Dragon Ball Z: Ultimate Tenkaichi

Played it on: Xbox 360
Available on: Xbox 360 and PS3
Approximate Playtime: 25 hours

RATING: 3/10

Dragon Ball Z: Ultimate Tenkaichi is not a fighting game. In fact, it's not even really that much of a game, and even though it can be an interesting way to pass an hour or two, it quickly looses its appeal.

If you're a fan of Dragon Ball games, you'll recognize the "Tenkaichi" in the name from the Budokai Tenkaichi series, a classic example of what perfect Dragon Ball games are. They had epic fights, good story modes, a great selection of iconic characters, and they felt amazing to play. This was especially true of Budokai Tenkaichi 3, and Ultimate Tenkaichi, on the surface, promises an even grander version of the PlayStation 2 classic. The fights are the most cinematic they've ever been, the stages are varied and well designed, and for the first time in a big North American release, it was possible to create your own Saiyan to be the hero of his own story. It sounds too good to be true. And that's because, unfortunately, it is

To begin with, the most important feature of any fighting game is, of course, the fighting. The base mechanics aren't too bad. At long range, pressing the attack button shoots ki blasts, and at short range it causes melee attacks. You can charge your ki at any time, and getting combos increases the super attack meter to unlock two super moves, such as the Kamehameha or Special Beam Cannon. It's then possible to use up some ki to either block a super and reduce its damage, dodge it, or intercept it and deal damage to the attacker. Ultimate attacks are only unlocked when one fighter reaches critical health so that nobody can start a fight with an ultimate attack and win automatically. It's also possible to enter a powered up mode at 100% ki, which tips the balance heavily for a short time at the cost of 25% of total ki and a short period of being completely unable to charge up. Unfortunately, most of that means absolutely nothing, as fights end up being a glorified match of rock-paper-scissors. After executing one combo (actually, only the last hit of the combo needs to land, so letting go of the block button half a second early still causes this) the game enters a quick time event with two buttons. If the defender picks the same button as the attacker, they dodge. If they pick the other button, the game enters what amounts to a cutscene where the attacker pummels them for huge damage, reducing the defender's ki and increasing their own super meter. It would be fine if this didn't happen often, but this glorified click-to-win is what the entire "fight" is. It may be satisfying and cinematic to see the first few times, but it's quickly evident that every battle is exactly the same thing. None of the characters even feel different other than their super attacks, and evolving or going super saiyan amounts to a change in character model and available supers, nothing more. Some computer controlled characters will be harder to predict when the quick time events start rolling out, but all it takes is a little memorization and suddenly every single fight is winnable. Use the QTE to max out your super meter, use it again to reduce their ki so they can't block your super attacks, then use the power up mode and hit them until they're at critical health. Once that's done, use an ultimate attack and the fight is over, usually with an explosion that could level North America or a beam shooting off into space that's wider than the Atlantic Ocean. There is nothing tactical, no strategy, and no nuances. Rock 'Em, Sock 'Em Robots is more entertaining.

Then there's the story mode. Now, all told, the Dragon Ball saga spans 508 episodes including Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, and Dragon Ball GT, with 20 movies and a soon-to-be fourth series entitled Dragon Ball Super. This should provide a long story mode with plenty of iconic fights, locations, and costumes. But what it yields in Ultimate Tenkaichi is a small collection of only the barest essentials in Z, a few movie villains that often have scripted boss fights, and the fight between Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta and Omega Shenron in GT. That, coupled with the lifeless combat, makes for an incredibly boring run of the story. Most of the actual plot is summed up in walls of text with frequent grammatical and spelling errors, and skips over some of the best parts of the series. It does win a few points back by introducing new animations at some of the most iconic points, such as when Goku becomes a Super Saiyan and when Gohan goes toe-to-toe with Cell. But while it's nice to see the animations in a crisp, updated way more than a decade after the original show premiered, they don't do nearly enough to make up for all the other problems the game has. But they're a nice addition, so they do earn some score back for the game.

