to experiment with capsules on different characters, and really make them your own.

Overall the capsule system is a big addition and is a lot of fun, and helps this game get an 8 in depth.

Graphics 8/10

The graphics in this game are definitely great for somewhat of an early game on the system.

It recreates the show very well, however I do feel that the stages could have been more detailed. They look a little bland, however the character models look great, they feel and move like their anime counterparts. They did get the colour of the Kamehameha wrong, though.

The blasts look really awesome and ripped right from the show it seems like, apart from the colours, of course.

The cut-scenes like I said, use the in-game engine. And, boy is it great. Animation is smooth, lip syncing is good, (with the Japanese dub, anyway) and recreates scenes from the anime perfectly and flawlessly.

The fights look great and are pretty fast-paced too, I have never had any problems with slow-down and such.

The characters are highly detailed and work like they should.

Overall there is not a lot to talk about when it comes to graphics, everything that can be said is: It looks great.

Difficulty 6/10

This game can definitely get difficult. The story mode starts out fairly easy. But it gets very difficulty near the end in the android saga.

The controls are not the cause of any of these problems, which is great. The controls are extremely responsive, and are not bad in any way. Even with the few combo’s the ones that are here are easy to pull off.

A thing that I stress a lot in my reviews, is that fairness in difficulty is extremely, extremely important.

The Computer-controlled opponents are very strong.

Overall: Again not a lot to talk about, this game is definitely challenging but it’s a lot of fun to go through.

Sound: 9/10 An epic soundtrack

This game has a great soundtrack, it might not be very similar to the Japanese or American, or hell even Canadian soundtracks, it’s still very good.

The composer here is Kenji Yamamoto. It can be fast-paced, happy or even scary. Everything that is here is great.

Now, of-course I will have to mention that some of this soundtrack is actually plagiarized, I listened to it and didn’t find too many similarities, but I do see why people would be upset.

A result of this, is that on the HD remake on the Xbox 360, and the playstation 3, all of the soundtrack was replaced for other dragon ball Z video game music.

The use of instruments is very well done.

I especially like the song ‘’Military March’’ Everything is done perfectly here

I am not an expert in music, so I won’t be able to comment on any of the bass or stuff like that.

Overall: overall the soundtrack is fantastic, despite claims of plagiarism.

Addictiveness: 7/10

Despite this game’s gameplay, It was surprisingly addicting.

Maybe it was because I love dragon ball, and wanted to see how they recreated the scenes of the anime.

But, the thing is. I got this game in 2009 or even earlier, and I still come back to it.

I always love playing the story mode, and there are also periods that I just customize my custom character, which these days is Android 19.

The controls are also definitely great and helps the addictiveness.

Playing the versus mode with your friends can be extremely addicting and fun. However, the big thing is that you have 3 superior sequels. Dragon ball Z budokai 2,3 and infinite world. However, if you want to collect all budokai games, this one is  definitely worth playing.

Overall: This game is surprisingly addicting, it makes me come back time and time again.

Memories 9/10

Yes, I have a memories section in my reviews, cool right? At least, that’s what I hope.

I have a memory for pretty much every dragon ball game on the PS2, Except Dragon Ball Z sagas

I was in the city and I was just about to go home, however I really wanted to go to a game shop.

I went to the gameshop, and there it was… Dragon Ball Z budokai 1..  I had never really seen it, and I bought it.

I really loved the game and played it a lot, I was never able to unlock all the characters until last year, though.

OVERALL: 7/10

This game is not a perfect fighter, but it’s a fun game non-the less. It’s especially great for dragon ball fans. It has an amazing story mode, with great cut-scenes.

The controls are good, the soundtrack is impressive, and overall it’s a fun game



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