PAGE TOP

3,853 Posts & 2,435 Pages Documenting Dragon Ball, since 1998. We've got you covered!
Published by 20 October 2013, 9:12 AM EDT8 Comments

Selecta Visión has been on a roll recently, tossing out even more remasters of the various Dragon Ball series, and now coming out swinging again with the big announcement that many fans in Spain have been waiting for: Battle of Gods has been licensed!

bog_selectavision_spain_license

The announcement was made alongside a screening of the film at this year’s Sitges Festival. There are no specific details yet about a release date/plan, but the company urges its fans to stay tuned to their Facebook page for more information.

Thanks to sangofe and MrKaytos for the heads-up.

Published by 17 October 2013, 5:13 PM EDTComment

On 13 September 2013, months following the premiere of Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods in theaters across Japan, Toei finally released the franchise’s first theatrical film in 17 years to the home video market. We gave everyone a first glimpse at the packaging as our own Julian (“SaiyaJedi”) received his copy a day before its official release. Now join us again, as we add our detailed information pages to the “Home Video Guide”!

The film’s home video was released in “Standard” and “Limited” edition packaging, with both editions available in DVD and Blu-ray formats. While the “Standard Edition” release is your typical single disc release, with a few bonus features, the “Limited Edition” release comes jam-packed with special presents, a second disc of bonus features, and the inclusion of the Dragon Ball “Jump Super Anime Tour 2008” Special. In addition to all that, a special booklet was included highlighting various aspects of the film, along with an exclusive introductory message from Akira Toriyama.

If you haven’t done so already, you can still pick up a copy for yourself from the following online retailers:

Published by 17 October 2013, 11:26 AM EDTComment

An upcoming “Dragon Ball Heroes: Special Binder Box Set 2” gives us a close look at the “new chapter” coming to the card-based arcade game in Japan, and more specifically at the adult, GT-styled Gotenks.

heroes_binder_2

9ポケットバインダーセットがドラゴンボールヒーローズで登場!高級感のある豪華金箔押し仕様のバインダーに加え、9枚の強力なカードがセット。付属の9枚のカードを組み替えることで、5種類の強力な戦略でデッキを作ることが可能!【商品内容】バインダー1冊、9ポケットリフィル10枚、バトルカード9枚 (・孫悟空:GT 超サイヤ人4[CAAチェンジバースト] ・孫悟天:GT 超サイヤ人[CAAロックオン] ・トランクス:GT 超サイヤ人 ・ブロリー 伝説の超サイヤ人[CAAチェンジバースト] ・ベジット 超サイヤ人[CAAロックオン] ・ゴジータ 超サイヤ人 ・ピッコロ ・孫悟空:幼年期 ・亀仙人[新1弾実装の新CAA] *ラインナップは変更になる可能性あり。*9ポケットリフィル (別売) が追加可能。


A 9-pocket binder set appears for Dragon Ball Heroes!! In addition to the deluxe gold-leaf inlaid binder with high-quality feel, comes a set of 9 powerful cards. By mixing and matching the 9 included cards, it is possible to create a deck with five kinds of powerful tactics!
PRODUCT CONTENTS: 1 binder, 10 nine-pocket pages, 9 battle cards (Super Saiyan 4 Son Goku: GT [Card Action Ability: Change Burst], Super Saiyan Son Goten: GT [CAA: Lock On], Super Saiyan Trunks: GT, Legendary Super Saiyan Broli [CAA: Change Burst], Super Saiyan Vegetto [CAA: Lock On], Super Saiyan Gogeta, Piccolo, Goku: Childhood, Kame-Sen’nin [New CAA Implemented in New Stage 1] — lineup subject to change).
* 9-pocket refills (sold separately) may be added.

The binder is due out in Japan 14 December 2013 for ¥3,150 MSRP, though Amazon Japan currently has it on pre-order for ¥2,704.

Thanks to HECTOR4 for the heads-up!

Published by 16 October 2013, 12:35 PM EDT2 Comments

The J-Stars Victory Vs updates are coming fast and furious now. Tokyo Game Show brought us a slew of new character and gameplay updates, and issues of Jump-branded magazines are filling in even more gaps, with next week’s upcoming 2013 #47 issue of Weekly Shōnen Jump in Japan (due out on Monday, 21 October) announcing even more for the crossover fighting game extravaganza.

