Episode #0294 (08 April 2012)

[VegettoEX]

Episode #0294 (download MP3) (rss feed) (subscribe in iTunes)
35:32; 96 kbps, mono; 24.6 MB

Episode #0294! VegettoEX and Meri discuss what it was like to be a fan of the “Dragon Ball” franchise in 1997 when “Final Bout” for the PlayStation hit store shelves. While we technically had one game for the franchise released a decade prior, to most American fans, we were playing a DBZ video game for the first time. How did fans actually view the game? Did anyone from any country ever have a chance to experience a “Dragon Ball” game in the same way ever again? Referenced sites:

• Walmart "Dragon Ball Z" HD Game Listing @ Kanzenshuu
• Manga UK DBZ DVD Official Announcement @ Kanzenshuu
• 3DS Game Website Listing @ Namco-Bandai
• "Final Bout" Re-release Cover and Description @ Kanzenshuu (News Archive)
• April Fool’s Archive @ Temple O' Trunks

[Eddie]

I enjoyed the episode. It was just what I needed for my walk. I have a question about a comment you made, though. Is there really a chance of Mikeless episodes? I'm not opposed to a Hujio podcast (he's a pretty cool guy), I'm just curious.

[Chuquita]

It's always so interesting to hear about the era of those several years before I got into DB via Toonami. I was busy with Pokémon stuff at the time, but it was similar enough where I can definitely relate to the feeling. Super-slow phone-line internet, going to magazines for info, everything seeming so mysterious, intriguing, and far-away. My first couple years of DB were kind of like that. I feel kind of spoiled with how easy-access everything is now--I mean, look at One Piece, Funi streams that officially only an hour after a new episode airs in Japan; how mind-boggling would that have been if the original Z, or even GT, had been capable of that. Still, I'm grateful for the speed; without it I'd never have gotten to see the 2008 special among other things.

I remember seeing the original Final Bout in Blockbuster years before I knew what Dragon Ball was and thinking how cool the guy on the cover (Goku) looked. It was probably the first DB-related thing I ever saw. I remember being able to rent systems, but for some reason I never did; I rented a lot of videogames at Blockbuster though. I also used to play on the in-store systems they had set up; the only time I ever played that weird-on-the-eyes virtual-boy. I think it was Mario Tennis.

Pre-Funi English Dragon Ball is also fascinating in that you see different spellings like "Vegita" or the full "Son Goku" name like in those screenshots on the main page. It makes for a unique glimpse at what almost was or could've been as far as official U.S. romanizations were concerned.

[SaiyaJedi]

Interesting that you decide to put out this episode just as I'm translating the songs from Final Bout. I nearly spat out my coffee when "Hero of Heroes" started playing while I was transcribing the lyrics.

If I can figure out how to upload stuff through the new system, maybe I'll get those posted before the week is out. Then start marking off my big list of corrections to things that are already up, then put up the rest of the songs I've finished….

By the way, am I officially bumped down a notch to "Webmaster #3" now that Heath is on board? Or do I get precedence by virtue of Daizenshuu EX being older than Kanzentai?

[DragonBoxZTheMovies]

Ahhhhh, my first post on Kanzenshuu. Little disappointed you guys didn't acknowledged the Toonami 'April Fools', but hey, new podcast is always good podcast.
Episodes about the past are always my favourite. I actually listened to the Fansub and the gaming magazine episodes recently.

[medama_oyaji]

I've never been much of a video game person, but this came out at a time when I was SUPER into DB, being a fan for only a few years at this point, so a lot of it was still mysterious to me, but I knew a little about GT... The only time I played it was a few times at a department store that had a sample copy out. I remember being really bad at it thinking, "I guess if I owned it or played more fighting games I'd be better at this" but it sounds like the controls were sorta wonky to begin with!

[JulieYBM]

By the way, am I officially bumped down a notch to "Webmaster #3" now that Heath is on board? Or do I get precedence by virtue of Daizenshuu EX being older than Kanzentai?

