"Sigh... another sloppy dbz game for fans"

Note: my reviews' scores use 5 as an average score, rather than 7 -7.5 as an average as most people and schools do. Therefore, 1 is terrible, 3 is bad, 5 is average, 7 is good, and 10 is amazing.

DBZ: Supersonic Warriors II

Summary: A fighting game for DS; sequel to GBA game. DBZ characters. Where have I heard that before?

Graphics 7/10 (good)
Pretty good, but the background is somewhat blurry. Smooth animations, and well... it's DBZ, you know what to expect.

Mechanics/Controls 6/10 (above average)
Spelling mistakes and Engrish galore. Very poor job translating. The controls are actually pretty simplistic; all the characters have the same control set (A+X for special move, B+Y for throw) so you don't have to memorize or study movesets. But on the downside, a loooot of the characters have the same moves. Poor use of touch screen; all it does is tap to switch characters or tap for a "team special".

Sound/Music 7/10 (good)
Voice acting is quite annoying at times... would be better if there were an option for Japanese voice. The music, on the other hand, is actually pretty good. There's a lot of rock-ish background music with some nice distortion guitar.

Storyline/Depth 5/10 (average)
Fighting games aren't exactly known for great storylines. This game creates "what-if" scenarios for characters. These would have been nice, if they made the least bit of sense. For example, in one of Ginyu's branched storylines, he goes to Earth and collects Dragonballs. Every time he's confronted by Goku or Piccolo or someone else, they fight, and at the end Ginyu says "look over there, it's Freeza!" and runs away. Then, he calls Shenron, revives Freeza, and together they beat Broly. Um... right... it seems every time they run out of ideas for a character, they shove Cooler or Broly into the branched storyline and make up some completely unfeasible way for them to meet and fight.

Creativity 2/10 (bad)
Oh there is NO creativity in this game. In fact, it's a step down. In the first DBZ:SW, some characters had some unique skills (freeza's planet destruction, dr gero's absorption, etc); these skills are either removed, or turned into "ultimates" (can only be used with 150%, with red health, once per battle, facing a certain direction) which makes them so rare to be used that they may as well have been removed. There are a bunch of modes, but they all involve the same old fighting. Also, the same old characters that are always in DBZ games are used, plus Cooler and Broly from the movies (who pop up their heads more than they should in the storylines). A lot of "support characters" like Dende, Dabora, Zarbon, Hercule who you can call (they come, do one attack, and leave) would have been nice if they were actual playable characters.

Gameplay 7/10 (good)
Despite its problems, the actual fighting is not too bad. You fly around, trading punches and kicks. Charge up KI, and you can use Ki attacks or a special move. Tag team battles, some characters have "team special attacks" with other characters. The actual fighting system is somewhat innovative and provides fun battles.

Balance 2/10 (bad)
Characters in a game are supposed to be balanced... right? Well, usually some of them end up superior and some inferior, but they're not supposed to be advertised that way or created that way... well they ARE. This game uses "DP" (dragon power) to determine which characters you can use. At the start, you have 7 DP (more can be unlocked by beating certain modes) with which to build a team. Dr. Gero costs 1 GP and Gotenks costs 7 DP. Yeah, it makes sense too, because Gotenks can beat Dr. Gero without taking as much as a scratch. Literally, one or two punches from Gotenks will off about as much HP off Gero as Gero can take off Gotenks with multiple energy attacks.

Replay 4/10 (below average)
Not that much incentive to clear everything. You probably will get fed up playing the storyline even once, because some of the "branching" storylines require you to win with strange conditions (that you aren't told about; trial and error or use a guide) such as: win with a perfect, win by time out, win with a certain character, defeat enemies in a certain order (and this one is terrible because you have no control over when the computer switches chars; you just dodge and wait).

Tilt 5/10
A mediocre game. A lot of issues with it, but is fun for a while.

Overall 5/10 - AVERAGE

Worth playing?
It's not the worst game out there; it's fun, but don't expect it to last too long.

Worth buying?
Nah... unless you're a hardcore DBZ fan.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 01/16/06