What if no one could fly?

[InfernalVegito]

Do you think the show would have impacted people differently? I mean, in DBZ and in GT basically everyone can do so and it's taken for absolutely granted. They fly to get to different places, they fly in fight. Basically all the time. Early in the first series everything was mainly done on ground, until later when the Crane School guys came along if I remember correctly. From then on more and more people could fly which made battles more interesting to say the least.

But what if our iconic characters never learned to do so, or if Toriyama never came up with flight? Do you conjecture people would think differently about the series?
I am asking mainly because to me at least the fact that almost everyone is able to fly effortlessly and use said ability when fighting, just goes without saying for everyone that knows the series. It's a fact just as much that water is wet. Everyone takes it for granted.

The story, which spans huge worlds together, kind of necessitates some kind of fast way of travel. But could Toriyama have done it differently maybe? Would the story be different? Better? Worse?

What do you think?

I don't know if that makes sense.

[TheGmGoken]

Just watch Dragonball. Most of the traveling for Goku would be on the Kinto'un while someone rides on his back and more fights would have taken place in the cities or underwater fights. Most of the traveling would be the same and there is still jet packs.

[Shiyonasan]

I think the fights in the series would remain being like martial arts fights like they are in early to mid Dragon Ball. The story would change in the sense that the fights would probably be smaller scale, though not necessarily less epic, for lack of a better term.

Would it be better or worse? Honestly, I think would be both. Better in that the fights would involve more melee combat and worse in that it wouldn't really seem all that different from other shonen anime. To my knowledge, not too many other shonen anime implement flying using only energy or ki. Well, at least not as much as Dragon Ball.

I guess I should also bring up that even if the characters wouldn't be able to fly, they could still use Shunkan Ido/Instant Transmission to get places quickly.

That's my two cents.

[Pantalones]

Hopefully not like the GT episodes where everyone forgets they can fly.

Other than that... I'm guessing the fight against Nappa and Vegeta would probably happen in the ruins of East City, since everyone can't relocate so easily. Either that or people would be running super-fast over long distances to travel, which might look kind of goofy (can you imagine Vegeta and Nappa running cross-country with the Sonic the Hedgehog "spinning feet" effect in place of their legs? XD) unless you couldn't actually see them in mid-run and they showed it through the effects of their movement (plants blowing around like a strong wind just passed them, trails left behind in the ground, occasionally something breaking, etc.)

I'm guessing we'd see a lot more of those super-high jumps people used to do back in Dragonball (like when Goku and Krillin first took off their turtle shells) if nobody could fly, too. I'm picturing Piccolo just saying "screw that" to climbing all the way up Karin's tower and just jumping straight up to Kami's palace when going to fuse with him before fighting Cell and the Androids.

And both the Freeza and Buu sagas would be pretty different without everyone constantly flying to new places. Same with the "searching for Dr. Gero's lab" part of the Android saga, and Cell searching for #18 (I guess that would need to be relocated, unless they wanted to have Cell walking/running across the water between islands trying to find her or something. Or doing Hulk jumps between islands, which would kind of fit with the big bulky 2nd-form Cell.) Finding Babidi's ship would be a lot different if they couldn't just fly after Spopovich and Yamu (and since Goku couldn't sense their ki for some reason, as mentioned during the tournament, he also wouldn't be able to just lock on to them with Instant Transmission either.) For some reason, I can imagine Buu still "flying" to get around, but by bouncing himself like a rubber ball and jumping across half the world instead of actually flying.

[Marco Polo]

It would have been interesting to see Kinto'un be used more often. Then again villains could just one-shot it and then we wouldn't have seen it more often

[ChroniclyFlaming]

"Don't worry, guys! I'm on my way!"

*waits for bus to arrive*
*has to find correct change for bus*
*gets kicked off bus for trying to slip a button as currency past the driver*
*cabs refuse to pick up weird man screaming about the world ending*
*reduced to stealing child's bike to save the day*

Kinto'un might work for Goku, but really none of the other fighters necessarily. Unless there are less discriminating magic clouds out there. The Instant Transmission would have been introduced probably a lot sooner. Bulma and/or the Capsule Corp would have had a bigger role if they needed something like a car to get around in. I guess we could have gotten some road trip montages and less flying over random islands scenes.

Same with the "searching for Dr. Gero's lab" part of the Android saga, and Cell searching for #18 (I guess that would need to be relocated, unless they wanted to have Cell walking/running across the water between islands trying to find her or something. Or doing Hulk jumps between islands, which would kind of fit with the big bulky 2nd-form Cell.)

I'm now imagining Cell seeing 18 on some other island, and can only shake his fist/tail futilely at her.