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Published by 05 June 2015, 1:42 PM EDTComment

A strategy guide book for the upcoming Nintendo 3DS game, Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butōden, has been announced for release 11 June 2015, the same day as the game’s release.

extreme_butoden_guide_cover

The 112-page “Limit Break Battle Guide” will cover the game’s 100 characters (including playable and Z-Assist characters), detailing the conditions required to unlock each character and their various in-game abilities. It will also detail the necessary techniques, strategies, and information needed to complete the story mode and all eight areas encountered in the game’s “Mysterious Adventure” mode.

The book will also come packed with special bonus material for players: Jaco and Gine (from Jaco the Galactic Patrolman) as Z-Assist characters, as well as a download code for a digital copy of the original strategy guide for the Super Famicom game Dragon Ball Z: Super Butōden 2. Various other Z-Assist characters are available as retailer-specific downloadable content via different Japanese stores.

The book will retail for ¥950 + tax and is available for pre-order via Amazon Japan.

Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butōden will launch in Japan 11 June 2015. First-press copies of the game will come packed with bonus content, including a downloadable version of the Super Famicom game Dragon Ball Z: Super Butōden 2 (previously included as a part of the J-Legend Retsuden compilation game). Arc System Works will develop the game for Bandai Namco. The developer previously worked on the Bukū… / Supersonic Warriors games on the Nintendo GameBoy Advance and DS.

Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butōden is currently available for pre-order from CDJapan. The Nintendo 3DS / New Nintendo 3DS are region-locked; a Japanese system is required for the game to play.

Published by 05 June 2015, 11:00 AM EDTComment

Anime News Network reports that next week’s 2015 #28 issue of Weekly Shōnen Jump in Japan reveals that the Dragon Ball Super TV series will begin airing 05 July 2015 on Fuji TV in Japan.

The promotional splash’s tagline, “A Super-New Work!!” (超神作!! Chō-Shinsaku), is actually a play on words where the 新 (shin) in the word 新作 (shinsaku, meaning “new work”), has been replaced with 神 (shin, meaning “godly”), and highlighted in red. It is possible that this pun is a hint at the series’ yet-to-be-revealed plot, or is merely a promotional tie-in with the franchise’s recent movies. A similar use of wordplay was seen in the tagline for Dragon Ball Z: Revival of “F”.

The issue’s splash also reiterates the previously-announced opening and ending theme information: the opening theme by Kazuya Yoshii will be titled “Chōzetsu ☆ Dynamic!!” (超絶☆ダイナミック!!), while the new ending theme from Good Morning America will be “Hello Hello Hello” (ハローハローハロー).

A supplemental note at the bottom of the page announces that Dragon Ball Super will be involved with the “Odaiba Dream Continent ~Dream Mega Summer Festival~” as a tie-in collaboration during its “treasure hunt” event. The festival is being hosted by Fuji TV on Tokyo’s man-made Odaiba island, which will be held from 18 July 2015 to 31 August 2015.

Online listings for the final box set of the Majin Boo arc of Dragon Ball Kai had suggested the impending debut date by way of the episode count corresponding to upcoming air dates.

Dragon Ball Super is the first all-new TV series for the franchise in 18 years. The story and characters will be developed by original manga author Akira Toriyama, will star veteran voice actress Masako Nozawa, and will be directed by Kimitoshi Chioka. The series will, “…follow the aftermath of Goku’s fierce battle with Majin Boo, as he attempts to maintain earth’s fragile peace.” A manga adaptation from “Toyotarō” will run each month in V-Jump starting in June.

Published by 04 June 2015, 9:21 PM EDTComment

The third and final pack of announced downloadable content for Dragon Ball XENOVERSE will finally hit Japanese, European, and North American console and PC players 09 June 2015.

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The pack, which was originally promised for May, is set to contain:

  • Four new playable characters including; Super Saiyan God Super Saiyan Goku, Super Saiyan God Super Saiyan Vegeta, Golden Frieza, and Jaco the Galactic Patrolman
  • Five new Parallel Quests
  • Two new masters including; Elder Kai and Jaco the Galactic Patrolman
  • Eight new Master Quests
  • 14 new skills
  • Two new costumes including; Gohan’s Tracksuit and Turtle Hermit’s Aloha Shirt
  • Two new accessories including; Tagoma’s Scouter and a Turtle Hermit Set
  • One new gesture
  • Seven new Z Souls

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A “Movie Costumes Pack” was recently released for free enabling players to equip additional cosmetic items from the new film Dragon Ball Z: Revival of “F”.

Dragon Ball XENOVERSE, developed by Dimps for Bandai Namco, is the latest video game for the franchise on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC.

Published by 31 May 2015, 9:37 AM EDTComment

Staff member Hikari wrote on the composer’s official blog this week that Norihito Sumitomo will return to musical composition duties for the upcoming Dragon Ball Super TV series.

