Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2

"Well, it's an improvement over for the first one, kinda."

Introduction
So, Dragonball Z Budokai came out on Playstation 2 and did the anime fighting game thing (read: mostly forgettable fanservice), and changed nobody's life, but it did put Dragonball Z fighting games into a 3D field. So Atari did the smart thing and made Budokai 2 with pretty cel-shaded graphics. Unfortunately, that improvement is offset by a bad story mode, and a general lack of polish.

Now the game encompasses the whole DBZ story, which means you'll have access to almost every character from the first game, plus about another bus-full of characters that you probably never liked. Buu, Kid Buu, and Super Buu all join the royale, along with the younger Saiyans, Kid Trunks, and Goten, and an older Gohan, the coolest of the bunch. Those are the only memorable new characters, and everybody else new has useless combos. Or whatever. Who cares?

Let's get the ugly out of the way. The Story Mode sucks, and is uninspiring. Making things worse, if you want to collect all the capsules, you have to play through it multiple times. It's the worst fighting story mode I've ever played. Devoted nerds might want to play the board game and try to re-enact the story, but it's just going to be a pain in the butt.

Budokai 2 improves over its predecessor, but fails at one major thing: Being appealing to the regular gamer looking for a good fighting game. You have your pretty effects (they are actually really amazing, compared to the original's bland graphics), voice acting, grunts, really loud Kamehameha's, transformations and fusions, but, nothing matters if the game capitalizes on nostalgicism, rather than real entertainment.

Yes, seeing Super Saiyan Three Goku and Gotenks duke it out is cool. Saiyan Fusions are easily the most powerful forms in the game, and some are downright hilarious. The blast waves are really spiffy too. Ultimate moves are increasingly impressive, and some actually make you smile from the kick-ass you've created as you pummel your opponent into submission. But, nothing's cool enough to get your friends to really care.

Sound
Not much of a difference between the first game. More wierd energy sounds, constipated yells, and cartoon-sounding explosions. More voices are nice, though. The battle music is still a bit lame.

11/15 points

Graphics
They're good enough. It was smart to go to cel-shaded graphics, but jagged edges, and a lack of life in character expressions, not to mention the fashionable constipated look when build up energy, all make for lackluster impressions. Still, they might be the highlight of the game.

15/20 points

Gameplay
The most important part of the game, and DBZ Budokai 2 isn't a letdown, but it isn't exactly the best example. Most characters are unbalanced, as some have really great moves, and others are too slow to perform their own special attacks. The most fun your newb friends will get out of this is spamming Gotenks and hold forward and punch forever, and hitting the circle button at random, and kicking your butt. The Saiyans enjoy ridiculous powerups and transformations, and the Buu's benefit from stupid-long range with their attacks. If you play out of the box of cool characters, you will hate this game. With the exceptions of some villain characters, most others are pretty much only useful for bragging rights, because it is embarrassing to have Goku get his ass handed to him by Yamcha. Cool concepts include things like struggles that occur at some Ultimate moves, and powering up to increases the power of your attacks, both by spinning the analog sticks rapidly, but the idea is lost under plenty of other problems you'll want to burn the disc over. Also, the story mode sucks.

31/50 points

Story
Story isn't the most important part, but, this game's story mode sucks. Hard. Unfortunately, it will be how you get breakthroughs for characters, and all the overpowered stuff. If you like collecting stuff, make sure you have a lot of patience, for the crappy story mode, and the amount of times you will have to play it through to get every Dragonball wish.

5/15 points

Replay Value
It's even worse than the first game, mostly because you don't want to deal with the story mode. 100% capsules is fun, but you'll usually get everything for your favorite characters and quit afterwards, leaving your friends to die because you have nothing for those unimportant characters they absolutely love to play with, but there is some fun to be derived from that, right?

(Low)

Total: 62/100 or 6/10, according to GameFAQS.

Final Recommendation
It's an improvement over the first, (kinda), but still not enough for people to pay attention. DBZ fans will enjoy this, fighting fans might enjoy this. The general gaming populace will not. Did I mention the story mode sucks?

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 02/25/08

Game Release: Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2 (US, 12/04/03)