Budokai Tenkaichi 2 & 3

[DBZGTKOSDH]

What are their differences in gameplay & content? Did they remove anything from Tenkaichi 2 when they made 3? Is Tenkaichi 2 a better game in your opinion?

[Insertclevername]

The game play improves greatly from the 2nd to the 3rd. Same basic formula but the combat is more fleshed out.

I can't think of anything specific that was removed in Neo that removed. I think the ruined city stage got remade.

The replacement soundtracks are different. I personally love Neo's over Meteor's.

I'd just go with Meteor, to be honest.

[VegettoEX]

The option to manually lock-on to your opponent is one that's always tossed about in terms of being removed from "NEO" to "METEOR". I know I've asked a few times, and I've gotten a few different answers, but I don't remember where or when they were to dig it all up .

[Eddie]

The story mode in BT2/Neo is more thorough, but it's entirely up to you as to whether that's a good thing. If you're anything like a great deal of other fans around here, you're plenty familiar with the story. Do you really want to play it again?

[goku the krump dancer]

I know in Tenkaichi 2 in versus mode (at random moments it seems like) whenever you played on say, the desert stage, if you smash a mountain an orb that had one of 3 colors would fall out and you could grab it. Blue restored ki (I think), Red increased strength and Green replenished some health.

The thing is, it happened frequently at first but then after continually playing the game, the orbs just seemed to disappear as the months went on, because it never happened again and then it was completely removed from BT3 and all other games afterwards.

It was a cool feature though. Another small thing that BT2 had that its successor did not was that even if you or your opponent completely missed your finisher if it hit the ground the planet would still explode.

[Darknat]

The story mode is different. Instead of roaming the world map you select the fight you want and you have several options during the fight to make things happen different. For instance you can defeat Majin Vegeta and fight Dabura afterwards. There is less fights, but the ones there are in are more detailed.

About gameplay, it's way faster than Neo's. It has more follow ups to the strong attacks done with triangle.

Rushes are all different this time (no more delta combinations), also they work a bit different. They have different ranges, some of them can circle the opponent while others go straigh, some of them are now grabs and some are just a damage on contact rush. They waste half the energy they cost if the opponent blocks them thus making them more difficult to spam.

There are way more defensive moves than in the previous installment. You can teleport almost out of everything, there is a special teleport for physical attacks, and an evade move.


The things removed from gameplay are more or less the lock on/off option. This time it works automatically. You can't taunt freely, the taunts are now automatic if you don't move for a while, and finally there is an attack done in sparking mode in Neo that is out as well. The one that let's you punch the enemy fast until your ki is out (the infinite rush is still there).


I really recomend Meteor over Neo. I even recomend Meteor over Raging Blast 2 (which I have been playing recently).

[InfernalVegito]

If you want very agile and fast gameplay then Meteor is your choice. A lot of combos and strings, especially when you're in MAX mode.
NEO's story mode is better though.

[Kamiccolo9]

I personally had a much harder time with the beam struggles in 3 than I did in 2, but that may have just been me. Overall, I preferred 2, mostly because of the soundtrack. I enjoyed both though.

[DBZ Mick]

I believe they also removed cancels.

I prefer Meteor. It has a great deal more fan-service, it feels more fluid (in a Sparking/Tenkaichi games), gameplay is more enjoyable and certain moves like Rushes and Energy Volley can't be as easily spammed anymore.

Story mode is a lot shorter but better than long and bloated BT2 one.

There's also quite a few interesting modes like Sim Dragon Mode which is hard to describe it's like a simulator/light RPGish, Survival (you can fight like 100 opponents one and one after each other and Mission 100 which is like those event battles in Smash Bros.

I'd recommend it.

[theoriginalbilis]

I've found my preferred way to play Tenkaichi 3/Sparking! Meteor is to turn off the BGM, and play your Dragon Ball music of choice (Yamamoto, Kikuchi, Faulconer, etc) while playing. It really adds to the experience. Unless, you own the Japanese release, then you can just listen to the cool midi-fied Kikuchi tracks.

