"Dragon Ball FighterZ" Official Discussion Thread

[AgitoZ]

Game looks great so far.

One thing I and several people noticed was that the game lacks music right now. A user on twitter recently added Kikuchi's BGM to some of the gameplay we've been shown and I'd say it fits very well. This lead me to think about the potential music for this game. I would very much like to see Kikuchi's classic score to be used for the game.

However, the reveal trailer during Microsof's E3 conference had rock/metal music playing through out and Guilty Gear's own soundtrack is mainly inspired by rock and metal. This leads me to speculate at the moment that the game might wind up with a similar sounding score. I know there's a certain subset of the fandom, particularly in America, that would be pleased with this but I think it would be highly inappropriate.

Even if we did get the Kikuchi score back, it's been pointed out to me that we could have it removed for international releases. We still had that happen even with the Raging Blast games. And I'd hope Bandai would be above that by now or at least fix whatever licensing issue that's preventing that score to remain consistent worldwide but you never know with this company.

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

However, the reveal trailer during Microsof's E3 conference had rock/metal music playing through out and Guilty Gear's own soundtrack is mainly inspired by rock and metal. This leads me to speculate at the moment that the game might wind up with a similar sounding score. I know there's a certain subset of the fandom, particularly in America, that would be pleased with this but I think it would be highly inappropriate.

No offense to it, but isn't the Kikuchi score used in ALL the Japanese dragonball games in general? You might be right about what American gamers might want to hear but I would like to hear more original scores for the games as well, as opposed to the same themes always taken from the anime. People generally want to fight to the themes they like to hear, not necessarily what is always spiritually faithful. I would rather a compromise to that though because I understand the significance the Kikuchi score has. I just personally don't want to hear Cha-La-Head-Cha-La all the time in every game opening, if some fans had it that way.

[VegettoEX]

No offense to it, but isn't the Kikuchi score used in ALL the Japanese dragonball games in general?

No. The only six games I'm aware of / off the top of my head that have default soundtracks which are reorchestrations of the original Kikuchi score (sometimes with the additional movie instrumental or GT jingle, as well):

Sparking!
Sparking! NEO
Sparking! METEOR
Raging Blast
Raging Blast 2
Ultimate Blast

... all of which were by the same developer (Spike), and all of which were made to be "simulators" in a sense of the fights in the show. The music was a part of that.

(We might also toss Zenkai Battle into the mix, I suppose, but it's arcade-only...)

And no, I don't want "CHA-LA HEAD-CHA-LA" as an opening game song for the umpteenth time, either.

[Quebaz]

No offense to it, but isn't the Kikuchi score used in ALL the Japanese dragonball games in general?

No. The only six games I'm aware of / off the top of my head that have default soundtracks which are reorchestrations of the original Kikuchi score (sometimes with the additional movie instrumental or GT jingle, as well):

Sparking!
Sparking! NEO
Sparking! METEOR
Raging Blast
Raging Blast 2
Ultimate Blast

... all of which were by the same developer (Spike), and all of which were made to be "simulators" in a sense of the fights in the show. The music was a part of that.

(We might also toss Zenkai Battle into the mix, I suppose, but it's arcade-only...)

Battle of Z as well.

[SquadronGOD]

So are we getting 1 on 1 fights or no? That 3 on 3 crap is just a big what if..

[VegettoEX]

Battle of Z as well.

No-one remembers Battle of Z.

(Not even Mike, apparently. Thanks!)

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

You know, what REALLY makes BT3 the "BEST" for them? Nostalgia? Aside from the roster (that I see more negatively than positive, because there's a lot of characters no one cares and it's very unbalanced), I don't really see their point. BT2 was really better gameplay wise for me, but everyone keeps talking about BT3 everytime and everywhere.

Its really just because of the roster and camera. When you look at why people are complaining about this game and read their alternatives, they really just want another 3D game that had this much cinematography, and they every year want huge rosters going into the hundreds just because that was their expectation they had from BT3 spoiling them with it. Then there are also people who think that the 3D games are "competitive" in arbitrarily, just because they particularly enjoy it - even if they really aren't. Its really just the people just wanting a huge roster and free roam. Nothing really of a counter-argument.

What I've seen from Arc System Works they just have slideshow story mode.

The DB fans definitely wont like that. They either want an extremely long, cut-scene centric storymode, or complain that its too long and want something shorter until the think its too short.