Sumitomo began with Dragon Ball in 2013 with the score to the theatrical film Battle of Gods. He returned for the Majin Boo arc of Dragon Ball Kai in 2014 following the removal of Kenji Yamamoto’s music, and again for the 2015 film Revival of “F”.

Back in February, staff member Hikari provided an extensive blog post documenting the recording session for the Revival of “F” musical score.

Dragon Ball Super is the first all-new TV series for the franchise in 18 years. The story and characters will be developed by original manga author Akira Toriyama, will star veteran voice actress Masako Nozawa, and will be directed by Kimitoshi Chioka. While an exact start date has not yet been officially unveiled, it is likely that Super will begin its broadcast run starting 05 July 2015, taking over the Dragon Ball Kai time slot on Fuji TV. The series will, “…follow the aftermath of Goku’s fierce battle with Majin Boo, as he attempts to maintain earth’s fragile peace.”A manga adaptation from “Toyotarō” will run each month in V-Jump starting in June.

Thanks to kei17 for the heads-up!

Published by 28 May 2015, 12:14 PM EDTComment

SM Cinema has revealed that fans in the Philippines have the 2015 Dragon Ball Z film, Resurrection ‘F’ (“Revival of ‘F'”), coming their way beginning 10 June 2015.

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The 2013 Dragon Ball Z film, Battle of Gods, also screened courtesy of SM Cinema.

The story for Revival of “F”, which opened nationwide in Japan 18 April 2015 in 2D and IMAX 3D, was crafted by original manga author Akira Toriyama, who stated he wrote it, “…as though it were a continuation of the manga when it was in serialization,” and that while it would, “…of course be a continuation of the previous Battle of Gods,” he has also, “…deliberately increased the amount of action scenes by a good deal.” Tadayoshi Yamamuro, who worked for many years as character designer and animation supervisor on the Dragon Ball franchise, served as the film’s director and animation supervisor. Norihito Sumitomo has returned from Battle of Gods and the Majin Boo arc of Dragon Ball Kai for musical composition duties. Momoiro Clover Z contributed “Vow of ‘Z'” as the film’s main theme alongside Maximum the Hormone, whose “F” is used during the film. Revival of “F” brings back Freeza and includes two new characters (Sorbet and Tagoma), features Beerus and Whis again from Battle of Gods, and much more. The film has been announced for distribution in 74 countries.

Big thanks to Nikki for the heads-up!

Published by 26 May 2015, 3:47 PM EDTComment

FUNimation has announced that the 2015 Dragon Ball Z film, Resurrection “F”, will see a limited theatrical run from 04 August 2015 to 12 August 2015.

funi_resurrection_f_theater_dates

The film will feature the same English dub cast returning from Battle of Gods. Chris Ayres returns as Freeza from his Dragon Ball Z Kai role, while Todd Haberkorn joins the cast as Jaco.

The company’s dragonballz.com website currently hosts a mailing list subscription form and a “teaser trailer” video:

The 2013 Dragon Ball Z film, Battle of Gods, also received a short theatrical run courtesy of FUNimation prior to its home video release just a couple months later.

The story for Revival of “F”, which opened nationwide in Japan 18 April 2015 in 2D and IMAX 3D, was crafted by original manga author Akira Toriyama, who stated he wrote it, “…as though it were a continuation of the manga when it was in serialization,” and that while it would, “…of course be a continuation of the previous Battle of Gods,” he has also, “…deliberately increased the amount of action scenes by a good deal.” Tadayoshi Yamamuro, who worked for many years as character designer and animation supervisor on the Dragon Ball franchise, served as the film’s director and animation supervisor. Norihito Sumitomo has returned from Battle of Gods and the Majin Boo arc of Dragon Ball Kai for musical composition duties. Momoiro Clover Z contributed “Vow of ‘Z'” as the film’s main theme alongside Maximum the Hormone, whose “F” is used during the film. Revival of “F” brings back Freeza and includes two new characters (Sorbet and Tagoma), features Beerus and Whis again from Battle of Gods, and much more. The film has been announced for distribution in 74 countries.

Published by 23 May 2015, 1:32 PM EDT3 Comments

A piece of promotional artwork resurfaced online yesterday tied in with excitement about the upcoming Dragon Ball Super TV series and, more specifically, its accompanying manga adaptation. Over the last day, several news outlets have incorrectly claimed this image is promotional artwork for the aforementioned manga adaptation.

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The image — drawn by Toyotarō — dates back to February of this year, where it was used in the Shonen Jump+ digital bonus material from that month’s (March 2015) issue of V-Jump. Alongside the image were sketches for the following month’s second chapter of Toyotarō’s Dragon Ball Z: Revival of “F” manga adaptation, which ran for three chapters in the April, May, and June issues of V-Jump this year.

