Budokai 2 is where the Dragon Ball Z games finally clicked for me. The cel-shaded art style was great, the roster was bigger and more varied and there was a lot more to do. Hell back then I even really enjoyed the QTEs that happen frequently during matches, something I’ll admit to disliking now, beyond the odd beam clash or high-speed punching, anyway. The thing I most remember about Budokai 2 though is the story mode, which instead of anything resembling a traditional set up is a strange board game thing, plus this game has a bunch of “what if?” fusions which are a really fun feature that sadly never returned, even in the direct sequel. So, let’s take a look!
Background:
Something about the movement in this game causes this weird half-faded thing to happen, so don’t expect many action packed screenshots here!
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2 was released for the PS2 on November 14th 2003 in Europe, December 4th 2003 in the US and February 5th 2004 in Japan, so again very much backwards to what you’d expect a Japanese-developed game based on a popular Japanese property! It was later ported to the GameCube in on December 15th 2004 in the US and March 18th 2005 in Europe, with no Japanese release at all. Given the Budokai HD collection was just the first and third games this is it for Budokai 2…
The roster this time went up to the Buu Arc, so had the proper 3D debuts of Adult (really Teen, but let’s not go there…) Gohan, all the forms of Buu, Dabura etc, and while it cut Kid Gohan, Dodoria, Zarbon, Android 19 and all earlier forms of Frieza and Cell it did oddly add Android 20 a.k.a. Dr. Gero along with extra forms of Buu where he absorbed people like Frieza, Cell and Vegeta, which was fun, and introduced in-game fusions as well, meaning Vegito, Gotenks and even some what if fusions like Tiencha and Gokule (or Gotan, really…) debuted here. As mentioned though, the What If? fusions and Buu absorptions are removed from future games, giving this game some replay value, if nothing else. I’ll also mention that a couple of the levels are weirdly based on the original Dragon Ball series, being the Red Ribbon Army base and Muscle Tower, so that’s fun but also weird given the game only covers Z. It also made up some levels as well, which is actually fun for variety (especially when embarking on a marathon like this!)
Gameplay:
Krillin just about to use the Kamehameha… um, that’s about it. Couldn’t really think of anything else to say…
As I remembered the gameplay here is much the same as the first game at a base level, so a punch, kick, block and ki blast button and special moves done by pressing a combination of the face buttons and maybe one direction like forward or back rather than traditional quarter-circle motions and what-not, though you can now dodge quickly in four directions and duck as well fly in the air intentionally rather than just because you were hit, making this much more of a 2.5D fighter than the last one, which was mostly on a 2D plain. New to the game are proper cinematic Ultimate attacks, which are big fancy massively-damaging attacks that you need a lot of Ki meter to pull off that in the last game were often not much different from regular ones, plus here they normally come with a mini-game like having to rotate the analogue stick to build up a meter or having to press a sequence of buttons within a short time, that kind of thing. Mildly annoying to me now but at the time I was perfectly happy, and in fact I think rotating the stick to see the meter go all the way up to “Max” made the move feel more powerful to me if I remember correctly, so I actually thought it was a “great idea” back then. Some characters have multiple different Ultimate attacks as well that can be swapped out thanks to the capsule system, which is fun. What I did eventually find annoying and now found annoying right away was a few sequences in the middle of the battle that are cutscenes where you have more QTE mini-games to do. It’s more the fact that you end up seeing the same cutscene over and over again when really I just want to have a 1 on 1 fight, it’s something that gets worse in the sequel, perhaps the only thing worse in the sequel, but we’ll wait and see on that. Overall it’s fine and does feel more polished than the previous game, but it’s still very “all ages” friendly and doesn’t have much depth, that’s one of the good things about the sequel that we’ll get to!
There also some screen transitions, where if you hit someone hard at the edge of the screen they get smacked through a mountain or some such and land on another level, a pretty common thing in 2D fighters now but at the time it was a really “cool” thing, and honestly even now it’s still fun. Some nit-picks still remain however, like non-sensical “transformations” like Unlock Potential (plus they gave Future Trunks “Super Saiyan 2” instead of the graded forms for some reason… that caused confusion from some on message boards at the time, let me tell you!), the fact you lose transformations far too easily making them not really worth doing a lot of the time (especially Super Saiyan 3, which drains you Ki like nobody’s business) and fusions aren’t selectable characters, instead you can only do them in-game by having enough Ki and doing a timed button press mini-game and will defuse after a set amount of time, so again it rarely feels worth it. I like transforming and fusing mid-game in other games but those games you can’t get knocked out of powered up forms and you can select to start as a fusion character from the start if you want. It’s one of those cases where back then getting to transform or fuse mid-match at all was a new thing so I thought it was great, but now it feels frustrating. The capsule system is also back from B1, where transformations, special attacks, stat buffs and special items like senzu beans to heal mid-match are able to be set on characters with a limited amount of space, but also like last time you can wish for “Breakthrough” capsules with the Dragon Balls that just give you all the moves and transformations available for the character in question in one capsule.