That said, the super moves cutscene transitions are simply out of this world. It’s like the gameplay and the anime are fully interactive with each other.

Its also something I doubt a sandbox fighter could really do, or at least I've never seen it by Spike for the longest time they've had the franchise. This game looks like the most detailed an anime DBZ game has ever been. Just from the intro an outro animations, you can see things literally directly taken from the anime. The cinematic heavy guilty gear games make that a good choice, even more so than what people wanted from Cyberconnect2.

“IT’S NOT LIKE TENKAICHI!! IT’S CRAP!!” : Again, this is an understandable attitude. Tenkaichi and Raging Blast and Xenoverse created the whole 3D arena fighter, which while it does have some faults (identical play between characters, not deep enough battle and combo system), it also provides the best possible emulation of fight and flight system the series is mostly known for. FighterZ cannot provide that - it’s a rock solid fighting game but it doesn’t have (and doesn’t want to have) free-roam flight mechanics. It’s a different type of game. So yeah, Tenkaichi fans and Xenoverse fans don’t care for deep fighting mechanics - they want huge rosters, free-roaming and, recently, character customization. FighterZ will not provide that, which is why they’re disappointed.

I honestly think the prejudice that DBFZ is getting from the younger/casual fanbase of the games just comes from their idea of how they think the games reflecting DBZ should be, based on the Tenkaichi hype and its camera angle completely changing expectations of how to feel immersed in it, and that they don't like Street fighter. But because of that vocal majority, Namco for the longest time just avoided the Budokai fans because people set the standard of their ideal dragonball experience based on the casual one. Dimps even said that they thought DB should be in 3D just because of those concepts and that honestly made me choke a bit reading it, seeing as Dimps was the transition back to 2.5D people expected, not Xenoverse.

[DBZAOTA482]

Battle of Z as well.

No-one remembers Battle of Z.

(Not even Mike, apparently. Thanks!)

It honestly should stay that way. That game was lamesville from top to bottom.

[Bullza]

What are the chances this game has a story mode?

[Quebaz]

What are the chances this game has a story mode?

Every ArcSys' fighting game since Battle Fantasia in 2007 has included some kind of story mode, be it Visual-Novel like (with various routes and choices to boot, leading to plenty of non-canon endings) or animated-features that are basically an 12 episode anime. Furthermore every DBZ game they did (Supersonic Warriors 1 and 2, Extreme Butouden) has included one as well.

[DBZ_Lee]

I'd say the 3v3 is part of the battle system, and I just don't see us being able to choose other combinations, or 1v1 sadly.
Each time Hiroki-San has been asked about it, she hasn't said no, but kind of avoided it - which suggests 1 of 2 reasons:

1. Not wanting any negativity by saying there are no other options.
2. Unable to say at the moment, as that would involve a feature from a mode in the game not yet announced.

I'm looking forward to the game hugely, but I admit I would have loved the option.

RE: Story Mode, I can't see there being much in the way of one sadly, but there will be scenes from the anime according to the original Press Release.

[AgitoZ]

I'd say the 3v3 is part of the battle system, and I just don't see us being able to choose other combinations, or 1v1 sadly.
Each time Hiroki-San has been asked about it, she hasn't said no, but kind of avoided it - which suggests 1 of 2 reasons:

1. Not wanting any negativity by saying there are no other options.
2. Unable to say at the moment, as that would involve a feature from a mode in the game not yet announced.

I'm looking forward to the game hugely, but I admit I would have loved the option.

I'm gonna have to agree with you and say that's what it looks like. The game Arc System Works is most trying to emulate is obviously Marvel vs. Capcom 3 (3 attack buttons and all) and that was also restricted to 3 on 3 fights.

[PeanutSaiyan]

Seeing the gameplay videos it looks fantastic visually, it definitely captures the look of the series better than any other game has ever done.

I am not impressed with the gameplay though. The fighting does look better than the Xenoverse games at least though that's not saying much.

I'm not usually that bothered with fighting games because they lack content. The DBZ games I've had more interest in because they have more content than usual especially Xenoverse.

This I expect will just be a basic fighting game. That Super Dragon Ball Z game was just like that and it was probably the worst game they did.