The image notes that the manga is “completely supervised by Akira Toriyama-sensei” and that “Toyotarō is drawing it with all his might!!!”

Japanese entertainment website Natalie ran a story announcing the forthcoming manga adaptation of Dragon Ball Super. The above image of Goku was used to accompany the story.

鳥山明ストーリー原案の「ドラゴンボール」新アニメ、Vジャンでコミカライズ

鳥山明原作のアニメ「ドラゴンボール」の新シリーズ「ドラゴンボール超(スーパー)」のコミカライズ連載が、6月20日発売のVジャンプ8月号(集英社)よりスタートする。執筆するのは、同誌にて映画「ドラゴンボールZ 復活の『F』」のコミカライズも手がけたとよたろう。

アニメ「ドラゴンボール超」は、悟空が魔人ブウとの壮絶な戦いを終え、平和を取り戻した地球を舞台とした「ドラゴンボール」シリーズ18年ぶりの新作。原案を鳥山が担当し、7月よりフジテレビほかにて日曜9時より放送される。


V-Jump Comicalizes the New “Dragon Ball” Anime From Akira Toriyama’s Story Draft

The new “Dragon Ball” anime series, Dragon Ball Super, from original author Akira Toriyama is receiving a comicalized serialization, which is set to start in the August 2015 issue of V-Jump (Shueisha) on June 20th. It will be written by Toyotarō, who worked on the comicalization of the Dragon Ball Z: Revival of “F” movie in this magazine.

The stage for the Dragon Ball Super anime, the first new “Dragon Ball” series in 18 years, follows Goku’s fierce battle with Majin Boo, where peace has once again fallen over the Earth. Based on a draft by Toriyama, the [new series] will be broadcast on Sundays at 9 a.m. on Fuji TV this July.

The image of Goku is simply captioned with “Goku Cut by Toyotarō” (とよたろうによる悟空のカット), noting the obvious fact that it is drawn by Toyotarō. With no promotional artwork — let alone a true logo — released yet for Dragon Ball Super, we can only assume Natalie simply grabbed whatever image they felt was most relevant, or was perhaps even provided to them by Shueisha; in this case, an image of the main character from the respective manga artist makes sense as a choice.

Following Natalie’s story going online, many popular anime and comic websites ran with the story that the image was specifically from and for the forthcoming Dragon Ball Super adaptation.

As is probably apparent, this is not the case.

We do not yet have a perfectly-concrete, in-universe timeframe that the Dragon Ball Super story will take place (other than after the defeat of Majin Boo). We also do not know if Goku’s design as shown above (which includes Whis’ symbol on his dōgi) will be kept; it may be, or it may not be.

As of right now, all we know is that Toyotarō will be handling the manga adaptation in V-Jump. Nothing about its content, including character designs, has been revealed.

Published by 23 May 2015, 9:28 AM EDTComment

Manga UK confirmed this weekend at the MCM London Comic Con that they have secured the rights to the 2015 Dragon Ball Z theatrical film, Revival of “F” (“Resurrection ‘F'”).

manga_uk_rof_confirm_twitter

No other information — specifically concerning any possible theatrical screenings and the eventual home release — has been made available, but the company promises more information soon.

The film, which opened nationwide in Japan back in April, has been announced for 74 countries.

Published by 21 May 2015, 9:52 AM EDT1 Comment

Shunsuke Kikuchi, composer for the Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z TV series (as well as their contemporary movies and TV specials in the 1980s-1990s) has been awarded the 2015 “International Award” from the Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers (JASRAC).

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The “International Award” is given to the domestic work with the most income generated by payments from foreign licensees.  This year, the score to the Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball TV series took the #1 and #10 spots, respectively.  The scores to Dragon Ball Z generated payments from eleven foreign countries including Italy and the United States.  Eight other anime soundtracks made the rankings.

Kikuchi received the second-place “International Award” for the same work back in 2011.

Thanks to kei17 for the heads-up.

Published by 20 May 2015, 11:53 PM EDT1 Comment

In conjunction with the launch of the official Dragon Ball Super website yesterday, the series’ theme songs were unveiled at the “Triad Rocks –Columbia vs Triad-” event held in Tokyo. The series’ opening theme, “Chōzetsu ☆ Dynamic!!”, will be peformed by Kazuya Yoshii (lead vocalist of The Yellow Monkey), while rock band Good Morning America returns from their work on Dragon Ball Kai to provide Super’s ending theme, “Hello Hello Hello”. Good Morning America and Kazuya Yoshii, who were both participating at the event, were on-hand to celebrate the announcement with Son Goku and Fuji TV producer Osamu Nozaki.

