Originally published March 2018

In my adolescence, I was a fan of many dorky entertainment sources and icons such as Godzilla, comic-book superheroes, and plenty of others that I've already mentioned on this site numerous times. One source of entertainment for which I had a misguided youthful affinity I haven't discussed much is anime. I overcame my anime affliction some years ago and left that world behind me—though, I still have friends trying to pull me back in. But, like many former anime fans, I remember the gateway drug that brought me into that seedy underground world. I remember the show that introduced me to the new styles of animation and the bizarre Japanese tropes that would be recycled tirelessly from show to show. I remember hovering my finger over the record button on my VCR to record specific episodes and moments of my favorite afternoon and nighttime action show: Dragon Ball Z. I also remember pining for a decent video game that represented the show. At last, we finally have Dragon Ball FighterZ.

A lengthy segue into the subject of the article, I know, but I wanted to preface my review with a quick background and give those who care an idea of what biases I might have. I was a huge fan of Dragon Ball Z once it came to Toonami on Cartoon Network and frequently watched it after school. I've seen every episode from the original Saiyan saga, through the Frieza saga, to the end of the Cell saga, and a majority of the movies in between. By the time the Buu saga finally aired on US afternoon television, I had started to grow out of the series a bit and was on to newer (worse) anime, though I still watched a majority of it.

Naturally, being as big a fan as I was, I wanted to play some fighting games that accurately represented the show. They had to be fighting games because the whole show was about superhero martial arts; I didn't want to play some dumb Dragon Ball RPG. However, the games that I could find at the time—and the list was short—were all terrible. It was reminiscent of how my fandom for Godzilla was repaid, as there were no good Godzilla games. Eventually, the DBZ Budokai and Tenkaichi series of 3D fighters came out for the PS2, which were acceptable and provided their own level of fun. Yet, they were mostly likable just because they were the best that was available, not because they were actually any good.

Now, with Dragon Ball Z making a resurgence in the public sphere due to the success of Dragon Ball Z Kai and Super, there's been a desire for a fighting game that captures the intense, wild, and colorful action of the highly influential series, without all the superfluous nonsense it was known for. Keep waiting for a game that doesn't include some of the terrible anime tropes, but for now, Dragon Ball FighterZ might be the game you're looking for.

The Short of It

What I've Played

Tons of time in training mode; 99% of sample combos completed
5+ hours of online multiplayer
15+ hours in single-player modes: arcade & story
1 Arc of story mode completed

Pros

Look and art of the game are straight out of the show in high-definition and striking colors
Special moves are super dramatic and over-the-top like the show
A majority of the characters have the same English and Japanese voice actors from the show
Many referential Easter eggs hidden within the game that will make true fans of the series excited
Fighting is fast and chaotic, but chaos that you can get used to a lot faster than other fighting games
Auto-combo mechanics add a new layer of skill that's given a new perspective on fighting game design
Moments in the story mode are entertaining with character interactions

Cons

A rather small roster of characters for a Dragon Ball Z game, with some glaring omissions
The required lobby system is terrible
Menus leave a lot to be desired
The story mode is an arduous and tedious affair
Not much single-player content of value, especially for an Arc game
Unlocking the hidden characters is a huge chore
Tutorials do a poor job of telling you about the systems in place and what potential combos you can do

The Rest of It

While I think this game is pretty good, that's quite a list of cons, with some more negatively impactful than you might expect. Dragon Ball FighterZ can be quite fun and frantic, but you have to be willing to do some lab work and willing to put up with some poor design choices.

DB-Fighterz-Screenshot-2018-02-24-19-26-08-1024x576.png — Image: Bandai Namco

Story

If there is one consistent criticism I've heard about this game, it's that the story mode is trash. Having spent a significant amount of time with it, I tend to agree. I actually haven't finished the story at the time of this review, but I've seen enough to know where I'll stand when it's all over. My opinions of it won't change even if there is some big revelation at the end for a few simple reasons. The main one is that I don't actually have a problem with the story they're telling, I just don't like how they're doing it.