Well this plus a few posts in here...and consider me triggered. I'm not sure people realize that before this, Dragonball Z games were a running joke in the gaming community. More often than not, they were ass (especially after the SNES generation). There were a few gems in between all the shit, but it was really fucking bad. Budokai came out and while it was a mediocre game, the fact that there was a Dragonball Z fighter on the Ps2 that wasn't complete shit surprised the fuck out of everybody. Soon after Budokai 3 came out and blew everybody's fucking minds. A DBZ fighter that is actually..really fun to play? And has a surprising amount of depth as a fighter? AND captures the over the top action that's associated with the series? It was a goddamn miracle (and by miracle I mean DIMPS actually gave a fuck & tweaked/revamped the game engine after 2 previous iterations), and for that reason Budokai 3 to this day is still heralded as the apex of the DBZ fighting game genre.

Then came Tenkaichi, and even though it was a mediocre game it was trying to do something that seemed natural for this series. Unfortunately it somehow devolved into "xx character isn't in it!" and we got a bunch of fighters that play exactly the same and a fighting engine with almost no depth whatsoever. It's really a fucking travesty that people somehow care more about if Puar is in it instead of the actual gameplay. Empty, superficial, garbage. Xenoverse was supposed to bridge that gap, and while a much better game it also suffered from the same problems: characters that play exactly the same, empty fighting engine, etc.

Now we finally, finally get what seems to be the best possible scenario: A seasoned developer like System Arc Works working on a Marvel VS Capcom/Guilty Gear competitive fighter. Do you remember Super Sonic Warriors? The first one was one of the most underrated DBZ games ever. It was a hand held, beautiful 2D fighter that had a very simple combat system yet somehow managed to capture the feel of the series. From the artwork, to the character design, to what is probably one of the best "What-IF" story modes in the franchise...You can just tell that these guys were fans. They loved the series. The sprites were crafted in a way that capture the essence of each character - from the sounds, the way they move, etc. Even though it's a low-res GBA game, it's not hard to tell who's who simply because every character had stances and attacks that organically moved in the same manner the characters did in the show. And that is exactly what we're seeing now! Fans of the series, really putting in a lot of effort to capture these characters visually. Every kick, punch, even ki spam is directly referenced from the anime/manga. It's amazingly detailed work that we haven't seen put in a Dragonball game before in terms of capturing the personality of each character.

I've been waiting for this game for a long time and so have a lot of my friends. We could never get past the how awful the Tenkaichi series was, and not surprisingly we share a similar distaste for Super because of the lackluster quality. Right now we feel as if someone gathered all 7 dragonballs, and wished for this miracle.

Sales fell as part of a whole package, same kind of game, same characters, same Raditz to Buu story and in general very little separating each game. The sales have dropped and dropped since the original Budokai game, it's not because of the gimmicky 3D arena fighters.

The sales only picked up once again to the highest they've been with Xenoverse, a gimmicky 3D arena fighter and that's because it had something different.

And I don't know what you're talking about with this being Fighter Z being mainstream because it won't sell a fraction what Xenoverse sold.[/quote

Sales fell because in the end, it wasn't a very good game. It was a neat concept that turned into a cash-churning gimmick. And I'd be willing to bet that this game has garnered more media attention at 20% than a fully complete Xenoverse could have ever hoped for.

Goku
Vegeta
Gohan
Piccolo
Krillin
Tien
Roshi
Buu
Gotenks
Vegito
Beerus
Whis
Champa
Frieza
Tagoma
Botamo
Frost
Cabba
Magetta
Hit
Future Trunks
Black
Zamasu
Vegito
Merged Zamasu

I also think this is such a disaster. Botamo? Frost? Magetta? Tagoma? These are 1 dimensional, garbage characters that made a cameo in the series. I can't think of a worse list, really. Personally, I think Super is garbage and the farther they stay away from it the better. Let the Tenkaichi/Xenoverse crowd have those characters - that crowd loves 100 different skins slapped onto 1 dimensional fighting engines anyway. The only ones that deserve a spot (begrudgingly) would be Beerus and Goku Black/Hit. Seeing as how System Arcs seems to be fans of the series I would bet that they also have a bone to pick with just how bad Super has been handled, and hopefully that means we see a Z dominated roster.

