Why was Shin Budokai - Another Road such a flop?

[GS7X7]

When I heard about this game I was extremely excited- we finally get to see what happens later in Trunks' timeline with Majin Buu and everything else?

The reality was.... well, it kind of sucked!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1xCR8NwKnk

I've watched the first hour or so and so far the plot and writing are extraordinarily disappointing.... I honestly feel like you could pick a random user on this board and they'd be able to come up with a better story.

I'm curious but why was this game so bad?

Apologies to those who may like it but it just looks really bad, imo.

[Kaboom]

The story could have been better if it didn't try to cram in every. Single. Playable. Character. I don't remember all that much about the story mode (since I still had my old save data when I picked it back up), but I remember it dragging on for that reason.

[GS7X7]

It definitely has just about the worst story of any DB game I've ever seen. Even that one horribly mistranslated NES game had a better story than this one did. Even my brother who doesn't like DB and has only seen parts of it could probably come up with something better without trying. Even DBZ Movie 11 looks like a Miyazaki film compared to this.

It's rare for a game to have such a bad story but it's shame that a game with this much potential got such a bad shake.

[Metalwario64]

I hated the gameplay. Well, the part they added where random enemies attack cities and you have to keep flying around and fighting them... even multiple times. That made me quit the game very, very early, so I can't even speak of the story.

[dbboxkaifan]

Shin Budokai 2 was a bad game?

To be honest, I never played SB2 for the story mode as I prefer to go straight to 1v1 battles always and in that regard it was (still is) pretty awesome and addictive, plus they added more playable characters which made it better for me since they were the ones I wanted.

Shin Budokai 2's like the medium package of a Budokai title for a portable console (PSPgo allows to play its PSP games on the TV with a DualShock 3 controller so it's more or less a console).

[Silkman3003]

Bad? Since when does the plot of a dbz fighting game dictate how good/bad the entire game is? When I read this topic, I thought I'd see a long post about how it did in terms of sales, or legitamate points against the gameplay or features. Instead I read something about "plot", which in all honesty isn't really the strong point of the DBZ fighting games?


The game is arguably one of the best budokai games because of the implementation of real time ultimates, faster gameplay, bouncing(allowing for more combo options), chargable moves, gut stun, aura burst, and more gameplay improvements. Sure story mode sucked, but it's not like the budokai games in general, have masterpiece story telling. The games excel more in gameplay, than the same old tired dbz story being told again and again(and lord knows we have enough of those) , or some dumb crappy what if. When I play the budokai games, I don't pay much attention to story. I play them for the gameplay, or improvements made to the system.

[Hellspawn28]

The story was terrible and may be the one of the worst written stories in DB history next to Episode of Bardock, Movie 11, DBE and GT in the opinion. The game ignores the statement what the Daizenshuu said about Buu in Trunks timeline and throws everything all over the place. The story feels like a fan fiction written by a kid in middle school.

As for the gameplay itself, it's hardly any different then what we got in the first game. The first game was a lot of fun despite it's bad story, but Shin Budokai 2 was pretty much Shin Budokai 1.5 in my opinion. The game got a lot of mixed reviews which lead into poor sales which is why we never got a third game.

[TheDevilsCorpse]

The story was terrible and may be the one of the worst written stories in DB history next to Episode of Bardock, Movie 11, DBE and GT in the opinion. The game ignores the statement what the Daizenshuu said about Buu in Trunks timeline and throws everything all over the place. The story feels like a fan fiction written by a kid in middle school.

I don't think that's a big deal at all. We have had plenty of stories released after the Daizenshu that have contradicted them and even the original manga. Some by the original author, some by others.

The bolded portion, that's the only real issue here. The story just plain sucks. It's horribly written. Partially because they try to cram every character in there, but also because a lot of it is just a rehash of the main timeline. They needed to mix things up a bit, jut not in the bad fanfic way that they did it...

[dbboxkaifan]

As for the gameplay itself, it's hardly any different then what we got in the first game. The first game was a lot of fun despite it's bad story, but Shin Budokai 2 was pretty much Shin Budokai 1.5 in my opinion. The game got a lot of mixed reviews which lead into poor sales which is why we never got a third game.

Even if they released "Shin Budokai 3" what exactly would have been made better, apart from the music, gameplay and graphics? A bigger roster and story, I suppose but they're such minor improvements it'd be a waste to make a third one Tenkaichi games are the ones that are done more in thought of quantity than quality (just take a look at the Tenkaichi/RB series).

