Which DBZ fighting game had the best and worst story mode?

[Hellspawn28]

Which DBZ fighting game do you think had the best and worst story mode? For me it would be (I'm going with the ones that I've played) in no real order.

Best:

Budokai 1 - Awesome cut scenes that still hold up well today

Budokai 3 - Lots of reply value in my opinion. You can find different paths to new story events and it was awesome.

Super Butoden 2 - Had some cool What if ideas like Future Trunks fighting evil clones created by Dr. Gero, Bojack using the Cell Jrs as his as henchmen and the only game where we get see Broli against Bojack.

Super Sonic Warriors - The what if stories were fun and enjoyable. I enjoy them all even if some of them were stupid and made no sense.

Meh (Not bad, but not good):

Budokai Tenkachi 2/Sparking 2 - It try to be like Budokai 3 but failed. You don't get explore around anything and no story paths that would lead to another new story event. When you enter a city, you just get a person that tells you nothing useful. In Budokai 3, at least you would get a item that would help you or someone saying something funny. I admit the game did a good job on being a long game, but you really need to play the story mode once and that it's it.

Burst Limit - Had good cut scenes, but it was way too short.

Raging Blast 1 - Meh.

Super Butoden - Had a pretty decent story mode but it was short. Given it was the early 90's, I will give it a pass.

Super Sonic Warriors 2 - Had some cool what if stories but I can barely remember any of them. With the first game, they felt more memorable in my opinion.

Worst:

Both Shin Budokai games - Both story modes in those games felt like awful fan fiction. The first game had Fusion Reborn after the events of Majin Buu and it end up being a total mess. So much crap was thrown all over everywhere like Young Gohan and Future Trunks somehow getting throw in the modern time era. You also have Freeza somehow killing Broli for the Dragon Balls. Don't get me started on the second game.

Budokai 2- You fight Cell and Freeza way too many times and the story makes no sense in a story mode perspective. If you never watch the show or read the manga before then you would be confused on what the hell is going on.

Budokai Tenkachi 1/Sparking - The game had some cool what if battles but that was about it. I remember the story mode feeling very lazy and rush. You get two characters talking to each other with one sentence of dialogue then the story mode starts. Starting the game with Radditz and ending with Super 17 seems very random too.

Ultimate Tenkachi/Ultimate Blast - They try to do a Budokai 3 story mode and they failed again. It was boring and felt very bare bones in my opinion.

[InfernalVegito]

Budokai 1 is my favorite game when it comes down to delivering an amazing storymode. It really felt like playing the show and that's what I value the most in that regard.

Least favorite? None.

[DarkPrince_92]

Budokai 1 indeed. Burst Limit next. Then perhaps Tenkaichi 2? Everything else was terrible. Spike was never really good with cutscenes, unless it was rush moves, which were copied straight from the anime.

[Doctor.]

In terms of content, BT2 and RB1 are up there.
In terms of enjoyment, probably B3 or RB1.

I don't really know about the worst.

[Super Saiyan Turlast x4]

Supersonic Warriors was the best. It was so awesome seeing Krillin wipe Cell out with a Genki-Dama--and seeing Ginyu piss Freeza off by using the wish to bring the Ginyu Force back, since Freeza assumed he'd have 3 like he did on namek. Those what-if's were so much fun. Way better than going through the same story over and over again.

Worst for me is Super Butouden 3. Oh, wait. There was no story But seriously, I'm not sure which would be the worst of them. I kinda find them all cool, though a bit repetitive. Not sure.

[Hellspawn28]

The first Super Sonic Warriors game had a lot of fun what if stories. With the second game, they were kinda lame and forgettable. I like the one where Broli becomes friends with Mr. Satan and Semi-Perfect teaming up with Metal Coola to get the Dragon Balls on Namek. I forgot the rest on what happen in that game.

[Neshawn]

Budokai 1 indeed. Burst Limit next. Then perhaps Tenkaichi 2? Everything else was terrible. Spike was never really good with cutscenes, unless it was rush moves, which were copied straight from the anime.

I like BL and the story mode is all there really is, I think it's a good story mode. not great. I think you and I discussed in one of these forums that there are a few fights and just a few characters that, if added, really could have set itself apart from other games! main fight being mecha freeza and trunks, since they have that cutscene in once you beat the game, doesn't make sense why it wouldn't be included.

[Shinnin]

In terms of accuracy (with what they had): Budokai 1, Burst Limit, Sagas, Tenkaichi 2, Raging Blast 1 and Ultimate Tenkaichi were the best; Budokai 2, Battle of Z and Tenkaichi 3 were the worst.

In terms of fun: Battle of Z, Sagas, Tenkaichi 2 and Budokai 3 were the best; Raging Blast 1 was the worst because it felt like a chore after a while.

[Lord Beerus]

Hmm... I'm torn between Budokai 1 and Budokai 3 when it comes to which DBZ game had the best story mode. Budokai 1 told the story faithfully and was damn near flawless are far as a cinematic experience goes in video games. But the story mode in Budokai 3 was so rich and deep.

...

I gotta go with Budokai 3. The sheer amount of content and hidden goodies in Dragon Universe was unlike anything I had seen before in a Dragon Ball. And judging from the hidden audio found on Budokai 3, the story mode had so much more content planned but Dimps were rushed to complete the game and all extra stories planned never saw the light of day.

That is why I think Xenoverse in Budokai 3's true spiritual successor. The amount of masters you can seemingly chose appears endless. It feel liks Dimps is trying to atone for not being able to go all out in the story mode In Budokai 3.