Following the event, comments from the artists and staff were released:

吉井和哉

子供達が学校の帰り道につい口ずさんでしまうメロディー、そしてその歌を呟けば、思わず強くなれるような、力が湧いてくるような曲を作りたいと思いました。

僕が悟空に持つイメージでもある、優しくて大きな強さの中にあるセクシーさも表現したかったです。

イントロからAメロは家族で空を飛んでるイメージです。作詞家としてリスペクトしている憧れの森雪之丞さんとの曲作りも超絶スーパーでした!この曲を作りながら自分もどんどん強くなっていった気がします。

レコーディングもLAの信頼するミュージシャン、スタッフで行いました!こちらも超絶!!楽しみにしていてください!


Kazuya Yoshii

I wanted to create a tune that kids would hum as they went home from school, and as they hummed it, it would feel like power was welling up inside them.

I also wanted to convey my image of Goku: kind, powerful, and sexy too.

The intro up to the first verse have the image of flying together as a family. Yukinojō Mori is someone I really admire and respect as a songwriter, so getting to make this song with him was absolutely super! I feel like I grew stronger and stronger while making it.

The recording was handled by LA’s trusted musicians and staff! Fantastic!! Look forward to it!

グッドモーニングアメリカ Vo./Gt. 金廣真悟

ドラゴンボール。前回携わらせてもらった「改」は、幼少時代に一度見たアニメのデジタルリマスター版。

当時そのエンディングテーマは影山ヒロノブさんが歌っていたし、良く知っている分、その部分を自分たちがするという事に、とても嬉しい反面、少しの違和感があり、なんなら未だに実感が無い状態です。

しかし今回は完全なる新しいストーリー。漫画にもなっていない未知なる冒険。とても楽しみだし、ワクワクしています。

ドラゴンボールの歴史とともに刻まれるような、とっておきの「超」新曲を持って来たので、楽しみにしていてください。


Good Morning America (Vocals/Guitar: Shingo Kanehiro)

Dragon Ball. I was involved with Kai last time, which was a digitally remastered version of an anime I’d seen once back when I was a kid.

Back then, the ending theme was sung by Hironobu Kageyama. Since it’s something I’m so familiar with, on the one hand I’m very happy that we’re getting to do it ourselves, but on the other hand it doesn’t feel quite right; it doesn’t seem real yet.

Still, this time it’s a completely new story. An unknown adventure that’s not even in the manga. I’m really looking forward to it and totally excited.

In order to go down in Dragon Ball history, I’ve brought my ace-in-the-hole “super” new song, so look forward to it.

フジテレビ プロデューサー 野﨑理

ドラゴンボールシリーズ18年ぶりの新作テレビアニメ「ドラゴンボール超」のテーマ曲を決定するにあたり、ドラゴンボールの世界に新しい風を吹き込みながら子供から大人まで幅広く親しまれる主題歌にしたいと思い、吉井和哉さんにオープニングテーマ曲を担当していただきました。

吉井さんもソロでは初のアニメ主題歌、そして作詞の森雪之丞さんとの初タッグということで、番組と共に新たなチャレンジをしていただいたのではないかと思います。グッドモーニングアメリカの皆さんには昨年の「ドラゴンボール改」開始時のエンディングテーマ曲を歌っていただきました。野沢雅子さんとイベントで共演するなど、新番組スタートを大きく勢いづけていただきました。「ドラゴンボール超」でもまた一緒に番組を盛り上げていければと思います。

18年ぶりの新シリーズ「ドラゴンボール超(スーパー)」と共に新テーマ曲にもぜひともご期待ください!


Fuji TV Producer Osamu Nozaki

When deciding on the theme song for Dragon Ball Super, the first new Dragon Ball TV anime series in 18 years, I thought that the main theme should be a breath of fresh air for the Dragon Ball world, something that would be popular with both children and adults, so I entrusted the opening theme to Kazuya Yoshii-san.

This is Yoshii-san’s first time singing the main theme of an anime solo, and also his first time collaborating with songwriter Yukinojō Mori-san, so I’m sure the two of them will take on these new challenges together. Good Morning America all sang the initial ending theme for when Dragon Ball Kai started up last year. They also performed with Masako Nozawa-san at an event, so overall they’ve been heavily involved with starting up new programs. I hope they’ll help us kick off Dragon Ball Super as well.

Please look forward not only to Dragon Ball Super, the first new series in 18 years, but also to the new theme song too!

Dragon Ball Super is the first all-new TV series for the franchise in 18 years. The story and characters will be developed by original manga author Akira Toriyama, will star veteran voice actress Masako Nozawa, and will be directed by Kimitoshi Chioka. While an exact start date has not yet been officially unveiled, it is likely that Super will begin its broadcast run starting 05 July 2015, taking over the Dragon Ball Kai time slot on Fuji TV. The series will, “…follow the aftermath of Goku’s fierce battle with Majin Boo, as he attempts to maintain earth’s fragile peace.” A manga adaptation from “Toyotarō” will run each month in V-Jump starting in June.