DB Fighting Games: Overall good or not quite what you want?

[mysticboy]

I've been letting this rest but I'll further illustrate my point now.

Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations.

Just saying that should be enough, but I know it won't. First of all, I don't even like Naruto but I can openly admit that game is absolutely gorgeous and amazing. Thus going back to the point I made that a game might be good even if I don't enjoy it.
Secondly, it uses an engine very similar to the Sparking series, only done right. You just need to see a couple of game play videos to notice the vast improvements that could be done to the Sparking engine. It has been done, to a series also from Jump, also from Bandai. There is simply no excuse.
Thirdly, look at how gorgeous the game is. That deliciously crisp cel-shaded graphics. Yum. Then look at that shiny plastic shit Spike has been given us. Yuck.
Oh and look at that, the game still is amazingly comprehensive, it's got various iterations of the same character, it's got tons of beautiful looking specials, it's got the works.

So basically, Sparking with less combat options is Sparking done right?

[DNA]

So basically, Sparking with less combat options is Sparking done right?

No, Sparking done right is Sparking done right. Good job on avoiding all the other points buddy.

[mysticboy]

So basically, Sparking with less combat options is Sparking done right?

No, Sparking done right is Sparking done right. Good job on avoiding all the other points buddy.

Exactly, Sparking done right is Sparking done right. So what I'm asking you is; how can the Storm series be Sparking done right with even more shallow gameplay?

[DNA]

Exactly, Sparking done right is Sparking done right. So what I'm asking you is; how can the Storm series be Sparking done right with even more shallow gameplay?

Yeah but Sparking isn't done right at all. I don't know about the game play depth since I haven't played it myself, I just saw a few game play videos and from what I saw it at least looked miles better. I would have to watch an intensive game play video showing me all the mechanics to then deem it better or not in that singular aspect, which is what you are doing. You are ignoring all the other aspects that compose the game and focusing on that single one.
Although, again, quantity does not make quality which means having more "combat options" as you call them does not necessarily make the game better. Having a lot of "combat options" and game play mechanics but having them poorly executed and barely intuitive is a big flaw in my opinion.
Despite everything else that has been said about it back and forth, the game has way more commands that the buttons of the controller permit you to do, which results in awkward button combinations to achieve simple things. In sum, the game developers try harder than they should in certain aspects and are completely lax in others.

I will once again refer to graphics and say that despite the fact that they are not all that matters and a graphically good game does not mean the game is good at it's core, they still are an important and integral part of the game itself. And the graphical style of all Sparking related games is really bad in my opinion, borderline disgusting even.

The games are playable and somewhat fun but flawed and weak. They've got plenty of content and fan-service but with a poor presentation.
You might tell me that X game or Y game was good but I'm generalizing the series and not analysing a single game. I do this because this is the series that has prevailed above all others, it's the games we are getting to this day, yearly. And again I must say, the end result is Ultimate Tenkaichi and Kinectic.
So tell me, are you happy? Is this what you wanted? Because the dip in sales tells me otherwise.

[mysticboy]

I just want a Raging Blast 3 that fixes the flaws of the first two and expand on the ground work Spike built up with them, just like anybody else.

And as far as gameplay goes, you do have point. Sparking has always been too convoluted for a lot of players (they tried to streamline this with UT, but overdid it by a hellavlot). I'm sure there's ways to fix this (and among other things such as presentation, physics etc.) without having to scrap the series' entire allure for another. I personally have some ideas of mine, but I'll save them for another thread.

[DNA]

I just want a Raging Blast 3 that fixes the flaws of the first two and expand on the ground work Spike built up with them, just like anybody else.

And as far as gameplay goes, you do have point. Sparking has always been too convoluted for a lot of players (they tried to streamline this with UT, but overdid it by a hellavlot). I'm sure there's ways to fix this (and among other things such as presentation, physics etc.) without having to scrap the series' entire allure for another. I personally have some ideas of mine, but I'll save them for another thread.

Well, finally. This is what I've been talking about for a long time now. You don't need to scrap the whole series but there's a whole lot of work to be done. Nostal covers many of the points that should be addressed and he extensively talks about fan-service and a cel-shaded graphic overhaul, but he barely addresses the game play, or rather tries to. He's understanding of it is quite lacking but kudos for trying.

I've been feeling cheated ever since Sparking METEOR, they gave us more characters in exchange for worse game play and story mode. NEO was better but had less characters. Instead of improving they simply keep adding and removing features. They don't keep all the good ones for some reason, like any developer would logically do. They keep some and remove some, why? And every time they add something new it always feels half-assed and washed-down, like the character creator. Come on now, everyone is a male Saiyan? You couldn't even make the tail an optional add-on so we could at least PRETEND to have humans?

