Ka...me...ha...me...HA!... ... ... X 10!
| Platform | Presentation | Controls | Variety | Audio | Depth | Value & Fun | OVERALL |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wii | 6.50 | 7.00 | 9.00 | 8.50 | 8.50 | 8.00 | 8.04 |
| General Information |
|
Multiplayer Importance: Medium. Previously played game in the series: None. Television set-up: 19" Sylvania CRT, SDTV 480i, composite cables. |
| Gameplay Description |
| Dragonball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2 is a fighting game based off the anime series. You and your opponent fight until one of you loses all your health. |
| Dedication Meter | 45.00 |
| You can jump in and just have a fight, but until you've learned the game, that's not going to be a whole lot of fun. It will take a sincere effort to learn the intimacies of the battle system. You'll also need to make it through not just the single player campaign to unlock all the characters, which is an important part of the fun. | |
| Presentation | 6.50 |
|
The visual style and animation is near cartoon perfect. It really is in most ways good enough to use for an actual cartoon, as seen in the few in-engine cutscenes scattered throughout the single-player campaign. It isn't just the character models and movement, though; it's the effects that match the series. Vanish attacks and Kamehameha's have never looked better. As for the gameplay aspects of the presentation, the pause before special attacks is rather important. When you prepare to do certain moves, it zooms in on your character for a short animation; this gives a short opportunity to counter. Ultimately, however, having some other indicator would have been more practical and less of an annoyance, as you have to wait through the animation, which can vary in length. Hearing Vegeta say, "The Saiyans are a true warrior race! Don't underestimate us!" five to ten times in a fight can be especially grating. There's a serious absence in the production values of the storytelling in Adventure mode. The adventure mode is broken up into Scenarios, then further subdivided into Chapters. For each scenario there is a single short explanation of the entire scenario, right up to the final Chapter, even though you've yet to play through any of it. For each Chapter there's an in-game cutscene that is just characters standing an talking for a few lines before a fight. There is the rare legitimate cut-scene, but the overall package is rather underwhelming. The fact that the game jumps between the animated series and the movies can cause some continuity issues as well. The Dragonball movies themselves have continuity issues, but it doesn't help when the game, for example, substitutes Androids 14 and 15 with Androids 18 and 19 in the Super Android 13 scenario. The biggest problem with the storytelling is that it undermines the series. If you aren't that familiar with Dragonball Z coming into the game, Budokai Tenkaichi 2 is more likely to make you dislike it than to become a fan. A significant barrier to entry in the game is the very poor tutorial implementation. The game is very daunting to jump into, and the game leaves it up to the player to choose to go into Training and go through each individual little tutorial. Those tutorials are essentially reading before you get placed into practice mode until you quit. It's incredibly unintuitive, and leads to ignorance of more advanced techniques. The visuals make this game so much more appealing had the design been poorly implemented. At the same time, there are obvious failures in the presentational design that should have been addressed. |
|
| Controls | 7.00 |
|
The conceptual control scheme works for the game. It's not overzealous, nor does it implement unreasonable use of the motion sensing. You dash with the nunchuck motion, move with the analog stick, strike with A, block with down on the D-pad, and B is multi-purpose and mostly for Ki attacks (special attacks that require power up). An innovative little concept is that you can move your cursor off the screen to perform special attacks, which is quick and effective. There are many more control mechanics, that are too extensive to list them all out here. When you block, you move the analog stick up or down to block high or low (leave it as is to block middle). If you block correctly on a powered-up smash hit, your opponents blow will bounce off and cause him to be staggered. If you block the opposite (high on low, low on high), the attack with connect. If you're only partly off, the blow will break up your block and put you off-balance. The issues arise in execution. The nunchuck motion is hardly foolproof. You have to strike down or upwards with it to dash, but to stop is to bring it back to normal position. The problem with this is that you must hold your hand in the awkward post-strike position if you want to go very far. You can adjust to this, but it can still be temperamental. There is also a strange bug that will cause you to be stuck in the defensive position so that when you press the analog stick to move, you just block high or low. Then you have to either hold A to move until it corrects itself, or pause and unpause the game. This can be a serious problem in a tough fight. Another problem is that there's no clear indicator of when you can perform another Ki move, as you can't simply attack successively. There are other instances in which your option to use a Ki attack is unavailable, but it's not made clear, making it