The biggest asset that Ultimate Tenkaichi has is Hero Mode, which finally gives fans the chance to make their own Saiyan, with his own story. It should be a chance to make a unique hero with all the best qualities of DBZ characters: the brawn of Broly, the power of Super Saiyan 3, and the ability to fire Kamehamehas at will. But again, what it should be is nothing like what it presents. It's possible to create three separate characters, a heavy type with big muscles, a standard type with good all-around stats, and a light type with strong ki blasts. But there isn't nearly the customization that there should be. There are only a handful of outfits and hairstyles available across the three types, most of which are directly copied from other characters in DBZ, with no option to mix and match. The colors are customizable, given the usual arbitrary color wheel to give a false sense of some originality, but that option doesn't do enough to make the characters unique.

The different ki auras are available to all character types, but the super attacks are restricted to specific body types. The standard hero is the only one who can use a Kamehameha wave, while the light hero is the only one who can use Masenko. It might be better if there were a decent amount of options for all characters, but while the standard hero gets just about all the memorable attacks from the series, the heavy and light heroes are left with a meager five or ten, most of which are downright boring, involving an excruciating buildup when the attack begins - the hero charges menacingly towards the villain, the villain marvels at his power, the villain chooses which defense option he wants, it goes through a quick time event - and then when the actual super attack hits, it's just a headbutt or something similarly dull that ends in less than a second. Why? The attack itself shouldn't have been a super ability, but giving it 15 seconds of buildup for the worst payoff imaginable is utterly ridiculous. It makes many of the attacks not even worth using, which almost guarantees exactly which super attacks the heavy and light heroes will use. and makes the standard hero the only real "hero" worth using. Even still, while fans of the series got to see Goku achieve Super Saiyan form, and improve it through all its power-ups and ascensions all the way to Super Saiyan 4 in Dragon Ball GT, the custom hero only unlocks first level of Super Saiyan and somehow manages to beat the most powerful villain in GT, Omega Shenron, a creature so powerful that it takes the fused power of Super Saiyan 4 Goku and Vegeta to beat in the show, after just a handful of fights with some big name members of the DB cast. All said, it falls immensely short.

Lastly, one of the most depressing parts is the dismal show of graphics and engine power. I understand that translating something like Dragon Ball into a bunch of three-dimensional, polygonal character models and environments isn't easy, but it can be done. In fact, it can be done extremely well. Just look at the original Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm. It looks incredibly crisp and fluid, and plays amazingly. In contrast, everything in UT is washed out, stiff, and cardboard. Raditz's flowing mane of hair stays disturbingly stiff throughout fights, and there's not much of an indication of a windup or even of choreography at all. This becomes even more apparent during some supers, when it becomes obvious that all large, medium, and small characters have identical skeletons with different meshes. Some supers involve a grab or series of punches that look completely off when hitting some other characters, like when Broly "grabs" a young Gohan by holding onto the air near his body. It can be assumed, then, that the attack was meant to hit Goku and only Goku, as it looks similarly weird on other large characters when Broly stabs his hand into their chest and presumably crushes several vital organs, but looks decent when used on medium-sized characters. You know, like Goku.

I think this is the biggest problem with UT as a whole. It feels half-done, or maybe even less than that, and plays like garbage. Never mind the dismal campaign. Never mind the awful scripting. Never mind the dirty, underdone graphics and the broken netcode that makes PvP the worst thing since getting Hadoukened into a corner repeatedly. The fact is, we've seen this done better. Not theoretically, either, we've seen some amazing, fluid fighting games in recent years that have done wonders with their limited art styles and super-strong ultimate attacks. And for a game like Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations to be immeasurably better than a Dragon Ball fighting game with this kind of pedigree? It's disgracefully shameful. Don't torture yourself or your wallet with this game. Just don't.