Don't get me wrong, this story is dummmmmmb, like most fighting game storylines and most DBZ storylines. To expect anything better would be delirious, at best—they can't all be NetherRealm fighting games with good story modes. It is, at the very least, successful at delivering some satisfying fan service. In fact, it definitely feels like a fan-fiction story crafted together by DBZ fans who wanted to see what it would be like to put the same characters in different scenarios. If you have no affection for the show, then I would wholeheartedly recommend that you stay away from the story mode. Unfortunately, that also means you won't be able to unlock the extra character on your roster without spending some extra money or spending an excessive amount of time unlocking her in some way I haven't discovered yet.

What is the plot? Essentially, a new evil android has created hundreds of clones of the heroes and villains of the Dragon Ball Z universe and scattered them across the world so that she may slowly grow in power to consume all of the Dragon Ball fighters. In addition, there are these mysterious energy waves that have debilitated all the powerful heroes, rendering them immobilized and unconscious. While you may be expecting to play as Goku, the show's primary protagonist, you instead play as this mysterious fourth-wall-breaking "soul" who links with the bodies of the heroes and controls them during a fight. I guess this is to allow the characters to speak directly to the player of the game, though, I'm not sure what the point is of having this second-person storytelling perspective. You quickly learn that it's up to the player's soul to link with the fighters to control them so they can beat the clones. Since there is only one soul to go around, and since everyone is too weak to fight without your soul, they need to tag in and out of a match.

Convoluted much? I'd say so. The game made the mistake of trying to explain in its story why it's a tag-battle fighting game and why a character as weak as Krillin would ever have a chance fighting against Goku. The first Injustice did the same thing with how it tried to explain why the Joker could fight Superman with some mystery "happy pill" to make him indestructible. Whatever explanation you could come up with for how the characters of this fiction—from regular humans, like Yamcha, to actual gods, like Beerus—come together to fight in your fighting game is always going to be dumber than just ignoring it and moving on.

When you get past the dumb premise and setup, the story itself is...still pretty dumb and lame, because it's just about the team trying to stop the new android from becoming too powerful. However, there is some satisfaction to be found for those who know the characters and the lore of the DBZ universe. By sticking different fighters in your tag team before a fight, you'll get special interactions between those characters. Again, if you have no affinity for the series, this will likely do nothing for you. But if you do, then some of this stuff can be pretty entertaining. There are even moments that made me laugh out loud that I would have missed without the right combination of team members.

Image: Bandai Namco | Check her ID first

It's a shame then that the story mode is so tedious and lame to get to those moments. To drag it out as long as possible, the process of completing the story involves traveling around a map and selecting locations to visit for a fight. And what do you fight? The clones, of course. Dozens, upon dozens of mindless clones that barely put up a fight. Over and over again, and again, and again. Occasionally, you will fight one of the real villains and get some meaningful moment in the story, but then it's back to the map and back to the clones. This gives you plenty of opportunities to try out different team interactions, but it gets really old, really fast. It will not take long for you to dislike this mode for this reason alone, regardless of how much you like Dragon Ball Z. What's worse, the story mode does not autosave your progress. So, if you happen to leave it midway through, you may have to fight those hundreds of clones all over again just to get back to where you were. I spent at least 5 hours playing the story mode, blasting through it with ease, and yet I still only completed the first arc of three that make up the whole story. It's not fun, but I want that extra character…

Gameplay/Mechanics

First and foremost, Dragon Ball FighterZ is a tag battle game, similar to Marvel Vs Capcom. In fact, a lot of how the characters behave, the types of moves, the way tagging works, and even the button layout is somewhat reminiscent of Marvel Vs Capcom 3. So if you're familiar with that particular title, you'll probably have an easy time adjusting to this game. In fact, MVC3 is nearly a 1:1 comparison to Dragon Ball FighterZ with some of its other, more nuanced mechanics, such as X-factor (MVC) vs Sparking Blast (DBZ).

Rather than breaking down all the core mechanics of the tag-battle genre, I'd like to focus on what makes DBZ stand out. If you've never played a tag-battle game before, simply know that the purpose of the game is to eliminate the opposing team of three one by one and that you can use assists from other members of your team who are not currently on-screen to extend combos and super moves or to tag in and give other team members a chance to heal.

