So kicking off the gaming side of the DBZ movie/game marathon-thingy is the game that feels like it kicked off Dragon Ball games, as it was the first released here in the west that was any good (for context: you can find my reviews of “Ultimate Battle 22” and “Final Bout” by clicking on them here…) Admittedly as with most things that are the start of a series with multiple sequels this game is quite lacking in polish and modes it still created a solid framework to build on, and has a few unique gameplay ideas that I hadn’t experienced before or really since beyond its sequels. Sadly it looks like crap (even at the time I thought it looked off) but hey-ho. Let’s take a look!
Background:
This is why cel-shading was invented…
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai was released on the PlayStation 2 oddly in Europe first, on November 29th 2002, followed by December 4th that same year in the US and February 13th 2003 in Japan under the simple title of “Dragon Ball Z” (Yes, Japan got a Dragon Ball release after the English speaking territories, the anime’s Western boom was in full swing!) A Gamecube release followed on October 28th 2003 in the US, and November 2003 in Europe and Japan. It also has to be stated that the game only has the Japanese voice over in Europe, whereas the US version has the dub. Very odd, and something that never happens again, but I didn’t mind, I would’ve switched languages to Japanese anyway…
The game was re-released as part of the Dragon Ball Z: Budokai HD Collection along with Budoaki 3. It came out on the PlayStation 3 and XBOX 360 on November 2nd 2012 in Europe and November 6th in America, keeping up the weird Europe-first tradition. It also kept Budokai 1 only have Japanese voices for the European release, which is odd given it clearly could’ve had it this time round. I never brought the HD collection so I won’t be mentioning it beyond this point in the review, but from what I see beyond making it 16:9 there isn’t a great deal of difference…
As for roster the game only covers the Saiyan through Cell arcs and due to limitations of the time only has 23 characters playable, including Dodoria, Zarbon and Android 19, three characters that wouldn’t appear in the Budokai series again, oddly. It also has The Great Saiyaman despite not covering the Buu arc and files indicate Cui was supposed to be in but was cut, he wouldn’t make it into a fighting game until the roster-crazy Budokai Tenkaichi / Sparking! games. I’ll also mention that this game started the idea that Gohan and Krillin’s unlocked potential from the Frieza arc was a transformation they could access, rather than a boost to their base ability. Same with Piccolo and his two fusions, thankfully this vanished along with the Budokai series because it always kind of annoyed me.
Gameplay:
The “Power-weighted” Cell form is also pretty much exclusive to this game…
The combat in Budokai 1 is very simple, it’s something they add to as they go along to make it a bit more varied but here you have basic punch, kick, block and a “fire small ki blast” button and much like the PS1 games that came before it you have get knocked into the air and hover for a bit but otherwise we’re in basic 2D fighting territory. There are special moves obviously, done by pressing a combination of buttons rather than using directional inputs, but these are unlocked via “capsules” that have to be equipped onto a fighter, with only limited capsule room, which given you also have capsules for transformations and strength/health multipliers it is actually quite fun shifting things around and makes each player’s version of most characters unique, up to a point. You can eventually use collected Dragon Balls to wish for “Breakthrough Capsules” that take up just one Capsule slot but give you all the moves and transformations at once, leaving you free to add some buffs in the other slots. Still it was a unique idea at the time and something that has reappeared in a few different guises since.
The main thing I didn’t like replaying this, and this is something that appears in all the Budokai games, is that transformations vanish when you take a hit and your Ki is low, that always annoyed me. I mean I get how it happens sometimes with Saiyan transformations in the show but as a gameplay mechanic it just meant I had to keep charging Ki and re-inputting the transformation button sequence several times (or less, depending on how hard the fight was!) while also fighting, which meant often I just wouldn’t bother. The special moves being face buttons and the only real combos being “push square a few times then triangle” means this is a simple game to pick up and play well with very little in the way of skill needed. Again this was something addressed as the series went on, to be fair to Budokai 3 lovers, but in terms of this game it’s quite a bare-bones experience.