Following on the heels of last week’s announcement that Medaka Kurokami of Medaka Box would be a playable character, the characters to be introduced next week are all female.

jstars_female_update

Three of the four characters introduced this time are support characters: Lala Satalin Deviluke of To Love-Ru will restore the player’s stamina; Chitoge Kirisaki from Nisekoi can disable opposing support characters with a stinging slap; and Rukia Kuchiki from Bleach can freeze opponents using her Zanpakutō, leaving them open to attack. The lone fighter among next week’s additions is “Pirate Empress” Boa Hancock of One Piece, who will be able to use the Devil Fruit powers of her “Love-Love Fruit” to turn opponents to stone.

Perhaps most important of all is the game’s release date and pricing scheme. The game will finally drop 19 March 2014 in Japan on both the PlayStation 3 and Vita, with normal and “Limited Edition” versions of both. The “Limited Edition” will run ¥10,980 yen and ¥9,980 yen on the PS3 and Vita respectively, with the normal edition running ¥7,980 and ¥6,980 for the same platforms. The release date announcement also mentions a limited-edition “Anime Song Sound Edition” (presumably containing vocal songs from included series’ respective animated adaptations, though there is no actual explanation of the item) to go on sale at the same time, but it is also unclear at the moment whether this is the same as and included within the “Limited Edition” listed above, or represents a separate product with an as-yet unannounced price.

Online retailers have yet to update with appropriate listings for the four different SKUs, but we will keep you updated and point you in the right direction as soon as they are available. The PS3 and Vita are both essentially region-free, with only minor caveats thrown into the mix (such as Persona 4 Arena being software-region-locked on home consoles, and the Vita generally requiring multiple memory cards for multiple profiles and reboots, though they both will indeed play games from all regions).

Published by 16 October 2013, 11:36 AM EDTComment

The official website for J-Stars Victory Vsthe upcoming crossover fighting game for the PlayStation 3 and Vita featuring all sorts of characters from various Jump franchises — has updated with even more screen shots showcasing new characters and background stages.

Of most interest for Dragon Ball fans is the website’s formal introduction to Vegeta:

jstars_vegeta_large

DEFEATING KAKARROT IS MY JOB…

Vegeta:
Proud prince of the Saiyan warrior race. An elite with a high battle power from birth, his pride is also extremely great. He is also Goku’s eternal rival, who was once a brutal, evil warrior, but gained a new heart over the course of his battles with Goku & co.

New screen shots are also available for Toriko and Naruto characters, as well as a new background stage from Naruto.

Published by 15 October 2013, 12:57 PM EDTComment

When we last left J Legend Retsuden — the upcoming, Japanese, Nintendo 3DS compilation of older Jump-property-based video games — another Dragon Ball game was being included as a bonus download with first-run orders.

This week’s 2013 #46 issue of Weekly Shōnen Jump in Japan reveals another inclusion for the compilation: Dragon Ball Z: Super Butōden 2 from the Super Famicom.

sb2_jlegendretsuden_jump

Originally released at the end of 1993, Super Butōden 2 — a favorite here at Kanzenshuu! — greatly expanded upon the first fighting game for the franchise with refined controls, new characters (including two unlockable characters), new background stages, and a branching story mode incorporating the Cell arc as well as Dragon Ball Z Movie 9.

sb2_title_V2

Jump sadly notes that this will be the final inclusion in the compilation, bringing the total to 10 games:

  • Dragon Ball: Shenron no Nazo (Famicom)
  • Dragon Ball: Daimaō Fukkatsu (Famicom)
  • Dragon Ball Z: Kyōshū! Saiya-jin (Famicom)
  • Saint Seiya: Gold Legend (Famicom)
  • Saint Seiya: Gold Legend Finale (Famicom)
  • Charge! Men’s Private School (Famicom)
  • Go! Go! Ackman 3 (Super Famicom)
  • Yū Yū Hakusho (Super Famicom)
  • Dragon Ball Z: Super Butōden 2 (Super Famicom)
  • Dragon Ball Z: Gekishin Furīza!! (Famicom; download-only bonus)

J Legend Retsuden is due out exclusively in Japan 07 November 2013 for ¥4,980. Play-Asia is currently offering the game for pre-order at $47.49 with free shipping until 24 October 2013.

Be sure to check out Episode #0311 of our podcast for an exhaustive retrospective of all the mainline Super Butōden games, along with a few of its later and more recent successors.