I think somebody also mentioned that most of the people complaining are younger kids. And that makes sense, because the last few generations of gaming have been dominated by "frat boy" gameplay mechanics - i.e simple and not that deep/complex while delivering a hefty amount of fanservice. Unfortunately that's what dominates the market and some people grew up playing nothing but those games. You want superficial "content"? Go buy a pack of trading cards. Unfortunately you can say the same for today's Anime ecosystem - people are getting more and more used to lackluster effort behind what used to be a unique creative medium. And i'd argue the same explanation that the majority of people who are OK with Super are younger kids who just aren't that familiar with good storytelling and production.

as far as characters go - I want Broly. Love him or hate him, it'd be nice to see how they craft him in a fighter like this and it would offer up a different style of play for sure.

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

I also think this is such a disaster. Botamo? Frost? Magetta? Tagoma? These are 1 dimensional, garbage characters that made a cameo in the series. I can't think of a worse list, really. Personally, I think Super is garbage and the farther they stay away from it the better. Let the Tenkaichi/Xenoverse crowd have those characters - that crowd loves 100 different skins slapped onto 1 dimensional fighting engines anyway. The only ones that deserve a spot (begrudgingly) would be Beerus and Goku Black/Hit. Seeing as how System Arcs seems to be fans of the series I would bet that they also have a bone to pick with just how bad Super has been handled, and hopefully that means we see a Z dominated roster.

Agreed. Just because the characters are new, doesn't mean they are inherently good additions. There has always been a reason why, most games usually left out characters like Jiece, Burter, Dadoria, Zarbon, Android 19, Evil Buu, etc except for the Tenkaichi games that intentionally wanted a full cast. As with why GT casts never have all of the Shadow dragons either. No game beyond Heroes features them because of how unappealing they are. They aren't the faces of the arcs that most people are interested in. With Super, I haven't heard anyone say they cared about anyone beyond Hit, Frost Zamasu, Goku Black and maybe Champa and Cabbe. Beyond that, what is there to really offer with generic characters like Magetta, and henchmen like Tagoma, or characters like Botamo who have no techniques to them at all. Its why I could never see them as a priority. A priority roster of Super characters just because they're new seems pretty wasteful when these characters didn't do anything significant. Even less so than the majority of the Ginyu force. I honestly couldn't care less about Super being in beyond my interest for Hit, Beerus, Champa and Zamasu.

I think somebody also mentioned that most of the people complaining are younger kids. And that makes sense, because the last few generations of gaming have been dominated by "frat boy" gameplay mechanics - i.e simple and not that deep/complex while delivering a hefty amount of fanservice. Unfortunately that's what dominates the market and some people grew up playing nothing but those games. You want superficial "content"? Go buy a pack of trading cards. Unfortunately you can say the same for today's Anime ecosystem - people are getting more and more used to lackluster effort behind what used to be a unique creative medium. And i'd argue the same explanation that the majority of people who are OK with Super are younger kids who just aren't that familiar with good storytelling and production.

Agreed. I've been in debates about this in Soul Calibur forums within the same discussion on if gimmicks like guest characters and create a soul, end up being so popular to the casual crowd, that the demand and focus eventually eclipses the actual demand for the fundamental aspects of the franchise. The people that get used to expecting these gimmicks will end up seeing them as the priority simply because they like them, while their disinterest in the actual fundamentals for the games are ignored or complained about, to the point where they get dumbed down under the false sense of an accessibility curb for people who don't play the games for competition. With anime, I see it the same way. People treat anime like One Punch Man as revolutionary only because they are just written and animated better than most of the mediocrity of Toei (and those slice of life harem shows that get popular simply because of the gimmicks they have to their bizarre settings, or Otaku pandering, over actual quality). With shows like Super, we have people who generally watch nothing but shounen, or those who don't see DB as a well written story, but just on the hype of seeing powerful fights and new content added onto their nostalgia. So they will defend Super's mediocrity as if it is the best the series can do, just because it set the standard for itself to them, and they've never seen or care to see better.

[MCDaveG]

If there was a Story Mode, besides Arcade with maybe an opening and ending for each character, I would love the anime story being completely reimagined with different dialogues and the villain will have simmilar or different goals.
Something like the Red Ribbon arc from the 10th Anniversary Dragon Ball movie.
As much as I am bored from the anime to game word for word remakes from the series, I am starting to get bored from the ''Oh, all the villains are back!!! Let's defeat them again!'' also (Shin Budokai 1 and 2, Dokkan Battle).

