One of my more recent games.
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Table of Contents
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Dragonball Z Budokai Tenkaichi 3
System: Nintendo Wii
Rating: T
Story
Dragonball Z is a story that has been retold many times. With each game, a new retelling comes by. Tenkaichi 2 featured a lack of resources, so a lot of the areas/battles took place in different areas. Luckily, this game doesn't suffer from that problem for one simple reason; It doesn't feature the entire story.
This game is what you might call a game for the true fans of the series. It doesn't feature the whole story, but just the highlights of them all. The best battles, best dialogue, all of it. We see the battle between the Z Fighters and Nappa, Goku VS Frieza, Gohan VS Cell, and a bunch of other epic battles that made the series so popular. This game is truly a tribute to the fans who are still around to this day.
It features all of the series, in an almost literal term. Dragonball Z, GT, all of (or at least most of) the movies, and even a small bit of Dragonball is involved to show off some of young Goku's best battles against General Tao and King Piccolo. Each saga has about 3-5 battles so they're not very long, and the movie ones just have 1-2 battles so they fit into one section on their own. Sure, there is a lack of length in this story mode, but it makes up for that with long, difficult battles. Needless to say, you might need to train a little before trying it out.
In addition to this, it also features a "What If" saga like previous games, which tells a few events that could have happened, but didn't. One in particular is about the Saiyans finding out about Frieza's plot to betray them, then the best of them all (Bardock, Fasha, Vegeta and his father) team up to defeat him before he has the chance. That's the only scenario I'll mention now, but it's the highlight of the scenarios.
Gameplay
Gameplay is familiar ground for those who've played the games before. Ki blast, attack, guard, dashing, and so on… One thing that makes it unique is the use of the WiiMote. You hold it in a specific stance to perform special attacks. For example, to do the Kamehameha, you need to hold them together at your side as if you're doing the real attack. Granted, these attacks aren't too easy to perform if you're sitting down, but if you have too much trouble with it then you have the option to use a Classic Controller or Gamecube one. I prefer the Gamecube controller myself.
Also, there's something about story mode that makes it more realistic to the story. During a battle, you'll sometimes see a button appear on the bottom of the screen which is promoting you to press it. Doing so will usually change who you're playing as, or continue the story. This means you don't have to just win the battle to progress, but you can have it play out like it's meant to be. I really think it's a nice feature, and is good if you're having trouble beating someone (And trust me, that day will come.) In addition to this, a majority of story dialogue is spoken during the battles, which gives it a feeling of realism. Pretty need, huh?
Aside from story mode, there's also the usual stuff the games have, like dueling for free battles and 2-Player stuff, and a tournament which I'll go into detail about soon. There's also the ability to fight other players online, which I hope to do soon. The Z Evolution section for equipping upgrades for characters attacks returns, which is somewhat more limited and also a little less at the same time. There's also a section full of character profiles, and of course the controls and language setup. One notable thing about controls, however, is that there's no ability to assign the buttons to different places, which I find to be inconvenient.
Tournament mode has a nice variety of battles, but a randomized way to play them. The menu for tournament mode features a little clock which progresses whenever you leave the menu, and the purpose of this is so certain tournaments will be open for a certain time. The first one is just the Martial Arts Tournament, the simple knock-your-opponent-out-of-the-ring kind. Then the World Martial Arts Big Tournament, which is simply just like duels with randomly selected areas and the goal to defeat your opponent. Next is the Cell Games, a tournament hosted by Cell which, in pretty much any difficulty, can be unforgiving for the fact that you use the same health bar throughout the tournament. Next is Other World Tournament, which I think is just like the World Martial Arts Big Tournament, but with stronger characters. Lastly is the most random of all, Yamcha Games, which is a small tournament hosted by Yamcha. The oddity of this is that your character is chosen for you, so you probably want to be well polished with many of the characters.
There's also a section where you can either do a little session which is similar to a text-only RPG-style training session, and the amount of health and strength you've lost/gained in the training will determine your victory in a battle which takes place after 10 turns. Hard to explain, but it's a session I think you'll need to work on before being great at it. In this section you can also take on team challenges which are sometimes very difficult, but earn you money.
Aside from these things, there's not much notable things left to talk about.
Graphics
Sadly, this game features the same problem the previous game did with the graphics being limited to emotion. Characters could look serious but be laughing. And if it's even possible, cutscene animation has actually gotten a little worse. Instead of just having a bunch of idle standing characters, it limits to just TWO characters on screen, for whatever reason they did that. It's a minor thing, though, and you can skip these cutscenes anyway.
Music
These games are known to recycle previous game music and make new ones in their English releases, whereas the Japanese version features music straight from the show. Not exactly a good deal for the Americans, but music isn't important here anyway.
Voice Actors
Once more, the entire FUNimation cast returns for another great performance. I can't think of one character whose voice is replaced here, except MAYBE King Vegeta. I can't recall his original voice (or where I heard it for that matter), but currently he sounds like a deepened version of Vegeta. Not that it's a bad thing, but I recall a different voice used for him. Whatever, though, it's still great stuff.
Characters Featured
This game promised all of the previous games characters with some new ones added in, and that's just what we got. The most anticipated that I know of is King Vegeta and King Cold, who I've yet to unlock. There's also characters like Dr. Wheelo from The World's Strongest, Fasha the female Saiyan who worked with Bardock, and even a few additional henchmen to work for Frieza (they were only cutscene models in Tenkaichi 2, now they're playable!) There's also ones you probably wouldn't have expected too much, such as Android 8, General Blue and Nam from Dragonball, who I've been hoping to see. All in all, it's mostly the same cast, but with a few awesome additions. And most of the characters (and I DO mean most) are already unlocked when you get the game, so you could have an epic 2-Player battle right when you start the game.
Sequel?
Is it possible? I can't say for sure. The Budokai series ran for three games, and this is the third of Budokai Tenkaichi, so I suspect they will make it an even set by stopping here. But some people believe the closest thing to a sequel here is Shin Budokai on the PSP since it already has a sequel, and Burst Limit for the PS3 and XBox 360. All I know is if they make a game with more characters, they're now scrapping the bottom of the barrel for new characters.
Overall
Overall… not a lengthy game, but an awesome one in its entirty. If you are (or have ever been) a fan of Dragonball Z, check it out. You won't be sorry.
Rating: 8/10