Dragonball Z: A Japanese Anime that has been off the air for years, releases yet another fighting game. Everyone used to watch this show when they were younger, thirsting for violence and mediocre animation. Does this latest incarnation of the Dragonball universe stay true to the story? If you’re a fan of the series, stay tuned.

I remember being 12 years old, sitting wide eyed on my sofa while i waited for Dragonball Z to come on, while it was still showing on television it was a very popular show, and numerous videogames ensued due to its success. It revolves around the story of the Dragonballs. The Dragonballs are 7 orange balls that grant you one wish if you gather them all together. It’s the rare aspect of their nature that causes big nasty aliens to come looking for them, usually lusting after immortality, which is the obvious cue for our main characters to “save the world”, or something to that effect.

Graphically Burst Limit is pretty nice, the whole game is cell-shaded like it’s previous titles. While the colourful backgrounds adjust to the style easily, there’s something about the character style that never really quite fit 3D properly. They don’t look bad, but to any fan of the series, seeing Goku and Vegeta in 3D is never going to feel quite right. Overall though, its a great looking colourful game that will treat your eyes with a pleasurable experience.

Goku, full of rage

There’s not much to say about the controls. As a fighting game it’s as simple as it gets: light attack, heavy attack, ki blast and guard. With the shoulder buttons, using a few specials is easy enough, to pull of big moves and special attacks. The fact you can use the guard button to dodge melee attacks by mashing the button makes it easy to win matches, and the fighting can get a touch repetitive after a while.

Special moves are pulled off by directional buttons and the ki blast button, and you can transform in battle, upping your speed and power. This can be done by using the shoulder buttons, depending on your character as not all of them can transform. You can also use an “Aura Spark”, drenching your character in a glowing aura, this powers you up and doubles your attack power, but it doesn’t last long and uses up your ki.

Goku Transformed Into A Super Saiyan

The game tries to make the battles as interesting as possible using new items called Drama Pieces. A Drama Piece is an in game cinematic that appears when you fulfill certain conditions during a battle. For example, I have a drama piece equipped that nullifies one special attack; if you attacked me with one, it would cut to a cinematic of my character deflecting said attack then switch quickly back to the battle. This sounds great in theory, but in practice I found it to be frustrating, you can’t skip the scene and they can greatly interrupt the flow of the battle. Luckily, during Vs. matches you can choose not to include them. Each character can only utilize 3 Drama Pieces per battle.