Spike does not deserve our support because they keep treating us like retarded babies. That's why I keep saying, they either change their ways and give us a good polished game or get the fuck out of our beloved franchise. I'd love to see a good polished Sparking style game in the future, but that simply doesn't seem like it's going to happen any time soon.

[Darknat]

I've been feeling cheated ever since Sparking METEOR, they gave us more characters in exchange for worse game play and story mode. NEO was better but had less characters. Instead of improving they simply keep adding and removing features. They don't keep all the good ones for some reason, like any developer would logically do. They keep some and remove some, why? And every time they add something new it always feels half-assed and washed-down, like the character creator. Come on now, everyone is a male Saiyan? You couldn't even make the tail an optional add-on so we could at least PRETEND to have humans?

I wasn't going to reply to the post again, but I'm curious, how can NEO have better gameplay than Meteor? O_o

[DNA]

I wasn't going to reply to the post again, but I'm curious, how can NEO have better gameplay than Meteor? O_o

Try them both and judge by yourself. I distinctly remember not being happy about the transition in game play. Even some supers have been changed around and some characters have lost good supers they had in order to have generic ones.

[mysticboy]

I still think Spike is competent.They just misunderstand want we want and overdo things a lot.

Take RB1's roster for example. It's about 40 characters not including transformations and about 70 characters including them. That's a problem right there. They treat each transformation for each character as if it's a different character entirely and they try to give them different fighting styles. This works for guys who undergo drastic physical changes like Freeza, Cell, Zarbon etc., but not the Saiyans. They also have so many Vegetas as well. If they just have one Vegeta, one Future Trunks, and not treat transformations the way they do now, they'll have a lot less to worry about and get more things polished and fixed. Shit, the characters would be more unique since they'd have less fighting styles to come up with. They'd get the most out of the year they usually have to make these games.

[DNA]

There ^^^^ That right there is what I've been talking about. I'm not saying they're incompetent, I'm saying they don't seem to care enough. Like I and someone else in this thread have said, different instances of characters could be easily solved by in-game changing styles. You input a command and you change from Trunks using his sword in combat to not using it. This has been done in other games. Gen from Street Fighter can change between two styles.

[ShadowDude112]

So, Dragon Ball games that are good? Well, those are few and far between in recent times, but I'll list some of the ones I really enjoyed, that come to my head.

Attack of the Saiyans: Why? Because it was such a fresh new thing for the series and it was honestly fun to play, and I really wish this got a sequel and not Raging Blast. AotS deserved it far more.

Super Dragon Ball Z: I hated this game as a kid, but, looking back, I saw it wasn't so bad. I just wasn't used to Street Fighter controls. Hopefully when I get a PS2 again, I'll pick this game up.

I just ordered Ultimate Butouden, so, when that comes in, I'll play it.

Honestly, probably a lot more I'm forgetting, but, I'll add more later.

[TheMightyOzaru]

Is the sparking series the best they can do? Hell no. I can see a lot of missed potential

There's your answer. It's simply inexcusable this day and age for us to keep getting the crap they shovel to us nowadays. I'm including Raging Blast and Ultimate Tenkaichi as the Sparking series, because it is what they are. It is not the best it can be done, it's not even close to the best it can be done. They are very mediocre games that keep getting rehashed with a few different controls and slightly worse graphical style.
Sparking! METEOR was okay, it was fun, it had tons of fan service, it was a pretty cool game, even though NEO was better in terms of game play. But nowadays the games we keep getting from them are simply pathetic.

It's an older game and standards were set to a medium back then. You can't blame the sparking series for the half assed crap we have been getting in recent years. Namco Banda is just lazy with Dragon Ball. Raging Blast 1 and 2 were at least decent though.

[Insertclevername]

Super Dragon Ball Z: I hated this game as a kid, but, looking back, I saw it wasn't so bad. I just wasn't used to Street Fighter controls. Hopefully when I get a PS2 again, I'll pick this game up.

If you get the chance again, definitely play Super Dragon Ball Z! It's awesome. I'll openly say it's the best DBZ fight game there is (from as far as I've played).

[dbzfan7]

Average I guess. I would like sparking more if all the characters didn't feel the same. I feel like it doesn't matter who I choose. Budokai had the same problem until budokai 3. I have infinite world which is like B3 except without any clashes or dragon rush, but apparently some say has a more refined battle system. I remember Super DBZ being fun on my third or fourth try ( i hated it before that) but it felt too slow. RB/2 is just a copy of bt3 with changes whether you consider them good or bad but still has the problem where everyone feels the same. And we all know how UT and DBZ Kinect are.