seem unresponsive. There are three different control mechanics for performing Ki techniques. One is to cursor-out (move the cursor off the screen) to a certain direction; this is the most responsive and simplest to perform. The next is to move the Wiimote back, then forward, which is used mostly for straight beam attacks such as the Kamehameha. The last is to shake the nunchuck twice then thrust the Wiimote forward; while it sounds convoluted, it's actually quite responsive. Unfortunately the last two conflict a little in the very few characters who have both (I can only think of one) as I find myself performing the Wiimote only move when I want to use the shake the nunchuck one. It would have been nice to have had the option of doing the full two-hand motion to do a Kamehameha, but perhaps that's a bit too over-the-top. There is also the option of the GameCube controller for those who are interested, but I am not going to critique that portion of the game, for I have no interest in learning another control scheme. And do not take my criticisms of the controls as a concession that the GCN controller would be a better option; the most significant flaws would likely appear in both options, and I'd also not expect the game to feel as rewarding. |
|
| Variety | 9.00 |
|
Budokai Tenkaichi 2 piles on the variety in sheer DBZ content. Just about every character with a name in the series shows up in the game in some form, and if that character has fought in the series, chances are that he or she is playable, too. Almost every playable character also has an alternate form. For example, Goku has various Super Saiyan forms. These forms can also be transformed into during battle. While there are many characters, the actual difference between each one is subtle. The most noticeable difference in character attributes is actually rather counter-intuitive to the series. Anyone who knows anything about Dragonball Z knows that speed is proportionate to power; the stronger you are, the faster you are. This is hardly the case in Tenkaichi 2. Rather, character speed depends more on the size of the character, which are seemingly segmented into small (the children), medium (Goku, Vegeta), and large (giant ape). Movesets vary, but stay similar in structure across most characters. Many seem quite alike, but you're likely to find, much like most fighters, preferring certain characters. The complement to the characters is the Z-Item system. The Z-Items are equipped to the fighters to improve their stats. These items increase in level as experienced is gained through fighting. The variety in the items, and categories of stats, are very extensive. You can upgrade Health, Attack, Defense, Speed, Ki, Blast 1, Blast 2, and Ultimate Blast. There is also Item Fusion, which allows you to fuse certain items to either create new Z-Items or unlock new characters. The story mode is just about as extensive as the character list. The game plays through the entire Dragonball Z series, the entire GT series, and all thirteen Dragonball Z movies. Along the way, you'll fight just about every battle that occurs in the series, unlocking those characters as you go. Alternate modes include Ultimate DBZ, World Tournament, Duelling and Dragon Library. Ultimate DBZ lays out challenges in a Mortal Kombat style layout -- fight through the tower until you reach the top. There are several Ultimate DBZ stages that unlock different things, but it's really just an excuse to fight and fails to mix it up. World Tournament has you fighting in the three different tournaments from the series in a tournament tree. Friends can join into the tournament, which features random drawing. Duelling is the straight-forward free-match; you can have any number of fighters in a match from 1-5 vs 1-5. Dragon Library is an extensive list of biographies and backstory for the characters and scenarios in the game. All that's lacking in variety is something other than straight-up beat your opponent. Every mode is basically pound your opponent into submission. |
|
| Audio | 8.50 |
|
The voice-acting carries the audio. From what I can tell, the entire voice-cast is in the game with many lines. The cutscenes are voiced excellently and the ingame audio from the characters is even better. Before each match, each character says a little clip, which are context sensitive to whom they're speaking; it's a really nice little touch. The music is appropriate but pretty empty and forgettable, and disappointing particularly when it comes to battle music. Where's the intensity? |
|
| Depth | 8.50 |
|
There are many ways to go about fighting in Tenkaichi 2. Fighting in close is good for characters with good speed, but may have a hard time against giants who aren't stunned by punches. The next style is integral to the extensiveness and uniqueness of the fighter, which is to rely on your Ki attacks. Each character has three Ki attacks, two of which are categorized as Blast 2, the other is that character's special move, or Ultimate Blast. There are two types of Ki attacks: rushing and blasting. Rush attacks have the character fly towards the other combatant for a short distance, and if contact is made, triggers a sequence of attacks. Blasting attacks are ranged attacks such as the Kamehameha. Ki is charged by holding 'B', and how fast that goes depends on the character and whatever changes to the Ki attribute the Z items that character has equipped do. When fully charged, you can perform the Ultimate