Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit Reviews
With previous Dragonball Games, the more recent Tenkaichi games, have gone with a 3D open fighting environment. With this game, Bandai and Dimps have gone back to the style of the older Budokai games, going back to the 2D fighting environment, expanded slightly with the ability to move around openly, but still in 2D form. Basically, if you liked the Budokai Games, you'll feel right at home here.
The main meat and potatoes of the game is Z Universe Mode, where you recreate the Dragonball Z Story from the Saiyan Saga, Frieza Saga, the Android and Cell Saga, and up to the First Broly Movie, including an extra 'What If' Storyline with Goku's father Bardock.
It sounds good and all, but with only 48 Fights, you won't be spending very long with this if you're a casual player. And some of the fights are a little unecessary, such as having to face Captain Ginyu 4 seperate times. They should have taken a page from BT3's book and merge some of the fights together, as it plays the story out better. However, I do like the fact that you can play as villians if necessary and if it relates to the storyline. Helps give across a good perspective of the story. There are also cutscenes that can affect the match in a number of ways once certain conditions are met. They can increase or decrease attack/defence and health, change your level of ki, or affect how the AI behaves. Problem is that this can disrupt the actual flow of fighting, and sort of forces you into playing in a slightly restrained environment. This can be good or bad depending on personal preference. At least you have the option to turn them off if you like.
Visually, this game looks great, very nice leap up to High Definition Graphics, the models and the auras look great around the characters, and their general design is great. Same for the level backgrounds and the beams, especially when struggiling. However, If I was to nitpick, there are some little niggles, such as Piccolo's Special Beam Cannon being the wrong colour, Lighting around Cell and Gohan being Yellow and not Blue, things like that, which considering how closely the game resembles the show in other ways, this is slightly dissapointing.
Other modes include a Versus option (Bog Standard), as well as Survival Mode, which splits into Survival, Time Attack and Battle Point. Survival is as the name suggest, beating up to 100 people in a row, While Time Attack and Battle Point Mode track the speed of which you defeat 10 Opponents, and Battle Point tracking you earning points for fulfilling certain conditions. Not bad, but difficult. And I don't see why there would be two seperate modes for this, with Normal Cutscenes, and then again with Custom Ones, because that's a little wasteful if you ask me, and unecessary.
As for fighting itself, it's overall quite a fun experience. The controls are pretty simple to get the hang off, and are very enjoyable to get stuck into you. And the game encourages you to dig deeper into the controls so you can become more experienced fast, with lots of little tricks and niches for you to gain an advantage. However, with no ki management really, it's simple to spam Energy Attacks and over and over again, which can be terrible and easily exploited at times. Otherwise it's done really well.
For lasting appeal, this is where the game has it's problems really, especially for the collection freaks out there. The Achievements are really hard and biased. I've unlocked 41/50 Achievements and only have 585G. Reason being is that the game has 3 100G Achievements, and way too many that's only worth a measly 5 points, more than 20 if I remember correctly. And also, these achievements force you into playing the game on higher difficulties, which can be near impossible at times. I mean, beating every match at Z Difficulty with Z Ranks? Come on now...
To sum up, if you're a generic Fighting Game fan, then this may be worth checking out, there's certainly a fair bit going for it, but if you're a big time Dragonball Z Fan, you may feel a little underwhelmed, especially if you've been playing the previous PS2 games, as well as Shin Budokai on the PSP, which is very similar to this. If you're gonna buy any DBZ Game now, buy Budokai Tenkaichi 3 on the Playstation 2 or Nintendo Wii, or wait for Raging Blast to hit shelves on November 10th. Thanks for Reading.
Graphics: 8.5/10 - Great
Definitly the best looking graphics on any Dragonball Z Game ever, not just because of the fact it's the first on a Next Gen console either. However, there are the occasional flaws, such as Piccolo's Special Beam Cannon being the wrong colour, and other occasional inaccuracies.
Audio: 7.5/10 - Good
You'll be needing your iPod on this one methinks, there's little actual music ingame, and the sounds are all from the DBZ Anime, which is fine, but they're outdated and could do with a little freshening up, but at least they're accurate. Also there is a choice of either Japanese or English dubbing, which will please a fair few.
Controls: 8/10 - Great
Overall, pretty decent, one of those easy to grasp, difficult to master controls. This is good, as there's enough to keep your modest fighting fan happy, but also enough depth for the experienced to dig a little deeper if they want to. However, there is a good deal of brokenness with some characters and some of their moves, which hold it back.
Story: 7/10 - Good
Now, this DBZ Game goes from the Saiyan Saga to the first Broly Movie, and considering this is only about 50% of the actual Dragonball Universe, this is very dissapointing, because this harms the number of characters, the lasting appeal and the depth to the storylines. However, the cutscenes in the story are actually very well done and are almost perfect in relation to the show, so credit there.
Lasting Appeal: 5.5/10 - Okay
Only 48 Fights (Some being very repetitive, such as fighting Captain Ginyu 4 times), and pretty boring extra modes mean this isn't a game you'll be picking up and playing often unfortunatly. With very little online options as well, everything really is a little substandard in terms of longevity. At an average pace, Z-Universe is 4-5 Hours. Just not good enough. Collecting Drama Pieces and Playing on higher difficulties is there to limit the damage though. Very difficult to 1,000 as well if you're a 360 Owner.
Overall: 7.5/10 - Good
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