Budokai 1 is a very, very close second though. Those cutscenes...

As far as which one was the worst goes, it's not contest. Budokai 2. If I wanted to play a board game, I'd play a real life fucking board game! Man, Dimps really went off the track with that one.

From best to worst, this is how I would rank them:
- Budokai 3
- Budokai 1
- Super Butoden 2
- Super Sonic Warriors
- Burst Limit
- Tenkaichi 2
- Tenkaichi 3
- Raging Blast 1
- Super Butoden
- Super Sonic Warriors 2
- Tenkaichi 1
- Battle Of Z
- Infinite World
- All of the Shin Budokai games
- Ultimate Tenkaichi
- Budokai 2

[MCDaveG]

Shin Budokai 1 and 2. Frankly, I liked the second more before they've introduced irelevant characters from the rest of the roster with dumb and nonsensical reasoning.
I will never forget Krillin's line about Maron and 18 using him as a toy in his sleep. It will haunt me for the rest of my life....
All the lines spoken by the characters sounded real mental. Was that a case of translation or are they this bad even in Japanese?

[DBZAOTA482]

Best

Story Mode (Budokai)- This one wins it simply for the presentation. Out of all the DBZ games I've played I feel this had the best representation of the Z storyline to date. Cinematic in-game cutscenes that recreate many key moments of the series along with the authetic beginning episode and next episode previews made you really feel like you're watching an episode of DBZ. There were even a few interesting "what-if" scenarios like what if Freeza achieved his goal of immortality or what if Cell absorbed Kuririn instead of #18. I'd even take out my memory card just to play through the story over and over again.

Oh and Cell.... best final boss fight ever!!!


Dragon Universe (Budokai 3)- While the storytelling isn't as good as the first game's, it made up for it with the variety of things to do with the new free-roam system. The hidden unlockables, alternating paths, side-conversations that will amuse gamers and fans (maybe even a few bells & whistles) alike, and leveling up system I felt were all nice incentives to complete the whole thing.



Honorable Mentions
Dragon Adventure (Budokai Tenkaichi 2)- Uses a similar free-roam system to Budokai 3 but it wasn't as fleshed out and the storytelling suffered due to extremely poorly animated cutscenes. I liked it mostly for the leveling up system and some of the hidden content.
Play Game (Sagas)- I would have added it to the worst section but only because the game as a whole is pretty bad. Admittingly it tells the story better than most DBZ games.



Worst

Dragon World (Budokai 2)- When I was a kid the moment I saw the first Budokai's story mode was replaced with this board game shit I was so utterly disappointed even went as far as to call it the worst in the trilogy because of it. It had a few good things about it but due to the slow pacing and how much the story strays away from the source material, it tends to get boring after a while which just made getting breakthrough capsules for everyone even more of a chore than before. On top of that, the story on this mode makes no sense regardless of you're familiar with the actual story of DBZ or not.


Another Road (Shin Budokai 2)- Boring, simple, and repetitive. That's all I can say. Also, the story was fucking stupid.


Dragon Mission (Infinite World)- The storytelling is insultingly bad, almost like the producers rose their arms up and said "Really?! Who gives a fuck?". Sure, there's finally animated cutscenes this time around but those are far and few inbetween. The game's poorly scaled difficulty curve is also at worst here (especially #18 with her constant spamming of Deadly Dance and Aura Burst). And don't get me started on those mini-games...

Dishonorable Mentions
Dragon History (Tenkaichi 3)- Partly because it far too short given the diverse number of characters to play as but mostly because the story is just not good. It skips over too key battles, leaves out a lot of important details, and the cutscenes aren't even capablr of handling more than two people on-screen at once.

[Hellspawn28]

I remember before BT3 came out, Spike mention how you change the path of the story mode and I was like "So it's similar how Shadow the Hedgehog was? Cool!". Instead we got a story mode that kinda sucked. With so many characters, they could have give us the perfect story mode.

[MajinMan]

Top 5
1. Budokai 1 - The cutscenes and music were really beautiful. It's a shame it only went up to the cell saga and not the buu saga.

2. Budokai 3 - I loved the whole exploring and branching path aspect of it, if it had cutscenes it would be number 1. The different characters you can use were cool as well.

3. Budokai 2 - I know I'm a budokai fanboy but I really think the story mode for this game is underrated. I personally like the board game stuff because it's so different, even if it isn't the greatest thing in the world.

4. Tenkaichi 2 - There was lots and lots of fighting. Didn't skip too many moments from the series.

5. Ultimate Tenkaichi - Only because of those cutscenes. The game sucks.

I can't think of the worst, but if I had to choose I would pick Tenkaichi 3 because it skipped so much.

[AgitoZ]

Looking back on it, after the first Budokai, I think all story modes are kind of trash. After the first Budokai meticulously followed the story every other game paled in comparison. But even then, as a Dragon Ball fan, it was really boring to go through from Raditz to Boo over and over and over and over again. So most games are in this weird spot where they're not detailed enough to truly allow non fans to follow the story but too close to the story to all the fans who have watched/read/played the story multiple times.

So to sum up: Budokai 2 clutches it out.

[mcdonough88]

Sparking meteor was a complete disappointment, TOO many important fights got cut...

[Zephyr]

Budokai 2 was my favorite story mode. I really hated it at first, but it grew on me.

The story it told wasn't exactly the same as the manga story, which is quite refreshing. I didn't see any problem with Freeza and Cell repeatedly coming back.

The board game mode added a new dimension to the whole thing, and it could be played with friends. I really enjoyed searching for stat buffs, Dragon Balls, and unlockables.