Dragon Ball Z: The Legacy of Goku

"It's a good thing this game is short."

Introduction

This game pretty much defines, utter and repetitive crap. I seriously doubt this game had a development team that worked on it. Because I've seen much better games made by some guy who used a flash program. And that is a pretty damn sad thing to say. This is the most unprofessionally put together crap, I have ever played in ages. The only good thing about this game, is the fact that it is short. So I didn't have to sit through as much torture to get to the end of the game.

Gameplay 1/10

You play as Goku. And anyone with any shred of common sense, can tell you that he is supposed to be a powerful character. I mean, he can shoot beams of energy from his hands. Is an expert at hand to hand combat, and can even fly. So why is he reduced to getting his ass handed down to him by snakes and crabs? Even I can kill snakes and crabs in real life. If that doesn't make things bad enough, most of your attacks seem to go right through your enemy. So when you run into wolves for the first time... they will rip you to shreds.

Battles consist of hitting the punch button over and over praying it makes contact with the enemy. Or they would, if it weren't for the fact that if an enemy hits you once. Say goodbye to pretty much half of all your health. So the only tactic you can utilize would be the good ol Hit n Run. Out walk (yeah no run button) your enemy a bit, turn around and shoot off a ki blast. Rinse, lather, and repeat. The same way you kill a crab, is the same way you will be killing Freiza.

This game also has poor excuses for quests. The first one you will be doing, is collecting Magazines for Master Roshi that are in plain sight. Seriously, you would have to be blind to not miss them. That quest is more like a waste of time. There is also no incentive to do any of the quests. They only give you a little bit of exp as a reward. So it's best to just do the required quests to get through the main plot(if you would call it that). This is the first RPG game I have ever played, that made me feel like not wanting to explore and complete everything.

Sound 1/10

The sound is something you would expect from an Atari game. The music tracks are also pretty short, and get repetitive pretty fast. Nothing memorable in the soundtrack, other than Goku yelling Kamehameha if you charge it long enough. Another thing that ticked me off, was the boss music. It wasn't even upbeat, or action packed. It was something you would hear walking around in one of the towns of the game. They really should have used some more DBZ soundtracks.

Graphics 1/10

Not even the graphics in this game are any good. The effects of this game, such as the Ki blast or Kamehameha look like they were made from 2 minutes of Microsoft Paint. The Kamehameha for instance, is nothing but a small line made up of two bars stuck together. Also, items needed for "quests" and such blend into the background easily. In one required quest, you need to find three rocks to make a bridge for some old fart trapped on a small island in a river. The fact of them being hidden isn't the hard part, but the fact that they blended in the background so well... I didn't even know if I could pick them up or not until I tried. For another example, the Namek saplings look exactly like any other tree you would find on Namek. Thank god that quest was optional.

I'll give the graphics one thing, the intro and ending were ripped pretty good. Scenes directly from the anime fit into the small screen nicely, though it could have been in better quality. It looked a bit pixilated even on a small screen.

Execution 1/10

This game has just about the worst scripting I've seen in any game. They made the final battle a joke. Krillin for instance, walks up to Frezia just BEGGING to be slaughtered. When instead, he should have been shot from far away like in the anime. Becoming a Super Sayin does absolutely nothing but make your hair turn blonde. No super speed, no super power, not a damn thing. And the area you fight in, instantly transforms into a planet on the brink of falling apart. There is no smooth, swift transaction of the planet being destroyed by your combat together. It's just, one moment, poof! Speaking of Boss Battles, every single one of them starts off with the boss randomly walking around just ahead of your friends waiting for you to talk to them. For instance, when you get to Vegita. You can walk right up in front of him, run(excuse me, walk) in circles around him, pose for a picture right next to him, etc... It's almost as if he doesn't even notice you are there.

Also, when characters "fly" in to talk to you. Such as Raditz, or Piccilo at the beginning of the game. They just instantly, and magically spawn right next to you. There is no animation of them flying and landing on the ground. No animation of them lifting off, and flying of the screen. Just an instant spawn and despawn. Also, when characters "blow up", such as one of Freizas victims, they despawn as well. There isn't even a puff of smoke, or even a sound effect. It's like they put no effort into making this game. Like I said before, I've seen amateur gamemakers do better scripting in flash games than this.

Is this game worth a buy?

No, it isn't even worth a rent (if you can still rent GBA games). Nor is it even worth borrowing it from a friend, who sadly had to blow money on buying this pathetic excuse of a game.

Reviewer's Score: 1/10, Originally Posted: 07/27/06