My favorite story modes were in Supersonic Warriors 1 on GBA. Something like that

[Bullza]

I also think this is such a disaster. Botamo? Frost? Magetta? Tagoma? These are 1 dimensional, garbage characters that made a cameo in the series.

A lot of Dragon Ball characters are one dimensional. The Ginyu Force are one dimensional but you'd probably be fine with those characters being in it. It also doesn't have anything to do with being in a fighting game.

These are characters from the new current series and characters we haven't already got to play as in over 20 odd games already. Botamo, Frost and Magetta have made multiple appearances in the series. If they can already have Golden Frieza then they can out these in.

By your own logic it was a disaster to include characters like Android 19 and 20 into a game when they were hardly in the series or Dabura.

as far as characters go - I want Broly. Love him or hate him, it'd be nice to see how they craft him in a fighter like this and it would offer up a different style of play for sure.

And yet he's the most one dimensional character of them all, who has appeared in damn near every game already because he's popular with the "frat boy" who think he's cool because he shouts a lot and has big muscles.

[Zidiane]

What I've seen from Arc System Works they just have slideshow story mode.

The DB fans definitely wont like that. They either want an extremely long, cut-scene centric storymode, or complain that its too long and want something shorter until the think its too short.

This was the Guilty Gear XRD -REVELATOR- Story Mode (edit: Arc System Work's latest fighter, which seems to share its model style w/ DBFZ).

https://youtu.be/G3ACgWrS-d0?t=2m32s (edit: this scene shows a lot of comic/manga style shots, which would work amazingly for Dragon Ball)

There should be a good story mode with plenty of nice cutscenes, fully animated interactions, voice acting. Then aside from this nice, long story book story, Revelator had additional short separate arcade stories for each character.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NesBKdgB1XE

The worst part about it is in the main story mode you didn't actually fight, it was just a long movie where you had to keep going through dialogue. I hope they change that for FighterZ. I always like fighting the story fights.

[MCDaveG]

However, the reveal trailer during Microsof's E3 conference had rock/metal music playing through out and Guilty Gear's own soundtrack is mainly inspired by rock and metal. This leads me to speculate at the moment that the game might wind up with a similar sounding score. I know there's a certain subset of the fandom, particularly in America, that would be pleased with this but I think it would be highly inappropriate.

No offense to it, but isn't the Kikuchi score used in ALL the Japanese dragonball games in general? You might be right about what American gamers might want to hear but I would like to hear more original scores for the games as well, as opposed to the same themes always taken from the anime. People generally want to fight to the themes they like to hear, not necessarily what is always spiritually faithful. I would rather a compromise to that though because I understand the significance the Kikuchi score has. I just personally don't want to hear Cha-La-Head-Cha-La all the time in every game opening, if some fans had it that way.

I've never had Kikuchi score in video game... Sadly
Had to import Sparking! Meteor to enjoy the full DB sim.

But I am all for original score here, Kikuchi score doesn't fit for me in this type of game.

[PeanutSaiyan]

I also think this is such a disaster. Botamo? Frost? Magetta? Tagoma? These are 1 dimensional, garbage characters that made a cameo in the series.

A lot of Dragon Ball characters are one dimensional. The Ginyu Force are one dimensional but you'd probably be fine with those characters being in it. It also doesn't have anything to do with being in a fighting game.

These are characters from the new current series and characters we haven't already got to play as in over 20 odd games already. Botamo, Frost and Magetta have made multiple appearances in the series. If they can already have Golden Frieza then they can out these in.

By your own logic it was a disaster to include characters like Android 19 and 20 into a game when they were hardly in the series or Dabura.

as far as characters go - I want Broly. Love him or hate him, it'd be nice to see how they craft him in a fighter like this and it would offer up a different style of play for sure.

And yet he's the most one dimensional character of them all, who has appeared in damn near every game already because he's popular with the "frat boy" who think he's cool because he shouts a lot and has big muscles.

19 & 20 played a pivotal part in the arc with 19 being Dr.fucking Gero. The Ginyu Force easily have much more personality and staying power than those other characters. They aren't the best choices to fill up a roster but to include some one-shot characters that barely had any impact on the story is ridiculous.

[simtek34]

New interview from Gamespot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHnBhhRUzhA