Dragon Ball Z: Supersonic Warriors

I like and even love a lot of anime. But one I can’t find a place in my heart for is Dragon Ball Z.A lot of anime doesn’t have the tightest storylines or make sense in many areas, but I just don’t get DBZ at all. That however, isn’t the case for a large number of fans that have hooked onto DBZ. The overwhelming popularity of DBZ has led to many video games since the days of the earliest consoles starring the DBZ cast of characters. The new addition to the DBZ Game Boy Advance ranks is the fighting game Dragon Ball Z: Supersonic Warriors (DBZSW).

DBZ fans will have a lot to like. First off, there’s a full roster of DBZ players here: 13 in all, including Krillin, Piccolo, Vegeta, Goku, and Frieza. Who these guys are, I personally don’t know, but all DBZ fanatics will undoubtedly be thrilled they make an appearance. The fighting that occurs in DBZSW is right out of the usual battling seen in a typical episode of DBZ. These aren’t quick little scraps, either. Most fights last a few minutes each, with plenty of smashing combat.

Although there’s a lot of moves to learn to master DBZSW and the controls are responsive as they need to be for a fighting game, most of the fighting usually turns into a button-mashing fest, where you can defeat your adversary simply by mashing buttons rapidly. That decreases the challenge level that DBZSW presents to the average player, who can mow down opponent after opponent with relative ease simply by having fast thumb reflexes. That’s a shame, because the game utilizes the small availability of GBA buttons to its advantage perfectly for very reliable fighting game movement and fluid fight action. Making the gameplay more focused on using combos instead of simply button-mashing would have given veteran gamers a tougher and more appreciated challenge.

There are plenty of modes to extend the playing life of DBZSW, even with a low challenge difficulty. When you first start playing, there is both a Tutorial and Training Mode to teach you the Dragon Ball ways of fighting. A Free Battle mode gives you a chance to try out some of what you learned in game action, although you won’t earn any bonuses while in Free Battle mode.

The Story mode places you in a DBZ-style adventure that takes place in different environments. The Z Battle mode enters you into a DBZ tournament. If you win you climb up the tournament ladder. Lose, and your out. And finally, the one mode that can give you a real challenge is the Link Versus mode, where you can connect to another fellow DBZSW owner’s GBA with the GBA Link Cable and throw down the DBZ gauntlet for a little one-on-one DBZ mayhem.

Disorienting in-game physics throw you off in heated battles of dynamic DBZ destruction. Because the characters can “fly” a portion of the fighting takes place zooming in and out of the air to the ground and various points in-between. But since the GBA doesn’t have a true 3D graphical ability, DBZSW tries to fake the 3D and it doesn’t entirely work to give a true 3D sense to the gameplay. It is passable, but that’s more a GBA issue than a developmental slip-up.

Graphics are surprising stellar for a GBA title. It’s usually only the Nintendo-developed titles that turn out this nice-looking on the GBA. But all the DBZ characters are extremely well drawn and animated. They are close to being dead-on perfect to their anime counterparts, much more than you would expect them to be. Sound effects don’t carry the same impression, sounding too midi-created to really be anything but average.

I may have enjoyed Dragon Ball Z: Supersonic Warriors a bit more if I had some sort of vested attachment to the DBZ characters and license. Still, it’s easy to recognize that this is still a good fighting game, albeit a somewhat easy one to get through, that does justice to the DBZ legacy that not every DBZ game is able to do. It looks good, plays solid, and offers the chance for multiplayer fighting. DBZ fans will get their portable kicks (and punches) with DBZSW.

- Lee Cieniawa

lcieniawa@armchairempire.com