Dragon Ball: Evolution kinda is "Shin Budokai 3" with new characters and stuff but overall nothing that no Budokai gamer hasn't played before.

[Hellspawn28]

The DBE game was a cheap movie license game. Calling it Shin Budokai 3 would be like calling the Street Fighter Movie game "Street Fighter III" at the time.

[GS7X7]

"The story feels like a fan fiction written by a kid in middle school."

I honestly consider that to be a compliment to the game. There were some pretty dumb people at my Jr. High, but nearly any of them could have come up with a better plot.

Now, elementary school level or Kingdergarten? That's more suited to the level of writing for this game.

[BobZ]

Yeah, Shin Budokai 2 did have an atrocious story mode. Kudos for trying something different (the idea was good), but if you can't execute it right, best leave it be.

The story mode wasn't the only downside of this game, unfortunately. I remember being super excited when I got it for my PSP and I had invested many hours in the story, just to be brutally punished with the difficulty level at the later stages. I still haven't finished it and probably never will.

The only purpose this game serves is playing it if I ever feel like playing some Budokai-esque battles on the go. Not that I take my PSP with me so often now that I have a Vita, but still...

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

Could the PSP have been something to do with it? It took a few years to get any legs in any territory.

[90sDBZ]

The story mode was overkill. I actually remember buying the game by accident. I took the SB1 case to the counter and when I got home realized they'd given me the SBAR game instead.

[Quebaz]

One thing i hated bout the story mode was that they used THE EXACT SAME STAGE OVER AND OVER AGAIN! Like seriously, besides chapter 4 and 5, you always battled on the plains stage.

[Super Sayian Prime]

Could the PSP have been something to do with it? It took a few years to get any legs in any territory.

The discussion isn't about sales reception but the game's story mode.

Looking it up, the scenario writer for Shin Budokai: Another Road was Tatsuro Tsumori. Googling his name doesn't bring up many results, but the little it does implies he's not typically a writer, but a game planner/designer. That would explain why the story is so awful. Of course the production staff above him at Dimps and Bandai should've been able to tell that writing was not his strong suit.

[GS7X7]

Sometimes people's egos too big for their britches and they insist on throwing their ideas into a project to satisfy them. Mass Effect 3's ending was by just one guy, and a lot of Hollywood movies have arrogant executives arbitrarily "improving" scripts. Most of the ME writers hated the ending, but had no power to stop it. The guy's ego was so big he couldn't bear to have anyone else "share" in "his" ending- that backfired when the ending was widely loathed.

I've heard people claim that the gameplay is amazing- while I'm sure many of the designers for the DBZ game were intelligent enough to recognize the poor writing they were likely powerless to do anything but bow to his ego to keep their job. It's like working for Donald Trump and then telling him that he's wrong and he should do something a different way.

I mean, nobody is good at everything. But sometimes the people on top become so arrogant they think they are amazing at everything, and the fact that they rose to the top must mean that.


http://www.mobygames.com/developer/shee ... Id,453145/

Tatsuro Tsumori probably was just an egomaniac who wanted all the credit for making an amazing storyline so he hogged it all for himself. It's a damn shame that showing what happens later in the alternate Trunks timeline fell into the lap of this guy.

Mac Walters is notorious too, since he singlehandedly penned the ME 3 ending and wouldn't let others get involved.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

Could the PSP have been something to do with it? It took a few years to get any legs in any territory.

The discussion isn't about sales reception but the game's story mode.

That's not what "flop" usually means, though. I thought I was taking the thread back on track, if anything.

[Super Sayian Prime]

Could the PSP have been something to do with it? It took a few years to get any legs in any territory.

The discussion isn't about sales reception but the game's story mode.

That's not what "flop" usually means, though. I thought I was taking the thread back on track, if anything.

You're right in that "flop" typically denotes a financial failure (or an Oscar worthy athlete), but you're wrong in trying to bring this conversation "back on track". If you actually read the opening post, you'd know the topic was always about the game's quality in regards to its story.

[Hellspawn28]

The second game did get mixed reviews from critics and fans. I think Dimps did had plans for a third game, but Namco Bandai most likely told them to scrap those ideas for now. Maybe can see a similar game to Shin Budokai in the future like Heroes Budokai on the Vita.