Dragon Ball Z Ultimate Tenkaichi | "DESTROY ALL FANBOYS!"

Platform: Xbox 360 (also on PS3)

Developer: Spike

Publisher: Namco Bandai

# of Players: 1 – 2 (Online 1 – 2)

ESRB Rating: T Teen

Score: B (75%)

Bigger, meaner, louder and faster pretty much sums up each new Dragon Ball Z game that hits consoles on what seems to be a yearly basis, but this year’s DBZ game, Ultimate Tenkaichi, while spectacular looking and a thrill to play, somehow drops the ball when it comes to character count. While there’s a character edit function here, it’s a bit limited and the overall number of playable fighters isn’t as impressive as last year’s Raging Blast 2. If you can manage to get over that disappointment (or could care lass about who’s in this game as long as it’s fun), what’s here is a total blast to dive into again and again as it still packs in many hours of exciting fighting action. A few elements, such as the emphasis on quick time events for some special attacks and interesting pattern-based boss battles that would feel more at home in a 3D platformer, may take a bit of getting used to for some younger players. But overall, there’s more than enough of the usual DBZ stuff here to keep you busy for quite some time. Continue reading →

If there was any doubt that Dragon Ball Z had staying power after all these years, Namco Bandai’s upcoming brawler should squash that like oh so many bugs under a hard heel. The game is intense, insane and from what I played last week at their NYC press event, pretty non-stop in terms of the all-out action fans expect. Looking even better than the anime it’s based on, the game might even get some non-DBZ fighting game fans to pick up a controller once they get a peek at the speed and visual flash of the battles. Yes, there are indeed quick time events in these fights, but both players can either get in attack or defense moves by being the fastest to jam on a certain button when prompted. The Super attacks are impressive and can absolutely turn the tide in battle, provided you’ve been beating on your opponent enough so your cinematic blow can get.

Controls are solid, as noted, the game looks fantastic (the huge destructible environments get blasted up pretty good) and yup, there are ridiculously fun boss fights that feel like something from a classic 3D platformer, memorizing pattern attacks and all. The boss demo ended JUST as things were getting good, so it looks as if we’ll have to wait until October to see how it all turns out. PS3 and Xbox 360, of course…