Nostalgia for the so-called dark ages of DB

[Dbzfan94]

I wouldn't call it the dark ages but it definitely wasn't a good time for the video games. The series was long done at that point so games like Burst Limit and Raging Blast lacked innovation and were commercial disappointments as a result. Spike had the right idea with Ultimate Tenkaichi but the execution leaves a lot to be desired mainly with gameplay, which is so detached from a fighting game is supposed to be, thus the most polarizing DBZ game was made. Then the worst of the lot, Battle of Z, came and was somehow even more shallow and barren than Ultimate Tenkaichi.

Thankfully, Xenoverse brought DBZ games out of their creative rut and back to their roots.

I don’t see how Battle of Z can be worse than Ultimate Tenkaichi in any shape or form. Battle of Z wasn’t great but it was amazing compared to the shit that was UT

UT at least had an actual meta (even though it sucked), CaC (even though it was very limited), Hero Mode, good graphics, and local multiplayer. Battle of Zzz... (sorry, fell asleep) had nothing.

What meta? It was Rock Paper Scissors.

[DBZAOTA482]

What meta? It was Rock Paper Scissors.

The Clash System had 2 different options. It was either a high-speed beatdown which drains the opponent's ki or a smash pursuit which built up the spirit however you can overcome the guessing game by either attacking from behind, attempting a smash on neutral, or using the ki high whatever mode. Super moves also force you to be within a certain range which may activate the approach clash/attack system when attempting to use one.

UT is essentially a game of spacing, guesswork, and meter management. It's a similar concept to other fighters only it's extremely automatic and simplified.


Battle of Z's "depth" comes exclusively from its co-op system and even that's not much. Without it, it's just a game of who can tap buttons faster.

[Yuli Ban]

I wouldn't call it the dark ages but it definitely wasn't a good time for the video games. The series was long done at that point so games like Burst Limit and Raging Blast lacked innovation and were commercial disappointments as a result. Spike had the right idea with Ultimate Tenkaichi but the execution leaves a lot to be desired mainly with gameplay, which is so detached from a fighting game is supposed to be, thus the most polarizing DBZ game was made. Then the worst of the lot, Battle of Z, came and was somehow even more shallow and barren than Ultimate Tenkaichi.

Thankfully, Xenoverse brought DBZ games out of their creative rut and back to their roots.

I don’t see how Battle of Z can be worse than Ultimate Tenkaichi in any shape or form. Battle of Z wasn’t great but it was amazing compared to the shit that was UT

UT at least had an actual meta (even though it sucked), CaC (even though it was very limited), Hero Mode, good graphics, and local multiplayer. Battle of Zzz... (sorry, fell asleep) had nothing.

Those reasons are exactly why I always put UT below Battle of Z, usually with Sagas and Taiketsu. Battle of Z's more the realm of the "generic 2000s DBZ game", which describes the ones besides Budokai 3, Sparking 3, and Super DBZ.

Battle of Z, from the start, was a mediocre game with nothing going for it. It was basically the typical Spike game, but now developed by someone else. It had a new gimmick to get around DBZ games' dwindling budgets with lackluster gameplay, which was basically just an excuse to get the Ginyu Force all on screen at once as well as capitalize on Battle of Gods.

Ultimate Tenkaichi had potential, and that's what's so fucking pathetic. It failed at literally everything it set out to do save for the graphics (and only the graphics). Battle of Z's gameplay was milquetoast "anime fighter", while Ultimate Tenkaichi pissed on the Tenkaichi/Raging Blast system by throwing in that godawful heads-or-tails system (which everyone inexplicably keeps comparing to rock-paper-scissors despite there only being two choices). The graphics were nice... but the animation was atrocious. Literally "mouths flapping up and down" not matching even the Japanese voice acting and characters swiveling around like they're on turntables, all perfectly complemented by the voice acting switching between the OG dub and Kai dub and some of the most lifeless performances heard up to that point.
And the goddamn Hero Mode. The fucking Hero Mode!
How could they fuck up something so simple? How could they ruin so badly something that was almost literally prepackaged with a bow on top for them?!

Consistently failing at everything you do & putting in a piss-poor effort is worse than not trying at all. It's the difference between The Room and the myriad forgettable dramas that come out every year on Lifetime, except worse than that because you can clearly see a good game there. There was no good game in Battle of Z from the start; it was always going to be a C-grade licensed game, and it entirely met those expectations. Ultimate Tenkaichi had the potential to be one of the best DBZ games ever, but because it was made on a shoestring budget (how many times have I said it? DB as an IP circa 2010-2012 was in a pitiful state) and the developers threw around too many gimmicks and cut too many corners, it became a frustrating mess. I'd rather play Battle of Z well before subjecting myself to Ultimate Tenkaichi. I'd rather play Sagas before Ultimate Tenkaichi. At least that game has an overload of glitches that provides endless entertainment.