Interesting to think about. Heath is still listed as the Number One Rival. Will be become Co-Webmaster #1 now?

[CashmanX]

By the way, am I officially bumped down a notch to "Webmaster #3" now that Heath is on board? Or do I get precedence by virtue of Daizenshuu EX being older than Kanzentai?

Interesting to think about. Heath is still listed as the Number One Rival. Will be become Co-Webmaster #1 now?

Nah, he's Webmaster #1.5.

[coola]

Great times, ever since i saw that list of every Dragon Ball games in PC magazine called Click (December 2000) i wanted to play Final Bout and Legends, i finally managed to get them in 2001, i still remember "codes" from Polish Dragon Ball sites
Uub: Finish game 7x SSJ Trunks, 12x SSJ Vegeta, 20x Pan, 3x Piccolo, 5x Freeza, 13x Cell
Kuririn: Finish game 3x Uub

[Hellspawn28]

I remember renting systems years ago when my mom's friend rent us a N64 back in 1998 with Super Mario 64 and Turok. It's hard to believe that 1997 was 15 years ago since I still remember it very well. I did not play Final Bout until 2001 or 2002 when my friend had a Japanese copy of the game and I remember I wanted to buy it at some local shop in the mall but it was over $100.

I remember I buy the 2004 re-release so that I can play it again and I was the only person that bought the game. I remember I sold it a few weeks later noticing how bad the game was, at least it's somewhat playable compare to UB22.

[Akumaito Beam]

It's always fun to hear about your past Dragon Ball experiences. Even though I delved into this fandom during a totally different period the nostalgic talk about trying to retain every new piece of DB infromation you ran across certainly hits home with me. I was playing Budokai 3 yesterday and I remembered how close I used to pay attention to the cutscenes because I hadn't seen large chunks of the story first hand. I remember thinking things like "Between Budokai 1, Budokai 3 and the single that I own I've basically seen the entire Freeza Vs. Goku fight, right?" I'm not sure if new fans get that today with entire seasons for 15 bucks.

This podcast really helped clarify why Final Bout was so expensive for awhile. I had always thought a bunch of Japanese import copies had fallen off the back of a truck or something ( I've obviously never thought too hard though!)

[kidpromo]

It must have been exiting to be a dragonball fan in the US. Manga and anime culture is not that big here in Norway so we got the manga, but no anime series. I do have some dragonball dvds dubbed in Norwegian though. They are interesting to say the least.

[Taichi]

Loved the podcast! Hearing you both recall your memories was great, and really got me thinking about how I came across Final Bout.

I was a late bloomer to Dragon Ball, so I guess it was around 1999 when I came across the game. By then, (as Mike stated), the game, or should I say, the American version was long gone and was running pretty extreme on eBay and whatnot. Back then we really only had 2 gaming stores in Joplin, Game Exchange being the most popular. I remember fondly they having a small section for import games. Final Bout was only $50 and buying the PS Exchange, IIRC, was a CD and spring that allowed you to convert your Play Station into an import playing machine, I took them home and immediately got started, without knowing a lick of Japanese.

I know that over the next couple of years my friends and I played that game so much! We didn't care that it wasn't the best, it was that you could play almost any of the characters you wanted to and we'd all take turns battling each other. Even took it on my Senior trip in 2001 and a bunch of us played from late night till early in the morning.

It's a bad game... even to this day I can't bring myself to play it again, (it just sits on a shelf with UB22). One because I know it's bad and I'd rather play something else. And two... well, those memories of me and my friends playing and not worrying about the game itself is something I want to remember with excitement and not risk playing it now and tarnishing what fun we had.

"That is all."

[Hellspawn28]

I was a late bloomer to Dragon Ball since I didn't watch until the early 2000's seeing that I used to hate DBZ. I feel like it must be wired seeing all of those characters in 1997 since GT was not released in the US until six years later and the game seem to spoiled the Super Saiyajin transformation to fans at the time since I think Vegeta was likely talking about the Super Saiyajin transformation in the Ocean dub of the Namek saga at the time.