[DBZGTKOSDH]

Just to let you know guys, I don't want to choose which of the 2 games I want to play, since I'm already playing BT3 for years, and I've also played Raging Blast 2 & Ultimate Blast. I'm just curious about the differences between BT2 & BT3.

[Darknat]

Just to let you know guys, I don't want to choose which of the 2 games I want to play, since I'm already playing BT3 for years, and I've also played Raging Blast 2 & Ultimate Blast. I'm just curious about the differences between BT2 & BT3.

Everything has been already mentioned.

Gameplay wise:

No cancels on Meteor.
No strong guard on Meteor (rushes can be stopped using normal guard)
Only guard agains mid, high and low attacks in Meteor (Neo also has right and left)
You can't charge your beams when they collide anymore in Meteor.
You can't change the direction of your beams in Meteor.
There are a lot more of struggles (beam vs volley, volley vs volley...) in Meteor
Follow ups to strong attacks (triangle attacks) in Meteor.
Blast comobos during follow ups in Sparking Mode in Meteor (you use a ki attack after the follow up).
Auto Lock in Meteor.
Automatic taunts in Meteor. Neo has a button to do the taunts while Meteor the taunts appear when you leave your character idle.
Sonic Sway in Meteor (you can evade Square rushes draining the ki of your opponent).
Z burst in Meteor (you can circle your opponent when you are using Dragon Rush).
Charactes now have different follow ups to square rushes instead of having all of them the same.
The attack to make your opponent face in the opposite direction (can't remember the name but I think it was hammer something) is now a triangle follow up.
Rushes have different ranges now, some let you circle your opponent and others just go straight. Some have become grabs, and some are damage on contact.
Rushes consume half the ki they need when they fail thus preventing spam.
Non Flying characters don't fall to the ground when they are on the air. They don't fly either, they just float gently down.
Damage to character is not dependant of the life bar anymore in Meteor, now the costumes get damage after beam struggles or after certain ultimate attacks.
EDIT:
I forgot two things of gameplay:
Instead of using X to go to your opponent, now it's needed to push up+X to do so. Pushing just X in Meteor let's you control freely your dashing.
Also, avoiding ki blasts in Meteor is done using left/right+circle instead of just circle as it was in Neo.


Content wise:

The story mode of Meteor let's you choose the outcome of battles doing certain actions or pushing R3. There are less battles but they are more enjoyable. Neo in the other hand let's you fly through a world map and uses normal battles for the story mode with a little introduction and epilogue to them. Neo has way more battles in storymode but they are just normal battles.
Meteor has 5 differnet kind of tournaments whereas Neo only has the normal one. Neo let's you choose an 8 character tournament (as in original Dragon Ball) depending on the difficulty setting while Meteor the tournaments are always the big ones from DBZ.
All the characters in Meteor have different rushes and attacks whereas in Neo they use a lot of common rushes (high speed rush, delta combination...).
Meteor has all characters of Neo plus a lot more from DB, DBZ and DBGT (it also includes the one from Neo on Wii).
Meteor has sim dragon which is a simulation of training.
Meteor has mission 100 which is something similar to Ultimate Battle Z in Neo.
Meteor has a survival mode.
Metero let's you record your fights to watch later.
Menus are organized better in Meteor. For instance, training is now the default option instead of tutorial.
Meteor includes disc fussion which lets you play Ultimate Battle from Sparking and Ultimate Battle Z from Neo (if you have the original DVDs) -only on PS2-
Meteor has Online mode -only on Wii-
Meteor has way more costumes for characters, and better damage to them. The only one I miss from Neo is Goku with the costume damage after Tao Pai Pai's fight in DB. But the damage from Piccolo Daimao's fight is way better.