Published by 12 October 2013, 11:23 PM EDT2 Comments

Along with the Dragon Ball franchise’s main outing, Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Z (hitting the 360, PS3, and Vita sometime in early 2014), the multiplayer crossover brawler J-Stars Victory Vs was also shown off by Namco-Bandai at this year’s Tokyo Game Show.

In addition to being playable on the show floor, a second promotional video was also on display during the event, which was uploaded to YouTube last week by the company:

Along with heroes Yūsuke and Gon and rival characters Vegeta, Sasuke, Zebra, the new trailer also details a few new tidbits.

Tarō Yamada from Chin’yūki will also appear as a playable rival character. New battle mechanics include various attacks such as “Hero Action”, “Combination Attack”, “Victory Voltage”, “Trap”, and a “Support Character” you can call on. Showcased as a support character is Jaguar Jun’ichi from Pyū to Fuku! Jaguar.

This past week’s 2013 #45 issue of Weekly Shōnen Jump also revealed two more character additions to the game: Medaka Kurokami and Misogi Kumagawa from Medaka Box. Medaka, the fearsome Student-Council President, can move “faster than the speed of sound” to strike her enemies, and apparently also includes a “fierce god mode”. Misogi Kumagawa is a support-only character, who is apparently able to attack and weaken enemy characters.

The game’s official website has been detailing some of the background stages, including Alabasta (One Piece), Planet Namek (Dragon Ball), and Vegetable Sky (Toriko):

J-Stars Victory Vs will be available on the PlayStation 3 and Vita. No official release date or price have been revealed.

Published by 11 October 2013, 2:57 PM EDT2 Comments

You may recall that about a month ago we reported that information had surfaced confirming that the upcoming Dragon Ball Z Blu-ray “Season” sets would indeed be in a 16:9 widescreen format. This confirmation came via online retailer product listings for the “Dragon Ball Z: Season 1” Blu-ray release, most notably from Amazon and RightStuf. In both cases the product descriptions, which appear to be the official promotional descriptions from FUNimation, clearly state that:

This epic collection presents the first thirty-nine episodes in remastered, high-definition quality and 16:9 aspect ratio using frame by frame, pan and scan technology, and features two English tracks (U.S. English broadcast version, English dialogue with Japanese music).

While that description makes it seem pretty cut and dry, it now appears that FUNimation is selling a slightly different story. Earlier this morning at their industry panel at New York Comic Con, hosted by FUNimation representatives Adam Sheehan and Justin Rojas, a fan inquired about why the upcoming Dragon Ball Z Blu-ray “Season” sets were being released in widescreen. In response, Sheehan made it clear that the matter of the aspect ratio is “still up in the air” and that nothing read online about it should be trusted at the moment.

The latter is quite an odd statement, considering the official product description contradicts it. It also poses the question: why was an official product description even released if the aspect ratio had not already been ironed out? So, it now appears that FUNimation themselves aren’t even quite sure what we’ll see on this release.

This all being said, fans may remember advertising material during the timeframe of the orange bricks subtly shifting language over time. While the entire nine “season sets” were indeed cropped/widescreen the entire way through, print advertisements in places like Viz’s Shonen Jump magazine stopped mentioning “widescreen” all together somewhere around the third release.

Thanks to Todd DuBois (@GWOtaku) for the heads up about this!

Published by 11 October 2013, 12:05 AM EDT2 Comments

Now that the onslaught of Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods movie news and work has more-or-less blown over, we’re finally getting back to porting over all of those missing movie information pages in the “Movie Guide”. So, picking up where we left off, we’re jumping into the late-1980s and early-1990s to bring you the first three Dragon Ball Z theatrical films. As always, we’ve gone a step beyond simply importing the old pages, having spent a lot of time digging through everything we could think of to really bring you the most comprehensive information possible. You’ll find updated information about each movie’s promotional materials, premiere, and releases, along with additional movie notes, character profiles, background information from movie staff, detailed name pun analysis, and more!

Be sure to check back soon for our next content update! This is only the beginning.

Published by 10 October 2013, 4:23 PM EDTComment

With New York Comic Con right around the corner, Namco-Bandai has unveiled a batch of new screen shots from the upcoming new fighting game for the franchise, Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Z. The new screens showcase some of the options available in the game, including adjusting the color of character models/outfits, via the “Limit Jewel” and other character customization aspects.

Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Z will be available in “early 2014” on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Vita (the latter being a digital-only release). Multiple in-game bonuses are available via pre-orders and “Day One” purchases.