Also, finished to the end of the Bardock DLC finally after replaying the main game & first 3 DLCs. Full thoughts.
The main game is still good, if a bit easy on the normal difficulty. The moments where CC2 show they care about DB stand out very well, though the lack of the Vegeta & Trunks VS Cell moments during the Android arc are really missed. I genuinely have no idea how they gave so much love to the best moments of the other 3 arcs of Z, but completely cut those. And yet they felt the need to force in a fight of Goku VS second form Cell where it wasn't needed or wanted. Not even adding them in the patch that added the Trunks DLC, which would've been the time & place to add them. Though, I HATE how they rewrote Goku's farewell speech to his friends & family at the end of that arc. That went too much into the territory of "Goku doesn't love his friends or family." Granted, the original version of the scene wasn't great because it runs on bad logic & Goku comes off as an idiot, but that was a side effect of what Toriyama was trying to do for the ending of the arc as opposed to something he was intending. Especially when CC2 went out of their way to show Gohan & Goku having a good relationship & had Goku & Chichi having some nice moments earlier in the game, including that same arc.
A lot of everything else, though, I liked & consider really good. Best DB game that retells the story of the manga & anime? Probably not, but I enjoyed it.
Battle of Gods DLC: A bit of a letdown. I was looking forward to a full adaptation of the movie, but the DLC is nothing but a glorified way to get forms early if you go into it after starting the game, as well as get items for power leveling the characters to 250. Admittedly, it's not hard to grind these things, just time consuming & a bit mind numbing when you figure out the best skills to use on Whis to defeat him on the highest-level training mission. The training with Whis is ok, if repetitive after a while, & the fights with Beerus are ok as a superboss. It also showed Vegeta getting the SS God transformation, which neither Res F or Super bothered to show or explain.
Resurrection F DLC: I liked it ok. The movie was not that great & neither was the arc from Super that adapted it. A nice touch was that in this continuity, the story happens a little while after the defeat of Kid Buu rather than like 5 years or so. As you go through the main game, you wish on Shenron to summon back to life the enemies of the arcs of the series, so Frieza went off into space & trained to get his golden form & the Ginyu Force went with him. So, when he comes back to Earth, rather than having Tagoma & crew, he has the Ginyu Force, which I liked. Gohan's also been training with Piccolo, which was good. Also showed how Goku & Vegeta actually attained the SSGSS form, which was good.
Trunks - The Warrior of Hope DLC: My favorite of the DLCs thus far. Though I don't know why Alexis Tipston voiced preteen Trunks (the explanation of Eric Vale not sounding young enough doesn't work when not only has he played Trunks at that age in other media before this game, but also a year later would voice present Trunks in Super Hero alongside Goten being voiced by Robert McCollum, so...
), but she's not bad in the role. The retelling of the story was really good, though the first part may be a little too dragged out with the apocalypse future stuff. The additional stuff that adapts stuff first explored in the flashbacks of Super, moreso in the manga than the anime, was also very damn good & I loved it. I also love how the new skills they gave Trunks in the DLC transfer to the main game. It's a damn shame you don't play as Trunks much in it like I mentioned up top, or else that'd be more worth it.Also, it needs better ways to get orbs, as I couldn't unlock all of the skills & don't feel like going through it again.
Bardock - Alone Against Fate DLC: I liked it. It didn't blow me away like the Trunks DLC did, but it was good. A pretty by-the-numbers retelling of the anime's TV special with some stuff tacked on to the beginning before Bardock & his crew being on that alien planet at the beginning of the special. Sonny Strait's performance as Bardock felt inconsistent, where he doesn't put as much gravel in it as he should in places for some reason, so the voice sounds off in those moments. I'll say, I applaud the decision to use OG Bardock as opposed to the Minus version. OG Bardock is much more interesting & compelling, not to mention his design is much better. Kinda surprised they didn't try to do a hybrid approach where they fuse elements of both into a composite version of the character, but I'm fine with what they did. I will say, not reverting his friends' names back to the original Japanese ones was a missed opportunity. When we live in a time where current dubs of the various games & new anime materials are working to fix past dub mistakes (Tapion's name being pronounced as it is in the Japanese version rather than Wrath of the Dragon's dub in XV2, Kaioken being pronounced right in Kai onwards, & them finally acknowledging Goku's full name of Son Goku in English, for instance) & the like, I don't understand this at all. They had an opportunity here, but didn't take it. The kid Vegeta stuff was also ok, if really short & kinda meaningless.
But, yeah, very good retelling of the special's story with some great animation work on the pre-rendered cutscenes. I'll say, the choice to use still frames from the special rather than render them in the game's graphics engine was weird. Also, Justin Briner is phenomenal as kid Vegeta. He has the accent & cadence down pat so well that it genuinely feels like Sabat's talking for him. Outstanding voice acting there from him.
Also, needs better ways to get D Medals. I still have skills to unlock at the training grounds, but not a lot of Medals to use for that.
1 thing I also wish the last 2 DLCs allowed was in the post game when you've completed their stories, I wish it would carry over items & shit from the main game like the first 2 DLCs did. They allow you to carry over the soul emblems, so I don't see why not. The way to get the waters in the Bardock DLC isn't really worth it to me, as it takes too long for mediocre amounts of the rewards & I have a LOT of them from training with Whis in the main game.
The 9th gen console version of the game also could've used some more TLC. I've said here before that the pre-rendered cutscenes are where this is felt the most. Not the ones that use the higher quality models, animations, & whatnot, those are fine, if a bit low res. The ones that were rendered in-engine should've either been converted to in-engine cutscenes, or re-rendered with higher quality assets. They look like shit & are aliased to fuck when watched between gameplay sections where those aren't issues. I have no idea why they went through the trouble of redoing or adding to the lighting, assets, & other things for the gameplay & in-engine cutscenes, but didn't feel the need to redo those. They stick out like sore thumbs is the point. Love the 60FPS performance mode, though. The smoothness of the gameplay is great.
That's about it. I can't wait for the 23rd World Tournament DLC whenever they drop it later this year.