And the worst part about it all is that Ultimate Tenkaichi actually still does some things better than Xenoverse has (and probably ever will), like customizable fighting styles. It's so baffling how Xenoverse— fundamentally one big "original character do not steal" simulator— missed out on something so blatantly obvious when UT did that. UT, the game where having your own customized fighting style made the LEAST sense because 90% of all combat is a heads-or-tails minigame and the other 10% is a literal minigame. Whereas Xenoverse allows you to train with mentors, mentors you can take as your teacher, but you're still stuck with the style you get from your race/gender. So in UT, you could theoretically adopt Guldo's heavily telekinetic fighting style and get to see it in action for the 2 seconds in every round you're actually fighting and know that you're theoretically attacking differently & dealing different damage than if you had Yamcha's attack set.
Whereas in Xenoverse, you can change how you shoot ki blasts based on your super soul, sometimes.

God.... DAMMIT.

[jollyr]

I remember being like 5 or 6 years old and randomly catching the very first episode of DBZ on cartoon network when it first aired and being blown away. I recall it very vividly weirdly enough and just loved it. It was actually cool cause growing up every other kid was into it too and even now I could bring it up with any other 26 year old guy and theyd know what the fuck I'm talking about. its kind of a shared experience

[Dbzfan94]

UT at least had an actual meta (even though it sucked), CaC (even though it was very limited), Hero Mode, good graphics, and local multiplayer. Battle of Zzz... (sorry, fell asleep) had nothing.

Those reasons are exactly why I always put UT below Battle of Z, usually with Sagas and Taiketsu. Battle of Z's more the realm of the "generic 2000s DBZ game", which describes the ones besides Budokai 3, Sparking 3, and Super DBZ.

Battle of Z, from the start, was a mediocre game with nothing going for it. It was basically the typical Spike game, but now developed by someone else. It had a new gimmick to get around DBZ games' dwindling budgets with lackluster gameplay, which was basically just an excuse to get the Ginyu Force all on screen at once as well as capitalize on Battle of Gods.

Ultimate Tenkaichi had potential, and that's what's so fucking pathetic. It failed at literally everything it set out to do save for the graphics (and only the graphics). Battle of Z's gameplay was milquetoast "anime fighter", while Ultimate Tenkaichi pissed on the Tenkaichi/Raging Blast system by throwing in that godawful heads-or-tails system (which everyone inexplicably keeps comparing to rock-paper-scissors despite there only being two choices). The graphics were nice... but the animation was atrocious. Literally "mouths flapping up and down" not matching even the Japanese voice acting and characters swiveling around like they're on turntables, all perfectly complemented by the voice acting switching between the OG dub and Kai dub and some of the most lifeless performances heard up to that point.
And the goddamn Hero Mode. The fucking Hero Mode!
How could they fuck up something so simple? How could they ruin so badly something that was almost literally prepackaged with a bow on top for them?!

Consistently failing at everything you do & putting in a piss-poor effort is worse than not trying at all. It's the difference between The Room and the myriad forgettable dramas that come out every year on Lifetime, except worse than that because you can clearly see a good game there. There was no good game in Battle of Z from the start; it was always going to be a C-grade licensed game, and it entirely met those expectations. Ultimate Tenkaichi had the potential to be one of the best DBZ games ever, but because it was made on a shoestring budget (how many times have I said it? DB as an IP circa 2010-2012 was in a pitiful state) and the developers threw around too many gimmicks and cut too many corners, it became a frustrating mess. I'd rather play Battle of Z well before subjecting myself to Ultimate Tenkaichi. I'd rather play Sagas before Ultimate Tenkaichi. At least that game has an overload of glitches that provides endless entertainment.

And the worst part about it all is that Ultimate Tenkaichi actually still does some things better than Xenoverse has (and probably ever will), like customizable fighting styles. It's so baffling how Xenoverse— fundamentally one big "original character do not steal" simulator— missed out on something so blatantly obvious when UT did that. UT, the game where having your own customized fighting style made the LEAST sense because 90% of all combat is a heads-or-tails minigame and the other 10% is a literal minigame. Whereas Xenoverse allows you to train with mentors, mentors you can take as your teacher, but you're still stuck with the style you get from your race/gender. So in UT, you could theoretically adopt Guldo's heavily telekinetic fighting style and get to see it in action for the 2 seconds in every round you're actually fighting and know that you're theoretically attacking differently & dealing different damage than if you had Yamcha's attack set.
Whereas in Xenoverse, you can change how you shoot ki blasts based on your super soul, sometimes.