Button Layouts and Auto-Combos

Dragon Ball FighterZ is essentially a 6-button fighter with light, medium, heavy, and ki attacks being your primary face buttons and then the other two buttons reserved for the standby characters on the team. The light and medium attacks are what you would expect, while the heavy attacks serve multiple purposes. Most notably, the heavy attack button is the launcher. Connecting the heavy attack, under certain circumstances, sends the opponent flying through the air in a stunned state. This allows you to chase them through the air to follow up with aerial combos, superattacks, or other heavy strikes that send them back down to the ground.

The ki attack button is unique to Dragon Ball FighterZ. Since the TV show was all about fighting dudes with feet and fists while flying through the air and blasting fireballs at one another, a Dragon Ball fighting game demands the ability to shoot fire out of your hands at a moment's notice. If you ever played fighting games in the past and had trouble landing those Ryu fireballs, fear not, there's a dedicated button that you can mash to send barrages of fireballs at your opponent. If you know how to do the fireball motion, common in most fighting games, you'll be able to send more powerful ones in the direction of your opponent. These attacks are not typically the most powerful option, but they can be useful combo extenders and finishers, or useful methods of putting pressure on your opponent.

Now, even though these individual buttons all do something different, pressing different combinations of the buttons also has an action. Rather than spelling them all out in detail, I'll just list them:

Light + Medium = Dragon dash. This is basically a character throw. Your character dashes in, knocks the opponent into the air, and then your character chases in for a follow-up.
Light + Ki =Charge. Hold these buttons down to charge up your super meter.
Medium + Heavy = Vanish attack. A unique attack to Dragon Ball FighterZ. Your character disappears behind the opponent and strikes. Useful for extending combos and cross-up attacks. Uses 1 bar of super meter.
Ki + Heavy = Super dash. Your character glows and zips across the screen, automatically tracking the opponent. Can be used to chase characters into the air or start new air combos.
All four at once = Sparking Blast. Your character bursts with red electricity, sending the opponent flying into the air, which can be followed up by a combo. The burst creates a temporary buff to your character's offense and defense, alters the behavior of some moves, and heals damage for your character on-screen. The buffs and healing effects last longer when you have fewer people alive on your team.

It all seems like a lot to keep track of, but the game has some shortcuts to help. The first game I recall having an auto-combo system was another Arc System Works game: Persona 4 Arena. All an auto-combo does is allow the player to mash the same button over and over again. So long as the strikes land, the character performs a full combo. These combos didn't do significant damage in comparison to the custom combos a player could create, but they could be extremely useful while under pressure, or for beginners. Since Persona 4 Arena, Arc has stepped up their game, because the auto-combos here are more extensive and more useful to advanced players.

Every character has three auto combos; one for light, one for medium, and one for heavy attacks. In some ways, you can mix and match these combos to create new lengthy strings that take characters high into the air and deliver devastating damage. Even though I consider myself a relatively intermediate player in fighting games, I was able to get some of these "advanced" combos with minimal effort. What's more interesting, is that I am able to pull off moves that would normally require much more precision than before because the auto-combo systems can alter the trajectory of your character. The game is trying its best to fulfill the auto-combo guarantee by making sure that, if you keep mashing on the light attack, you should be able to see your combo to completion. Thus, it will help maneuver your character into a better position.

Dragon Ball FighterZ is a game that is filled with auto-combos and that's a good thing. It allows the newcomers to be able to do some cool strings without being frustrated with the controls. It also allows the more advanced players to manipulate the systems in place to their advantage in some creative ways. The different intermediate mechanics and how the auto-combo game logic can be manipulated to better improve your strings are all extremely fascinating to me as a fighting game fan. I like being able to go into practice and see what sort of strings I can come up with for all this stuff. If you want a more in-depth example, see Maximilian's video on combos:

When it's all said and done, the game controls great and the fighting feels smooth. There aren't that many special moves for each character in the roster, and since each has its own sets of auto-combos, that might seem rather dull. But once a match starts, you can quickly see how you don't need to have a ton of moves to have interesting and exciting combat with a lot of variety. Dragon Ball FighterZ managed to strike a balance with its gameplay so that it's not as overwhelming and unapproachable as some of the Marvel Vs Capcom games have been to newcomers. However, it also isn't so simple that pros have nothing to work with. The gameplay is fast-paced and frantic, but once you've got a grasp on how everything works, it becomes relatively easy to follow.

