"You will ONLY like this game if you are a DBZ fan"

''Dragon Ball Z: Legend of the Super Saiyajin'' was Bandai's first attempt at a Dragon Ball Z RPG for the SNES. Needless to say, they failed pretty miserably. This game is lacking in almost every category, with its only saving grace being the fact that it has the name DBZ on it. I think the scores will speak for themselves though.

GRAPHICS: 3/10

Now, the graphics for this title could have been worse, but not much. All of the game's images could have easily been recreated on the NES. When walking around on the world map, Goku, or whatever character happens to be leading the group, appears short, fat, and poorly drawn. The maps are no better with rocks and grass reminiscent of the original ''Final Fantasy.'' On top of this, there were only about 10 different enemies that could be fought against, while for variation Bandai changed the colors of some. The only thing that saved DBZ LOTS from a 1/10 was the battles. Some of the attacks are fairly decent looking, and the ki blasts don't look all bad. However, this does not excuse the rest of the game in this category.

SOUND: 1/10

This is the first game that I have ever given a 1/10 to in any category, but this one deserves it. There were only about 5 different tracks in the entire game, and every one of them was unbelievably repetitive. This, coupled with the fact that these repeating tracks don't sound all that good to begin with, does not make for a very good combination. If you choose to play this game, I think you will find yourself cranking up the stereo after about 20 minutes of play.

CONTROL: 9/10

Interestingly enough, this is the one category that not even DBZ LOTS could screw up. The game consisted of walking, flying, and battles which were all easy to control. Choosing fighters and their moves was all made very easy by the game's battle system, but then again, with an adventure RPG this category is really hard to bomb in.

GAMEPLAY: 5/10

TOO MANY %$#@ BATTLES!!!! The only things this game consisted of were looking for Dragon Balls (which were very easy to find with the radar) and fighting countless random battles. And, the battles never got any quicker to finish. Throughout the entire game an average battle took about 1-2 minutes. Now, pair this up with the fact that you had a random encounter every 6 steps and it quickly becomes very irritating.

Not to completely condemn this game, the battle system itself was actually pretty good. The fighting was turn based and every turn you could select up to 5 fighters to attack. The attack itself was based on a selection of 5 cards that were replaced every time one was chosen. This added a slight element of strategy to the fighting, but it is still mostly luck what cards you will get.

Another problem was that for any given boss fight there were only a couple of fighters actually worth attacking with. The rest usually died immediately when sent against almost any boss in the game. This aspect detracted a great deal from the overall gameplay.

STORY: 10/10

What do you expect? The story follows Dragon Ball Z from the beginning through the battle with Frieza. I am not going to go into it because everyone should know the story already, but this was one thing that Bandai did exceedingly well.

So, if you are a Dragon Ball Z fan, most likely you will have fun playing this game one time through. If not, don't even waste your time. The game was a little short, clocking in at about 15 hours, but that was plenty. Don't buy this even if held at gunpoint. Death would be more satisfying than the knowledge that you shelled out money for this cartridge.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 02/14/03, Updated 02/14/03