Dragon Ball Z: Budokai
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai is a series of fighting video games based on the anime series Dragon Ball Z.
Gameplay
The Budokai series plays like a typical 2-D fighting game. As well as including the regular punch and kick buttons, there is the ability to shoot ki blasts, which can also be used in specific special moves. The special moves are mainly taken directly from the anime, including Goku's Kamehameha, Vegeta's Galick Gun and Frieza's Death Beam. Although these mechanics have stuck with the series, other ideas such as the "Hyper Mode", the ability to move at incredible speeds, fly freely, and "Beam Struggles" between two characters' beam attacks, were later replaced in favour of other techniques.History
''Dragon Ball Z: Budokai'' (2002)
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai, released as Dragon Ball Z in Japan, is a fighting game released for the PlayStation 2 on November 2, 2002, in Europe and on December 3, 2002, in North America, and for the Nintendo GameCube on October 28, 2003, in North America and on November 14, 2003, in Europe. It was the first Budokai game of the series but also the first Dragon Ball Z game to be released in all Europe and aside from specific releases in France, Spain and Portugal like it was with the earlier games. The game was released in Japan by Bandai on the PlayStation 2 on February 13, 2003, and on the Nintendo GameCube on November 28, 2003. It was developed by Dimps and published by Infogrames and later by Atari as a Greatest Hits title for the PlayStation 2 in North America.The game includes a total of 23 playable characters, and the story follows the first three chapters of the Dragon Ball Z timeline starting with Goku and Piccolo's fight with Raditz in the Saiyan Saga, up to Gohan's final battle with Cell in the Android Saga. Features included in the game were a story mode, a versus mode, a tournament stage, a practice mode, and an items shop which allowed the player to purchase various customization abilities using money that was gained through the various challenges in the story mode and tournament victories to customize and make the most powerful warriors. Story Mode was divided into special chapters, initially having the player fight predominantly as Goku and Gohan through the Saiyan, Namek and Android Sagas before unlocking bonus chapters from different perspectives like Piccolo and Vegeta. The story mode also included a few "what if" episodes to play with the villains of each saga, retelling iconic events in the Dragon Ball history with a few twists. A cel-shading effect was added to the graphics in the GameCube version.
The North American versions feature English voice acting from the North American Funimation dub, while the European versions feature the original Japanese voice acting and several European languages text translations.
''Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2'' (2003)
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2, released as Dragon Ball Z 2 in Japan, is a fighting game and a sequel to Dragon Ball Z: Budokai and was developed by Dimps and published by Atari for the PlayStation 2 and Nintendo GameCube. It was released for the PlayStation 2 in North America on December 4, 2003, and on the Nintendo GameCube on December 15, 2004. The game was published in Japan by Bandai, and released for the PlayStation 2 on February 5, 2004.The game's features include a tournament stage, versus mode, and an item shop. Unlike its predecessor, Budokai 2's story mode is known as Dragon World, which introduces a unique retelling of all four chapters of Z and plays like a board game as the player assembles a team of Z-fighters alongside Goku to challenge the various enemies from the story. The game has a total of 31 playable characters including fusions of different fighters, and Majin Buu's various absorbed forms, many of which were unique to Budokai 2 including an original fusion between Tien and Yamcha and Super Buu absorbing Vegeta, Frieza, Cell, and Tien and Yamcha simultaneously, which did not appear in future games. The Japanese version of the game added several new costumes, as well as a new stage in the game's story mode. Some of the added costumes were added to the North American release of the GameCube version.
Once again, the North American versions feature English voice acting from the North American Funimation dub. The European PlayStation 2 version also features it, while the later European GameCube version switched back to the original Japanese voice acting because of negative feedback from most European Dragon Ball fans which were used to the Japanese dub since the 16-bit era.
''Dragon Ball Z 2 V'' (2004)
In Japan, 2,000 lucky V-Jump readers got Dragon Ball Z 2 V, a revamped version of Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2 with Cooler, Kuriza, Majin Frieza, and Majin Cell included. All of the characters were already unlocked, but the capsules were preset. The World Martial Arts Tournament now displays the "V-Jump" logo.The logo for the game was slightly changed. In addition to a "V", mostly likely to emulate the "V" in V-Jump, Cooler poses near the "D" in Dragon Ball Z.
''Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3'' (2004)
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3, released as Dragon Ball Z 3 in Japan, is a fighting game developed by Dimps and published by Atari for the PlayStation 2. It was released on November 16, 2004, in North America in both a standard and Limited Edition release, the latter of which included a DVD featuring a behind the scenes looks at the game's development. In Europe, it was released on November 19, 2004.The game's story mode yet again plays through the story of Z, but this time, the game includes several characters outside the main story, which include Bardock, Cooler, Broly and Gogeta from the DBZ films, Omega Shenron and the Super Saiyan 4 transformations from Dragon Ball GT, and Kid Goku and Demon King Piccolo from the original Dragon Ball. Players fly around a map of Earth and Namek, which changes depending on the Saga. Story Mode was originally intended to have storylines for every playable character in the game as proven by audio logs, but were cut down to just eleven characters, likely due to time constraints. Other features the game includes are a versus mode, an items shop, a tournament, and a battle ranking stage where the player has to challenge the AI in a hundred fighter challenge. Moving a spot above after beating who ever is next in the ranking. The fighting mechanics have also been enhanced from the preceding 2 games making the game closer to its anime counterpart in terms of combat. Budokai 3 has a roster of 42 playable characters in recent releases of the game.