[Big Momma]

The option to manually lock-on to your opponent is one that's always tossed about in terms of being removed from "NEO" to "METEOR". I know I've asked a few times, and I've gotten a few different answers, but I don't remember where or when they were to dig it all up .

I do miss that. I think it added more strategy having to manually lock-on to someone. And, IIRC, some characters couldn't lock on through buildings/etc. because they aren't able to sense ki. And some characters (the androids) can't be sensed without seeing them because they don't have "ki".

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

The option to manually lock-on to your opponent is one that's always tossed about in terms of being removed from "NEO" to "METEOR". I know I've asked a few times, and I've gotten a few different answers, but I don't remember where or when they were to dig it all up .

I do miss that. I think it added more strategy having to manually lock-on to someone. And, IIRC, some characters couldn't lock on through buildings/etc. because they aren't able to sense ki. And some characters (the androids) can't be sensed without seeing them because they don't have "ki".

All of these, as well as the hilarious AI screw-up in which they fly to the edge of the arena, back to you, and continually try to lock on. Sometimes you can even throw beams at them and they'll teleport-dodge, despite having no idea where you are.

[90sDBZ]

Another thing that they removed in BT3 was the way the Spirit Bomb worked in BT2. BT2 had it just like in the Frieza saga where you have to first gather energy and it forms in the sky and gets bigger the more you use the 'Share your energy' move and you could throw it any time you wanted once it was formed which was cool. In BT3 it just appears instantly when you decide to use it.

Plus they replaced the godlike soundtrack of BT2 with a mediocre soundtrack in BT3.

[VegettoEX]

Plus they replaced the godlike soundtrack of BT2 with a mediocre soundtrack in BT3.

Not if you played the Japanese version...!

Though I'm pretty sure there were one or two pieces that didn't carry over from game-to-game over the course of the three series. Still, METEOR was the most-comprehensive in terms of music in addition to characters and stages, too.

[Neshawn]

So I have a xbox360 and bought all the games with dbz in the title except Utenkaichi. I didn't get the first RB because I had RB 2. Now I am going to buy a wii and budokai tenkaichi 3 and revenge of king piccolo. I could buy BT2 but is it worth buying BT2 if I already am getting BT3? I am going after work so I hope someone can respond sooner than later. Thanks!!

[Thanos]

Eh, I personally don't see any reason to pick up BT2 if you have 3. It isn't even that interesting from a historical perspective. It's simply BT3 with less content, less variety, and the story mode is just a headache. I appreciated the similarities to Budokai 3's story mode back in '06, but now it just feels tedious and cumbersome, having to go from point A to B just to do the next fight. I actually enjoy BT3's more simply because I feel no need to flesh out the same scenarios we've been playing for years. I like the stream-lined slideshow style, and the in-fight cutscenes and commentary are a nice touch.

[dbboxkaifan]

Eh, I personally don't see any reason to pick up BT2 if you have 3. It isn't even that interesting from a historical perspective. It's simply BT3 with less content, less variety, and the story mode is just a headache. I appreciated the similarities to Budokai 3's story mode back in '06, but now it just feels tedious and cumbersome, having to go from point A to B just to do the next fight. I actually enjoy BT3's more simply because I feel no need to flesh out the same scenarios we've been playing for years. I like the stream-lined slideshow style, and the in-fight cutscenes and commentary are a nice touch.

Agreed.

There's one thing that really annoyed me when I'd play Tenkaichi 3 and that's the music, it was absolutely awful and forgettable (except for like 5-6 tracks) and in this regard I wish they would just have used Tenkaichi 2's soundtrack for it because it's one of the best VGM scores of Dragon Ball.

The only song I can still remember is the Opening other than that, I've forgotten the rest.

[Neshawn]

thanks for the tips! I ended up just getting bt3 on my way there I thought it would have been redundant to buy 2 AND 3 and the same time. so I also got revenge of king piccolo and pre ordered Xenoverse! ss4 vegeta is mine!