Toon Zone has a little bite from “TV Guide” where James Masters (who plays Piccolo in the upcoming American live action Dragon Ball movie) briefly mentions the series:

Oh, Dragonball is the coolest television cartoon in the last 50,000 years. It’s got a Shakespearean sense of good and evil. The movie has incredible action scenes with characters with unbelieveable powers. It’s going to be really visually exciting.

We have certainly learned a couple extremely important things from Atari’s latest press release:

1. Donny Clay still has a job.
2. They are not changing the title (“Burst Limit”).
3. They think they will still be around later this year.

Here is the full scoop:

NEW YORK, Jan. 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Atari, Inc. one of the world’s most recognized brands and a third-party video game publisher and distributor, today announced that Dragon Ball Z(R): Burst Limit is in development for Xbox 360(R) video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PLAYSTATION(R)3 computer entertainment system. Exploding into the next level of intensity with next-gen graphics, online gameplay and lightening fast action, Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit is being developed by NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc. and is slated for a 2008 release.

Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit is revolutionizing the series by entering the realm of next-generation gaming. Complete with fierce online battles and radical 3D graphic effects only possible on Xbox 360 and PLAYSTATION 3 system, Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit will blur the line between video game and iconic anime series. Jam-packed with graphically enhanced playable characters, realistic battle stages and environments, players can take hold and experience Dragon Ball Z(R) as never before.

“Atari is excited and ready to offer fans the next iteration of the Dragon Ball Z video game series on the next-gen consoles,” said Donny Clay, Producer, Atari, Inc. “With explosive cinematic graphics and online gameplay, fans of the series and of the fighting genre will surely enjoy Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit.”

The immensely popular Dragon Ball Z(R) series is the gold standard of anime-based video games, with more than 30 different games and over 11 million units sold since May 2002.

Pretty awesome. Let us keep our fingers crossed that the new opening theme (“Kiseki no Honō yo Moeagare!!”) remains intact, whatever the BGM is remains intact, and we keep those selectable Japanese voices.

I came across an article over on VarietyAsiaOnline.com that states Atari’s gigantic problems (including yet another warning from NASDAQ to get their stock into shape) could potentially hurt the upcoming live-action movie set to release next year.

Really? How exactly do you figure? The article states nothing more than:

But if Atari, which recorded a $12 million loss for the first quarter of fiscal 2007, is delisted, it may not sit well with 20th Century Fox, which is producing a live-action “Dragon Ball” pic for an August 15 release in the U.S., with James Wong helming and Justin Chatwin starring as Goku, the pic’s super-powered boy hero.

What does Atari have to do with 20th Century Fox? Unless there is some deal going on for Atari to promote the movie in some way with some sort of gaming experience, I just do not see the connection — which is probably impossible, anyway, since Atari has completely departed from the game production business and exclusively acts as a distributor now. The only upcoming promotional tie-in I could see would be “Burst Limit” happening to be available around the same time. Even if Atari were to completely crumble, FUNimation would sell off the remaining time of the license (or sell a new one, entirely) to a new bidder and keep going from there. As far as I can see, Namco-Bandai themselves would just take over the job (since they are the ones creating the games over in Japan).

Furthermore, the following is completely inaccurate:

Atari “Dragon Ball Z” license expired last September and, after negotiations with Funimation, signed a deal in December for a reported $3.5 million that renews the license until January 2010.

As we know, the license did not expire; FUNimation claimed Atari was in breach of their contract due to marketing shortfalls, and Atari paid the difference to keep things amiable and still-going. The license always was until 2010, and it remains so.

The event to end all fanboy events took place in Japan last week, and our old buddy Greg was there to take it in with style. Check out Greg’s video of Masako Nozawa performing the Kamehameha; you can also find a video of Hironobu Kageyama performing “WE GOTTA POWER” live for the audience! It appears that next year the Japanese public will be able to check out episodes of Dragon Ball Z on their cell phones via the website 5958.jp. Interesting.

A promotional video for the game was released this past week (viewable on the official website, as well as downloadable via gametrailers.com) showcasing all sorts of awesomeness from the upcoming game, including yet another all-new vocal song! Performed by Hironobu Kageyama, “Kiseki no Honō yo Moeagare!!” (“Flare Up, Miraculous Fire!!”) sounds as if it is going in a much different direction than “Super Survivor” (the opening theme from “Sparking! METEOR”)… but it is amazing, none-the-less:

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While we are impressed with the motion and movement of the characters, we are not quite sold on the art style yet, and we are extremely concerned about playing through the Saiyan arc in a console fighting game for the seventh year in a row.

The heroes of “Battle Stadium D.O.N.” (and Shueisha in general, really!) made an appearance in “Second Life” on December 22-23 as a special promotion for Jump Festa going on over in Japan at that time:

Players could gather the Dragon Balls, win items, and more. If you are into that sort of thing, I guess that was pretty awesome.