Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit Review

We got our hands on a copy of Dragon Ball Z Burst Limit, and after getting some early hands on at GDC, we were interested to see how the final game came out. Well, it has been about seven hours of gameplay, and we are still playing it. Coming from a person who knows nothing about Dragon Ball Z, I think that is saying something.

The game starts off, and pretty much throws you into the game, giving you about a 20 to 30 second dialogue between a few characters, before throwing you into the game. The controls and everything are pretty simple to get used to, as the game seems to be a button masher as you start off, and have no problem beating enemies. Yet, if you play online, or multiplayer, button mashing can only get you so far, as specific moves are required to win the fight. Trust me, this reviewer went 17-0 on the campaign, only to get crushed 0-5 when playing multiplayer.

Although the game is enjoyable in a sense, the game has some flaws which cause the game to be annoying for anyone over the age of 11, and we say that coming from the “we don’t watch Dragon Ball Z anymore” frame of mind. As every match starts, we get some dialogue which you can skip, same with the ending dialogue and storyline. However, as the fight is going on, and dialogue events are triggered, you can’t skip them, which is a little irritating. Kids may enjoy this if they are following the story, but at the college level, I think I’ll pass on entering the Dragon Ball Z storyline.

Small Sample of Dragon Ball Z Gameplay

If you are reading this review, and care about the storyline, we apologize, but we aren’t going to cover it. As for characters, the game has a nice amount of different characters to choose, all with a special attack, and hidden attacks that we have only discovered a few of. It is one of the positive aspects of the game, that while we have been playing it, we only have unlocked a few of the many things including the hard and extra hard difficulties of the game.

The campaign ranking system, which we are still discovering, is all dependant on what happens during the game. Every “drama scene” displayed increases the amount of stars that you get, and if you fill up the bottom bar, you get the best ranking of Z. Beating the fight in 90 seconds, landing different attacks, hitting them first, and dodging will also net you the stars. Could unlocking Z scores on every fight unlock move stuff in the game? We hope so, as it might be the key to some of the replayability factors of the game.

All and all, despite the repetitiveness of the dialogue (seriously, too many “What” or “Grrrrr” so far), and the obvious repetitiveness of the fighting game, we think Dragon Ball Z fans, and fans of the fighting genre will enjoy this game. We aren’t going to tell you to buy this game, but its definitely worthy of a rental. All depends on what type of game you are into, and seeing that I’m not the biggest fighting fan, and yet still playing it (with the sound muted, and my own soundtrack playing), its worth a try.