It also seems like Final Bout (The 1997 US copy) is now only $40 on Ebay. I still remember it $200 on Ebay years ago and it seem like shitty games tend to go up in high prices since I remember when factory sealed copies of games like Spawn: The Eternal, Mortal Kombat: Special Forces and Shaq Fu would be over $150 on Ebay. I can't imagine anyone paying a copy of Shaq Fu that much though !

[GotenDaisuki]

Hahah, I was a very late bloomer (Kai-era fan here)... and considering I was a mere newborn when the game was released, I didn't get to experience the hype of a Dragon Ball game for the first time ever. Seems like a pretty interesting period though, and it was fun to hear initial thoughts from those who experienced said hype and what it felt like.

[Piccolo Daimao]

Well, I was only 2 in 1997, so I was introduced to Dragon Ball with Final Bout in the early 2000s. I remember sitting down to play it at my friend's house and thinking it was really cool. We'd spent almost the entire day just playing through it and having difficulty defeating Baby. Good times.

[BrodieK41]

I remember in 2002, I was at a flea market and some guy was selling all three of the PS1 games for $50 a piece. I debated whether to get Final Bout or Legends but opted to get the latter since it had a cooler cover. I guess I made the right choice in retrospect since Legends is one of my favorite DBZ games.

[Hellspawn28]

I was six years old in 1997, I remember my Dad give me the original Dragon Ball VHS tape vol.1 for my birthday but I didn't like it because I thought it was wired. In 1997 I was not a Dragon Ball fan at all and I was more into Beast Wars at the time. Not to mention in 1997, I was too busy loving The Lost World: Jurassic Park as a kid at the time as well.

[Innagadadavida]

Even though, I didn't get into Dragon Ball heavily until '08, I was a casual fan in the Toonami days. The original show was what I liked, but I occasionally stuck around for a Buu saga episode afterwards, much to my confusion. I watched it with my Grandma who babysat us and she would sometimes ask if they were doing witchcraft. I didn't know what they were doing, but I assured her that this was wholesome secular entertainment time and time again.

I remember going to Minnesota to visit my cousins, this must have been 2001 because of where I was in the broadcast of the show. I had only seen up until the General Blue arc and only had a passing familiarity with Dragon Ball Z, but I knew it existed. My cousins were big fans. They had a ton of toys and cards and nicknames for all the characters. I remember they had Final Bout for Playstation and it was the first time I had seen a Dragon Ball video game. I played it but I was terrible at it. I now know this was because the game is shit, but at the time I didn't realize games could be bad and thought I was bad at it. I was confused as to who the characters were, but I was used to knowing there were a ton of guys I hadn't got to yet so I just figured it was all Dragon Ball Z stuff. I always picked Kid Goku because that was the character I knew. I was excited to see he had a tail, I remember that much. I played it for a few hours but I didn't like it much. I soon got behind on the story by missing a few episodes and gave up watching the show.

It wasn't till years later that I watched Avatar: The Last Airbender and it reminded me of Dragon Ball. So I did a little torrenting and revisiting. And here I am now having sunk well over $1,000 into this damn show. Piracy. Sometimes its a great marketing tool.

My equivalent of Mike and Meri's Final Bout experience is Budokai Tenkaichi 3. I was so excited to play a DBZ game. It really blew my mind and I'll always rank it up there in my top five Wii games.

[Rory]

I love you guys. You've been here for me for years, possibly the only constant since 2005, and whether you decided to call yourself Daizenshuu EX, or Kanzenshuu, that doesn't matter to me, all that matters is that you're here.....
However.
By no means am I a tough individual, but if you have the audacity to claim Hyper Dimension is overrated... I will fight you.

That aside, another fantastic episode! I just love hearing about the retro (sorry Meri!) stuff once in a while!