Blast, which could be ranged or rush. A wildcard in the gameplay are the Blast 1 stocks. These are used for unique manoeuvres such as a protective barrier or activating transformations. While a nice little addition, outside of rare instances, you have to go very in depth before their uses become practical. It's always good to see a fighter than is more than a combination of button presses. Every aspect of the fighting system has a legitimate aspect in battle and needs to be kept in conscious thought while playing. Blast 1 stocks, Ki meter, health, distance from each other, how much Ki do you, and more importantly, your opponent, need to perform an attack and so forth. The unfortunate drawbacks are mostly due to the imperfections apparent in the control scheme. Since defence is quite reliant on quick precise reactions, the often relatively imprecise control mechanics prove problematic, making Blast 2 attacks overly powerful. With practice, physical comboes are a remedy to this. Still, even if perfect, Blast 2 attacks are still a little overpowering for how quickly you can gather Ki. |
|
| Value & Fun | 8.00 |
|
Budokai Tenkaichi 2 has several things going for it. The single player with regard to a fighting game is rather lengthy and spans into multiple modes. It's great for DBZ fans to get to challenge all the toughest enemies in the biggest (and, well, all) battles while offering a challenge with three different difficulty levels (five in Duelling). The character system works well for the multiplayer. Instead of being balanced equally, the various fighters' capabilities are based off their relative strength in the series. While you can still win with characters that have no business even scratching the other more powerful characters (Krillin vs. Frieza, for example), but it makes for a good option for evening the odds against a friend. Unlocking everything is a pretty lengthy process as well, as it dives into the unexplained Dragon Fusion. All the game tells you is that you can fuse Z-items. You choose two Z-items and King Kai tells you that you can't fuse those two. Rather annoying until you realize that the fusions have a logical basis in the world of Dragonball Z. You choose related items to create a valid fusion; an artificial moon card can create a Giant Ape Saiyan, for example. It's another thing that's great for DBZ fans and downright frustrating for anyone else. There are some strange things and some annoying things in the story mode. First up is the obvious: the battle objective. Before each battle you'll get one of two objectives: either win the battle (most often) or the occasional "Survive as long as you can". The problem is that you're constantly getting "Win the Battle" followed by a cutscene that says "The Z-Fighters were no match for the awesome power of blah blah blah". While you can't really go on losing all the time (as happens in the show), it's a weird situation. Another weird thing is your enemy's power-level. The power-levels tend to jump around based on how powerful your enemy should be in relation to your character and no how powerful the character should be in context. While there should be an increase in power-level when our enemy transforms, it just doesn't work that way. An annoyance in the story mode is the constant switching of characters. The Z-items are integral to your success, but you only have so much Zeni (money) for Z-items while all these different characters are showing up. Another issue with the constant switching of characters is that you have to fight with really poor fighters in some instances (I'm looking at you, Hercule), which can be utterly frustrating. The last and most hurtful to the experience of the story mode is that chapters often consist of fighting the same enemy over and over, even without change in form. There was one chapter that consisted of fighting the same enemy, without hyperbole, ten times in a row. That's it, nothing else. The same fight ten times. The last little issue is with the AI. While the AI can be quite effective in mixing up their moves and being a bit unpredictable, there are certain behaviours that are straight dumb, annoying and shallowing. At the start of each match there is a three second time of no-combat in which you can move around into a favourable position. During this time, the AI will either fly up as high as possible and wander aimlessly trying to lock-on, or just stand there and let you start the match right behind it. Another issue is that when you're high up in the air and the AI is down low, odds are that the AI will fly directly below you and punch at nothing until you go down and fight it, which can be exploited with a rush attack. There's just a lot to do and a lot to unlock, as well as a fun multiplayer game here. Unfortunately when you reach the end of your collecting and finishing everything, there isn't anything to hold your interest as the difficulty doesn't get nearly hard enough for once you've learned all the nuances. Similarly, the multiplayer itself is partially hurt by the fact that the learning curve is so steep. |
|
| Overall | 8.04 |
| When it comes to Dragonball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2, my entire review is rather irrelevant. All it comes down to is this: If you're a Dragonball Z fan, this game is for you, get it, love it; if you're not, forget it, it's not worth the hassle. | |
Posted by Ellyoda Wed, 24 Jan 2007 00:00:00
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