The game was released in Japan by Bandai on February 10, 2005. Like Budokai 2 before it, the Japanese version of Budokai 3 added several costumes not present in the North American and European versions. The North American Greatest Hits version of Budokai 3 adds these costumes, as well as the option to switch the audio to Japanese for the first time in North America. This version was also released in Europe as a re-release of the game under the title Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3 - Collector's Edition. From this release onwards, all Dragon Ball Z games in North America and Europe were released with dual voice language options in English and Japanese in order to please all fans. as well as some graphical tweaks.
''Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai'' (2006)
Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai is a fighting video game part of the Dragon Ball Z franchise, developed by Dimps and released in North America on March 7, 2006, in Europe on May 25, 2006, and in Japan on April 20, 2006, for the PlayStation Portable. The game's story mode is based on the events of the movie . The choices the player makes in the story determine how the story evolves.Another mode is the Arcade mode, a single-player mode that lets you brawl against the CPU in order to fight and gain the Dragon Balls. Next is the Z trial mode, which consists of two different types of play: survival, where you fight against CPU-controlled opponents for as long as you can, and time attack, where you see how fast you can make it through a predetermined set of opponents.
Finally, there's the Profile Card mode in which the players will have their in-game character profile cards that lists their name and power level. The player can design their own card and customize them with the items from the game's item store.
''Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai - Another Road'' (2007)
Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai - Another Road is the sequel to Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai for the PlayStation Portable. The game features a brand new story that tells the tale of Majin Buu being released in Future Trunks' timeline. As Majin Buu is too strong for Trunks to handle alone, he uses his time machine to recruit the original Z warriors for assistance, eventually succeeding in the destruction of Majin Buu.''Dragon Ball Z: Budokai - HD Collection'' (2012)
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai - HD Collection includes remastered versions of Budokai and Budokai 3, alongside full Trophy and Achievements support. Both games include the optional original Japanese language track. Both games also feature reused soundtracks consisting of soundtracks from the US and European versions of the Sparking! games, whereas the soundtracks from the original PS2 versions were made by Kenji Yamamoto. This is because Yamamoto had used actual songs as bases for the tracks he made for the Dragon Ball Z games he worked on were replaced by Shunsuke's scores. Yamamoto was fired by Toei Animation in 2011, and all the soundtracks he did for the Dragon Ball Z games and Dragon Ball Z Kai were replaced by Shunsuke's scores. The game was released in Europe on November 2, 2012, and in North America on November 6, 2012, for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.Playable characters
| Character | Budokai | Budokai 2 | Budokai 3 | Shin Budokai | Shin Budokai: Another Road |
| Goku | |||||
| Kid Gohan | |||||
| Teen Gohan | |||||
| Great Saiyaman | |||||
| Vegeta | |||||
| Trunks | |||||
| Piccolo | |||||
| Krillin | |||||
| Tien | |||||
| Yamcha | |||||
| Android 16 | |||||
| Android 17 | |||||
| Android 18 | |||||
| Android 19 | |||||
| Frieza | |||||
| Dodoria | |||||
| Zarbon | |||||
| Captain Ginyu | |||||
| Recoome | |||||
| Cell | |||||
| Hercule | |||||
| Nappa | |||||
| Raditz | |||||
| Goten | |||||
| Gohan | |||||
| Kid Trunks | |||||
| Videl | |||||
| Supreme Kai | |||||
| Dr. Gero | |||||
| Dabura | |||||
| Majin Buu | |||||
| Super Buu | |||||
| Kid Buu | |||||
| Saibamen | |||||
| Cell Jr. | |||||
| Broly | |||||
| Omega Shenron / Syn Shenron | |||||
| Oob/Uub | |||||
| Kid Goku | |||||
| Future Gohan | |||||
| Gotenks | |||||
| Vegito | |||||
| Pan | |||||
| Baby Vegeta | |||||
| Super 17 | |||||
| Goku | |||||
| Vegeta |
Reception
''Budokai''
Budokai received "mixed or average" reviews on both platforms according to the review aggregation website Metacritic.Many critics complained about the GameCube version's simple interface and the fact that combos weren't worth the payoff. However, more complex combos were possible due to an oversight in the move canceling feature but were rarely known at the time. These oversights were turned into an important part of the system in the later games and were what high level play tended to revolve around.