[Darknat]

I wasn't going to reply to the post again, but I'm curious, how can NEO have better gameplay than Meteor? O_o

Try them both and judge by yourself. I distinctly remember not being happy about the transition in game play. Even some supers have been changed around and some characters have lost good supers they had in order to have generic ones.

I already have, that's why I wanted your opinion on it.

I don't remember characters really losing supers. For the most part they upgraded their rushes to be unique.

Anyway, gameplay is not the same thing as movesets. They are related, but gameplay goes beyond a moveset.

Rushes in Neo had a lot of problems. The main one being the spamming of them. You do a rush in NEO and you don't loose energy, so you can do it again, and again. Also the only way to stop rushes was using that strong guard move. That was slow, so many times the rushes were guaranteed to work.

Meteor changed that. Rushes loose half the energy, so you have to recharge after that. You can block them easily (losing energy yourself), or you can do that explosion move and stop it as well (loosing hp).

Whereas rushes in NEO were all the same, in Meteor there are different types. Some can track the enemy, some go straight, some are grabs... all of them have different range too.

As defensive gameplay goes, Meteor shines here, you have a very difficult guard move pushin up+square that if it's timed right, allows you to counter almost any physical move. You can use sonic sway to evade and deplete energy from your rival, you can teleport away at the last time, you can simply block, you can teleport and counter with an attack, you can counter normal teleports (this one is also difficult to perform, you have to press the circle almost at the same time as your enemy, and you follow his teleport), you have a counter defensive stance too. So as defensive options go, Meteor is far superior to Neo.

Meteor has the strings from Neo, and expands on them, also adding new ones.
They even fixed the non-flying characters a bit so they could still maintain a fight in the air (I still would have wanted some nice ground fighting, but at least they stopped being useless in Meteor).


Sparking was a bad game, with some good concepts behind it (It has always surprised me it even got a sequel...). Neo expanded on it a lot, Meteor expanded on Neo and also fixed things.

[DNA]

It's an older game and standards were set to a medium back then. You can't blame the sparking series for the half assed crap we have been getting in recent years. Namco Banda is just lazy with Dragon Ball. Raging Blast 1 and 2 were at least decent though.

Yes I can because Raging Blast, Ultimate Tenkaichi and Kinectic are still part of the Sparking series, just under a different name. And Namco-Bandai has Zenkai Battle Royale, I wouldn't call that lazy. Spike on the other hand is.

@Darknat
You don't need to tell me movesets and gameplay are different things when I've said that many times before. I thought it as clear I as making two different points. But anyway, I'll concede on that because I'm only evaluating it from memory and I remember no Boeing happy. I also distinctly remember Buu Pure Evil losing is moveset and getting Buu Zen's moveset, making them the same character.

[TheMightyOzaru]

No they aren't, they have too many differences to be a part of them. If you notice the gameplay between Sparking Games are fairly similar. The difference between Neo and Meteor are very small. Raging Blast is a cancel based system that introduced customizable supers, blast deflects, and signature skills. It also had a roster that was solely based around Z. No GT. Sparking had GT. Raging Blast 2 is the same game just with a handful of more characters and instead of a cancel system it was heavily followup-based. They are too different to be Sparking games. I don't even have to say anything about UT, it's certainly it's own kind of game. Furthermore, again, why is it the Sparking series' fault for these lack luster games?

Average I guess. I would like sparking more if all the characters didn't feel the same. I feel like it doesn't matter who I choose. Budokai had the same problem until budokai 3. I have infinite world which is like B3 except without any clashes or dragon rush, but apparently some say has a more refined battle system. I remember Super DBZ being fun on my third or fourth try ( i hated it before that) but it felt too slow. RB/2 is just a copy of bt3 with changes whether you consider them good or bad but still has the problem where everyone feels the same. And we all know how UT and DBZ Kinect are.

The characters feel the same in BT3? Huh must be missing something here because I can feel a distinct difference in all the characters I play. It's just the stock moves that make the characters seem similar but in actuality they are not. RB2 a copy or BT3? How do you figure? They play almost nothing alike.

[DNA]

@TheMightyOzaru Because they are made by the same company using the same engine, when they change the engine THEN I call it a different series. It is the same series under a different banner to sound different. They all use the same core engine.

[DBZGTKOSDH]

Does Ultimate Blast have the same engine with the Sparking!/Raging Blast series?

[mysticboy]

People will consider the RB series as the next (well last now) gen Sparking, just like Burst limit was the next gen Budokai.