I remember reading about this rumour a while back, and I'm pleasantly surprised to see that it's actually happening. I'm not entirely sure whether to be pleased that CyberConnect2 is developing the game - I've only played two of their games (Ultimate Ninja Storm 2 and Asura's Wrath), and they struck me as gorgeous in terms of presentation, but too mechanically shallow for it to engage me for more than five minutes. That said, those games were made years ago and this is an Action RPG, so I'm curious to see more of the game proper before I get properly interested or dismissive.
It's pretty cool to see a 3D Dragon Ball game where you can fully explore the world, but I'm really curious to know how you actually move about in the world. Too many open world games make the sheer act of moving the character functional but incredibly tedious (which strips all the fun out of exploring the world for its own sake), and I'm hoping that the controls/movement for the characters is enjoyable enough to be an adventure in its own right - much like how the UbiSoft Naruto games from the 00s managed to do that.
I actually don't mind the idea that this could be a traditional DBZ retelling. I never really felt that was a bad thing in the games, but I suppose the backlash came from a combination of two things: 1. There weren't really any games that offered an original story beyond the odd handheld original/spin-off, and 2. from 2005 to 2011, the series was dominated almost exclusively by the Budokai Tenkaichi/Sparking/Raging Blast style of gameplay. Even though I liked that style of gameplay, I imagine playing through the same narrative with the same gameplay for 5-7 titles in a row would get really boring.
But that was a long time ago: Dragon Ball games tend to tell their own stories these days, and usually offer a larger variety of gameplay styles. I think with that in mind, it's okay to do a game that retells the story with no additional twists or anything of the sort. And with the continuing focus on FighterZ and XenoVerse, it's not like this is going to bring us right back to having only "Raditz to Buu" games again. I'm happy with having both types of games around, especially since the retellings might be able to get new fans curious enough to check out the series (considering that was how I got into Dragon Ball back in 2008, I imagine that's happened for plenty of other folks, and could happen again with this one).
In regards to the speculation that this could be a Saiyan/Freeza only game like Legacy of Goku (BLECH), I'm not too sure. Yes, that's all we've been shown in the initial screenshots and teaser trailer - but I should point out that we've only been shown
the initial screenshots and teaser trailer. I'd suspect there is plenty more going on, but this is all we're being shown so far. Yes, we know that there is other material that comes after it, and it might seem weird that they won't show any of it (especially when it's at least 25 years old and would be pretty common knowledge amongst most fans by this point), but this is Japanese marketing. They tend to be a lot more secretive about things compared to the typical US approach of "show everything in case people get bored now now NOW!", because to show only a little bit of something can make people much more curious about something. I know I'm interested to see what else they've got to show for this game, and that might not be there if they showed off everything in the teaser trailer(!) before they even told us what the game's gonna be called.
I'm not saying it couldn't be a Saiyan/Freeza only affair (which would be really disappointing - as much as I like the idea of trying to expand on those arcs and fill them with interesting side-quests and stories "Attack of the Saiyans"-style, I really don't want the audience to feel like they should have to buy this game to partially ensure the existence of sequels to adapt the Cell and Buu arcs to a similar level of quality). All I'm saying is just wait until we hear more about this game; remember, we have no idea that XenoVerse was gonna have a somewhat original story and a character creator back when it was first announced way back when, so you never know.
The main thing that really interests me from that trailer are the cutscenes; not so much for the animation itself, but for the direction and cinematography. I once wrote about
how Burst Limit had the best cutscene direction out of any Dragon Ball game, most of which are pretty lacking and tasteless in their use of colours, storyboarding, sound and music, pacing, atmosphere, and the like. And going from a couple of the scenes in the trailer, it looks like this might be the first Dragon Ball game in a long time to try for something similar - the way Vegeta's death included a point-of-view shot of Goku, which is blurred by the tears in his eyes and quietly fading to indicate his impending death, is a particularly nice touch.
I don't have any of the consoles it's coming out on, nor do I have any need or incentive to get one right now, so I can't really look forward to playing this game. But I'm definitely interested to see how things turn out, particularly in the cutscenes and movement controls. Best of luck CC2, and I hope y'all make a good game that you've enjoy making.