Tutorial Trouble

All that being said, I think Dragon Ball FighterZ has a terrible tutorial system that fails to give you quite enough information to figure all this out. Don't get me wrong. I like it when games are willing to let the players figure out how to use everything on their own, but DB FighterZ has so many systems at work that it could have done a better job of at least leaving a breadcrumb trail.

At some point, fighting games stopped trying to spell out their systems or give you an idea of what you might want to do in certain situations. Instead, we have tutorials that tell us how to move back and forth or jump, as though we wouldn't be able to figure that out by pressing buttons. Since the tutorial is often almost useless, I usually skip it for a bit and just go straight into practice or into character challenge modes to try out the different recommended combo strings the developers outlined for the characters. However, this mode is quite pathetic in comparison to other fighting games and previous Arc games. The first 7 out of 10 challenges for each character are often regurgitations of the same combo strings because so many of the characters are similar to each other. In fact, every character-specific challenge mode forces you to use the auto combos—again, as though you couldn't figure that out by pressing buttons. The last 3 challenging strings of each character are the more unique ones, but they are often impractical and more difficult to pull off than they are useful.

The main upside to these challenges is that it does a better job of telling you more about the mechanics than the real tutorial does. For instance, it teaches you that you can launch a character and that pressing the heavy attack again automatically chases them into the sky, allowing you to follow up with custom combos. It also teaches you that ki blasts in the air are useful combo-extending tools. And, it teaches you that using the vanishing attack at the right time can result in some lengthy combos. However, it doesn't necessarily tell you when you might want to use a raw chasing attack or how sparking blast changes the properties of the vanishing attack. Nor does it really give you enough to get you started with a character. The best you can do with it is try the challenges of everyone, look at the similarities between the characters, and observe the properties as you go. Experiment in practice mode, play in the arcade mode for a while, and check the tutorial for any mechanics you don't understand already. Then, if you still want to learn more, you can try some tutorials on YouTube.

Online Multiplayer

I haven't been playing the online multiplayer nonstop, but I've played enough to get a basic experience. Like most Arc fighting games, the net code seems pretty solid, for the most part. I praised the original BlazBlue for its quality of connectivity back when it first came out, and I was still playing games on DSL at the time. Arc has always seemed to have a grasp on how to get matches to work and play smoothly, for the most part. DB FighterZ is pretty consistently good, with at least a 4-bar connection. There may be some hiccups during the match at some point or another, but it usually catches up with itself and the match can continue smoothly. Unlike my experience in the original Injustice, I didn't feel like I was missing combos because of connectivity issues; it was mostly my own fault or problems I've experienced offline as well.

And when it's all working, it feels great. I've had some truly exciting and close matches online that were better than most other multiplayer experiences I have had in a long time. When the connection is good, nailing the combos and achieving come-from-behind victories is exhilarating. And there are a lot of those. The mechanics lend themselves well to real underdog matches, allowing people to come back from the brink and take the match with a few well-placed combos, much like the show dramatically portrayed. If you can get a good connection online, this game can be amazingly satisfying.

That's a big "if" though. I have heard a lot of negative commentary about the matchmaking system. I haven't experienced enough to really weigh in on it other than saying that it could be better. I've had to wait quite a while for a match during peak hours and on weekends, and I still haven't played as much as the typical YouTuber, so I'm not sure how infrequent it can get. Regardless, it still doesn't seem as efficient of a process as it could be. In the original BlazBlue I rarely had to wait more than 30 seconds for a match to be found, but here, I had to wait a minute on average and up to 10 minutes in some instances. This wasn't a huge problem with the ability to play in training mode while waiting, but I'm also a low-level player online. I wouldn't be surprised if there were more issues connecting people of higher skill levels.

Presentation

If you've seen this game in action, you probably know where the ranking on presentation is going to land. Even when the characters are standing still, the game looks incredible with vibrant colors and precise details on both the characters and the backgrounds. When they start blasting fireballs, sending each other through the air, and performing super moves, it all looks even more amazing. I've likely mentioned this before at some point, but if you want your fighting game to stick with fans, the characters, the moves, and the combos have to look cool, and DB FighterZ has that in spades.

Arc has always been a dramatically detailed, anime-fighting-game developer. Known for Blazblue's vibrant color palate and for Guilty Gear's flair for the dramatic, the developers at Arc have definitely taken many of the lessons they've learned over the years and applied them here, making this game exciting to play and exciting to look at. There are numerous moves that very briefly pause the action, zoom in to a dramatic angle, and then allow players to continue fighting, which all really sells the drama. It's similar to a hard stop in a rock song where everyone in the band stops playing for a step and then starts again; it is all just as intense as it was before, but that brief pause makes it stronger and more dramatic. And if you want to finish it all off with an even more dramatic conclusion, end your lengthy combo strings with one of the game’s big super attacks, where the camera will zoom in and zip around to show you close-ups of the characters' faces as they power up and blast away the competition.

All of this stuff is extremely referential to the original TV show, as well as the new Super series and movies. The locales in which the characters are fighting, the moves they're performing, and the things characters are saying to each other in the match all have some of that nostalgic tinge to them. The fact that almost every character in the game has a voice actor from the show helps sell it all even more. What's more, is that it also has that Arc attention to detail. Arc games were always known for having little Easter eggs in their games where specific character interactions would occur during matches, under the right conditions. The same is true here. Super move animations may change based on who is on your team, and if the conditions are right, you can perform one of the game's dramatic cut-scene finishes that are practically ripped right out of the show. These are minor touches that the developer didn't have to do to make the game any better, but they are always appreciated.

The place where the presentation falls flat is in the music and the interface. The music isn't bad, but it's mostly forgettable, which is disappointing for an Arc game. Arc has consistently had some really good video game soundtracks with all their franchises, but this one barely made me think twice about it. But the disappointingly uninspired music is nothing compared to how much I dislike the user interface of this game.

At some point, Arc games started having this lobby system where players would hang out online as cute chibi versions of the games' characters while they waited for online matches. This is fine if you want to play online. If you just want to go into practice mode, or arcade, or anything that doesn't require an internet connection, there's no need to connect to a lobby and do that crap, right?

Not in DB FighterZ, apparently. Every time you start the game, you have to enter a lobby. If you lose a connection at any point outside of a match, you'll have to reconnect to one before being able to access any of the game's content. When you are in a lobby, you have to physically move your chibi character over to the section in this lobby that represents the menu option. So, if you want to go from practice mode to arcade mode, you have to run through the lobby to the arcade section. You can always use the warp option to get there quicker and save some seconds, but it's still several unnecessary steps. I don't know what happened to just giving me a damn menu to choose the mode I want to play, but instead, that has been opted out for the opportunity to run through this bland lobby area to the menu option before getting to play the game. I know it's all for the sake of interacting with people online, but let me choose to go online at my discretion; don't force me, and don't compromise the user experience of quickly navigating menus to make me interact with people. This lobby issue is exacerbated by the fact that if you are disconnected from the lobby while doing a single-player thing—like arcade mode on hard, after hours of trying to get an A rank against a cheating computer to unlock the special characters—you may lose your progress and the game will pretend like you didn't just complete it. (NOTE: They recently fixed this issue in a patch, but I still experienced it and it pissed me off, so I'm still including it in the review.) All of this is for the sake of having this crappy interface so that people can dance and post emotes with their cute DBZ characters. I know I sound like an antisocial old man with my complaints, but it's still stupid.

Image: Bandai Namco | Get ready to see this a lot

TL;DR (Conclusion)

Dragon Ball FighterZ took some time for me to learn and took some time to really start enjoying. Once I got over the learning curve and the unhelpful design choices, however, I've really sunk my teeth into this game. It's the first tag-battle fighting game I've been excited to keep playing in a long time. It's stylish, fast-paced, and true to the source material that caters to the DBZ fan buried deep within me. The annoying design choices, lame lobby system, somewhat long load times, and uninspired soundtrack are all unfortunate detractors of the experience. But, if you can see your way around it, there's a lot of fun to be had with the first really good Dragon Ball fighting game.

Do you agree or disagree? Tell me what you think in the comments!

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Dragon Ball FighterZ - Review