God.... DAMMIT.

pretty much agree with everything you said. At the very least, Battle of Z wasn't legitimately painful to play. (I forced myself to get every achievement on xbox for both, too.) But it wasnt quite heads or tails. i called it rock paper scissors because while there were only 2 buttons to press, there were three 'types' of character (Small, medium, big) which determined what they were more likely to press and what they had an advantage over.

[DBZAOTA482]

I don’t see how Battle of Z can be worse than Ultimate Tenkaichi in any shape or form. Battle of Z wasn’t great but it was amazing compared to the shit that was UT

UT at least had an actual meta (even though it sucked), CaC (even though it was very limited), Hero Mode, good graphics, and local multiplayer. Battle of Zzz... (sorry, fell asleep) had nothing.

Those reasons are exactly why I always put UT below Battle of Z, usually with Sagas and Taiketsu. Battle of Z's more the realm of the "generic 2000s DBZ game", which describes the ones besides Budokai 3, Sparking 3, and Super DBZ.

Battle of Z, from the start, was a mediocre game with nothing going for it. It was basically the typical Spike game, but now developed by someone else. It had a new gimmick to get around DBZ games' dwindling budgets with lackluster gameplay, which was basically just an excuse to get the Ginyu Force all on screen at once as well as capitalize on Battle of Gods.

Ultimate Tenkaichi had potential, and that's what's so fucking pathetic. It failed at literally everything it set out to do save for the graphics (and only the graphics). Battle of Z's gameplay was milquetoast "anime fighter", while Ultimate Tenkaichi pissed on the Tenkaichi/Raging Blast system by throwing in that godawful heads-or-tails system (which everyone inexplicably keeps comparing to rock-paper-scissors despite there only being two choices). The graphics were nice... but the animation was atrocious. Literally "mouths flapping up and down" not matching even the Japanese voice acting and characters swiveling around like they're on turntables, all perfectly complemented by the voice acting switching between the OG dub and Kai dub and some of the most lifeless performances heard up to that point.
And the goddamn Hero Mode. The fucking Hero Mode!
How could they fuck up something so simple? How could they ruin so badly something that was almost literally prepackaged with a bow on top for them?!

Consistently failing at everything you do & putting in a piss-poor effort is worse than not trying at all. It's the difference between The Room and the myriad forgettable dramas that come out every year on Lifetime, except worse than that because you can clearly see a good game there. There was no good game in Battle of Z from the start; it was always going to be a C-grade licensed game, and it entirely met those expectations. Ultimate Tenkaichi had the potential to be one of the best DBZ games ever, but because it was made on a shoestring budget (how many times have I said it? DB as an IP circa 2010-2012 was in a pitiful state) and the developers threw around too many gimmicks and cut too many corners, it became a frustrating mess. I'd rather play Battle of Z well before subjecting myself to Ultimate Tenkaichi. I'd rather play Sagas before Ultimate Tenkaichi. At least that game has an overload of glitches that provides endless entertainment.

And the worst part about it all is that Ultimate Tenkaichi actually still does some things better than Xenoverse has (and probably ever will), like customizable fighting styles. It's so baffling how Xenoverse— fundamentally one big "original character do not steal" simulator— missed out on something so blatantly obvious when UT did that. UT, the game where having your own customized fighting style made the LEAST sense because 90% of all combat is a heads-or-tails minigame and the other 10% is a literal minigame. Whereas Xenoverse allows you to train with mentors, mentors you can take as your teacher, but you're still stuck with the style you get from your race/gender. So in UT, you could theoretically adopt Guldo's heavily telekinetic fighting style and get to see it in action for the 2 seconds in every round you're actually fighting and know that you're theoretically attacking differently & dealing different damage than if you had Yamcha's attack set.
Whereas in Xenoverse, you can change how you shoot ki blasts based on your super soul, sometimes.

God.... DAMMIT.

If Battle of Z was anything like the games from the early-mid 2000s, it would actually be fun but it wasn't. It is both boring and mindless. UT is mindless too (albeit to a lesser extent as I've explained in a different post) but its fun in spirit bursts for what it is- an unadulterated DBZ simulator.

Also, The Room is a great movie. One of the best comedies from its time even though it wasn't even trying to be a comedy.