You’ll be seeing this… A LOT.
As for modes the big one is the new “Dragon World” mode, which as mentioned is the part of Budokai 2 that always stuck in my mind. It’s a set of nine board game boards loosely based on each arc, with a few not at all based on any arc sprinkled in, and you play as Goku moving around the board, but each time with a different ally or two in tow. Each character on the board, friend or foe, has a meter next to them with up to five bars, and each time you or an opponent is defeated they lose a bar, lose all bars and they’re knocked off the board (or its game over if it’s you!) Each turn you can move a space and meeting up with allies or getting to a location before an enemy can grant bonuses, including reaching Vegeta will unlock the ability to fuse into Vegito, that sort of thing. It’s where some of the funny non-canon fusions and transformations come from. You can also collect items, money and Dragon Balls, and if you gather all seven you can wish for the aforementioned Breakthrough capsules, or new characters/fusions, costumes or for “Babidi’s Spaceship” which is a mode I’ll get to later. It’s a fun mode honestly and makes a change from all the constant strict re-telling of the core story via cutscenes that most games go for.
Other modes on offer include the now-standard Duel (basic exhibition mode against humans or CPU), and World Tournament, which this time not only has the regular tournament with three difficulties each with greater prize money pots but also has a “Cell Games” tournament where you’re allowed to use fusions during the tournament and the final fight is with Cell, naturally. Then we have the Babidi’s Spaceship mode I mentioned that’s locked behind a Dragon Ball wish. There you fight the CPU with various harsher and harsher win conditions, with each victory building up an energy meter that at certain milestones unlocks things, including characters like Dabura and the different forms of Buu. Aside from that you just have your basic edit modes and shop area, where you can use earned Zeni to buy skill and buff capsules for characters. Funnily enough Bulma is the “shopkeeper” so to speak and you can wish for different costumes she’s worn over the course of the series that can appear in the shop menu with the Dragon Balls. I mean, I’d personally unlock actually useful stuff first, but hey-ho, play long enough and you too can see Bulma in her original story arc bunny girl outfit!
Graphics and Sound:
Can’t say I remember the classic Goku vs. Majin Vegeta showdown happening at a weird floating sky temple, but maybe my memory’s just fuzzy…
As mentioned the graphics were great at the time, one of the first times I saw cel-shaded graphics and it made such a big difference to the frankly poor visuals of the previous game. The menus are clean with good art too. Obviously in 2024 it looks a bit ropey to say the least, but you know as scary as it is to say this game is now over two decades old, so I’m not going to hold ropey graphics against it now!
Sound is good all round, sadly its locked to the FUNimation dub only which wasn’t as big a deal back then but it certain is now (I still have issues with some of the FUNi dub voices, especially kids like Trunks and Goten sound really ear-grating, but that’s just a me issue by the sounds of it!) and the background music is catchy, though apparently plagiarised or at the very least composed by someone who has famously arrested for plagiarism of other music, so don’t expect a “Budokai retro OST pack” for any game soon.
I also want to give a shout out to the amazing intro movie, which was fully animated with gorgeous traditional 2D artwork and a catchy new song by classic Opening vocalist Hironobu Kageyama (at least here in the UK/Europe and Japan, in the US they just had an instrumental version) Budokai 3 got one as well then they pretty much stopped and went to cheaper 3D stuff, which makes sense given the 2D animation cost would’ve been quite high…
Story:
Majin Frieza is born as you wander across the board.
Story-wise there isn’t much to talk about here. The “Dragon World” boards touch on all the major events of the Saiyan, Frieza, Cell and Buu arcs, plus add some extra bits like Frieza and his force invading Earth or Babidi bringing Frieza and Cell back to life as Majin Frieza and Majin Cell, which is fun even if it was just sticking a white ‘M’ on existing artwork / character models and giving them more health!
Thoughts Then:
Gohan teaches his younger brother how to get smacked in the face.
At release I loved it thanks to my deep obsession with Dragon Ball at the time and I played it solidly for a month or two and then on-and-off right up to the release of Budokai 3 the following year. Finally a Dragon Ball Z game I actually enjoyed playing!
Thoughts Now:
Much like the Krillin-absorbed-Cell from the last game, let’s end with a picture of one of the unique-to-this-game-only forms… justice for Tiencha!
Funnily enough now it’s still quite fun! Sure the combat is still extremely simple even compared to the Budokai games that followed but ignoring that the unique story mode and this-game-only-exclusive fusions and forms meant it was actually still a good time, honestly. I mean once I went through “Dragon World” I wasn’t really compelled to stay, happily moving on to 3, but I wasn’t really expecting to spend much time on some of these games, so Budokai 2 can be happy with that at least.
Hogan Reviews 