One of the mini-games from the story mode… by which I mean, the ONLY mini-game from story mode…
Game mode wise though it does have quite a few on offer. Story mode is just that, you play through the story with a few “What If?” side stories I’ll get to in the Story section (plus one solitary mini-game where you have to line up Raditz as Goku to get drilled with the Special Beam Cannon, that was fun, odd it was the only one!); a World Tournament mode where you can compete in increasingly more difficult tournaments with more competitors in; and the “Legend of Mr. Satan” mode (or “Legend of Hercule” if you wish) is basically a classic Arcade mode run where you defeat the cast of the game as Mr. Satan with some gimmick challenges like a tight time limit or only using one type of offense. There is also the standard versus mode and training mode, naturally. So while future games will add more diverse modes for the first in a series that’s not too bad, really.
That’s your lot. There’s a shop where you can buy capsules, or if you’re lucky Dragon Balls, from Mr. Popo using Zeni (money) you’ve won via Tournaments, but that’s it! Again, for a game built from the ground up on the PS2 it’s not bad at all and served as a good foundation to build on.
Graphics and Sound:
Just for the record, my PS2 emulator had issues with this game, meaning only one or two of these screenshots are actually mine. Can you find the give-away as to which is which?
As mentioned the graphics are pretty damn ugly, even at the time I thought they looked “wrong” and me and my friends would laugh at them (while enjoying the game, to be fair!) The pure CG blob style was not a good choice, thankfully for the sequel they went in a cel shaded style and Dragon Ball games haven’t looked back since. The intro is also pretty disappointing, while “Cha-la Head Cha-la” is always welcome (here in the European version) the visuals use the same blobby character models so it’s a far cry from anime intros to come, let’s put it that way!
Sound-wise it’s fine. Decent background music, good sound effects and the Japanese voice cast are always on point. If you play the US version then the FUNimation voice cast are good too, I’m sure. Nothing outstanding though, unlike some later DBZ PS2 games coming up in this list.
Story:
Some of the cut scenes are good, I’ll give the game that! (well, I should say “well animated”, I guess…)
Obviously I’m not going to recap the Saiyan, Frieza and Cell arcs here, so whenever a game adds something new to the lore I’ll talk about it, and in Budokai 1’s case they added three “What If?” stories centred around the three key villains of each arc. For the Saiyan Arc Vegeta simply beats Goku, Krillin and Gohan with little effort and then offers Yajirobe a place by his side (presumably for a laugh…) and when he turns him down Vegeta gets so angry he turns Super Saiyan. What a load of bollocks, but still Saiyan Arc armoured Vegeta going Super Saiyan is a cool visual (if the visual style wasn’t crap). For the Frieza arc one… Frieza kills everyone, wishes for immortality and then destroys Namek before heading to Earth. Not very exciting, I’m afraid.
The Cell arc one though still lingers in my head all these years later: Cell absorbs 17 but as he goes to absorb Android 18 Krillin steps in the way and Cell absorbs him instead and transforms into a smaller, much weaker version of himself, so weak that he has trouble beating Yamcha and then is about to be defeated by Tenshinhan before the actual Perfect Cell wakes up, it being revealed as a nightmare he was having while waiting in his ring for the Cell Games to start. It’s a good gag, and it being a dream means any fan annoyed at Cell being able to absorb and get characteristics of anyone other than the Androids not making any sense can relax (that included 18-year-old me when I first played it, I’m afraid to say…)
Overall a bit of fun with the Cell one, but otherwise just “the villain wins” as the bonus stories, which isn’t super interesting…
Thoughts Then:
The Goku-Ginyu does battle with Vegeta at the World Tournament, just like the show!
I was excited to finally play a Dragon Ball Z game I could actually stand to play and happily made my way through the story mode and tournaments etc, but with the exception of a few multiplayer sessions with friends and nephews I soon moved on to something else. It lacked any kind of staying power that the following games had, possibly due to the visual style just not being pleasing or very “of the show”, or maybe the simplistic mechanics not appealing. Either way, it was “fine” but not much else.
Thoughts Now:
Cell with Krillin absorbed, the one thing everyone remembers about the game!
Now? Well, not good I’m afraid. Completely understandably of course, a game from 2002 that was the first entry in a series that got several sequels to improve upon it isn’t going to hold up, but while I was happy to play the next bunch of sequels and spin-offs from this game I can’t say I would happily play this again, it’s too basic and really isn’t much of a looker! Ah well, it’s still better than Ultimate Battle 22, anyway…
Hogan Reviews 