Man, I remember coming home straight from school everyday just to make sure I didn’t miss the latest episode of Dragonball Z. And if there was a chance I was going to miss it, I made sure my mom recorded it for me. That’s how bad I was into it. I mean I knew the story was about 20 years old, but I was only about 14 or 15 then and it was brand new to me. I was a huge fan of Dragonball Z, but as I grew up, I lost touch with the series. That’s why I was happy to play the latest game about the popular anime series, Dragonball Z: Burst Limit.

Being the first DBZ game on the next-gen consoles, Dragonball Z Burst Limit is surprisingly a pretty decent fighting game, and, if you’re a DBZ fan, it’s an even better one. The game’s story mode, called the Z Chronicles, recaps the major fighting scenes and sagas from the DBZ series, but sadly the Buu Saga is nonexistent. You’ll still go through the Saiyan Saga, Frieza Saga and Cell Saga, unlocking characters and arenas as you go along. However, if you haven’t watched the anime series before or played any of the previous DBZ games, you might be a little confused with the story because not every scene from the series is described in the Z Chronicles.

Honestly, Burst Limit is not much different from DBZ’s last-gen fighting games, the Budokai series. Much of the controls and fighting mechanics feel somewhat the same, other than the enhancements that come with a next-gen console, such as looks and fluidity. The controls are pretty basic with two attack buttons, a defense button, a Ki attack button and a transform button. You can easily get away with just using the attack buttons to fight and pull off combos, but the real trick to this game is using your defense and teleportation to get an advantage on your opponent. To pull off a barrage of combos or to perform a successful teleportation, however, your timing must be perfect. Using your Ki attacks is also vital, but make sure you keep a close watch on your Ki energy so that you have enough to pull off any Super or Ultimate Attacks, both of which can easily turn the tide of a battle. Ki energy is also used to pull of Aura Actions, which are powerful moves that only require one bar of Ki to perform.

One of my favorite things about Dragonball Z is all the different characters and their unique personalities. It’s always hard for me to choose what character to play as because I like most of them and I like most of their fighting styles as well. Each character in the game has their own different set of attacks and special moves, such as the Kamehameha or the Special Beam Cannon. Just like in the anime series, the characters in Burst Limit have all their same unique moves to use in the game. They’ve also got the same abilities to transform, for example into a Super Saiyan or in Frieza or Cell’s case, another body transformation. Once your Ki energy is at its max, you’ll be able to transform, which will make your character much stronger.

The biggest difference in Burst Limit compared to the Budokai games is the introduction of Drama Pieces. These nonskippable cut-scenes occur randomly during battles and help you during a fight whether it’s giving you a boost in health or giving you some extra defense. Although they tend to slow things down a pit, Drama Pieces are cool because they coincide with the story that is going on. During the Z Chronicles, Drama Pieces can’t be turned off, but during Versus Mode they can be. However, if you decide to keep them on during Versus Mode, you can actually choose which Drama Pieces you want during battle. I’d recommend at least one Drama Piece to aid in health and one that sends out a partner to help.

Other than the Z Chronicles Mode and the Versus Mode, there’s also an Online Mode in which you can take your fight online. There are the usual quick match and custom match options, but I found it much easier to create my own room and wait for an opponent to come to you. Once you hook up with an online opponent, you’ll then choose a character, a set of Drama Pieces (if turned on), and then what battle stage to fight on. When I played online I didn’t experience much lag at all, but I did find out that I wasn’t the best in this game. The first online match I played, I got my ass handed to me. And the second one wasn’t much better. If you’re going to play online, be prepared and know how to execute all maneuvers properly and don’t forget about defense and teleporting.

Quite honestly, Dragonball Z has never looked as good as it does in Burst Limit. Goku and the gang have never looked so good before. The characters are extremely colored and detailed. The environments are straight from the anime series but actually look better in the game. I do, however, wish there were more destructible environments, because the Budokai games had some and the show itself definitely had a lot. The Super and Ultimate Attacks look so awesome… especially the Kamehameha attack, which is my personal favorite. The beautifully rendered DBZ world is just fabulous to look at and Burst Limit has all the bright and fancy colors the anime series was known for.

As a huge fan of the anime series, I was worried about how the characters would sound like in Burst Limit; however, in all honesty, there was no need to worry as all of the characters’ voice overs work very well. Most of them sound just like they sound in the anime series, except for a few stale conversations that seem to have been a little too scripted. Not only did they sound scripted, but not much of it was emotional at all. That was what I liked so much about watching the show, I felt attached to the some of the characters, but Burst Limit doesn’t give me that same feeling. The music, however, fits perfectly and sounds just like something you would hear in the show.

Dragonball Z Burst Limit is a solid fighter, indeed. For it’s debut on the next-gen consoles this game does a great job with graphics and much of it’s gameplay, but my main problem with the game is its lack of attention to its storyline. The Z Chronicles does a great job of summarizing the main fighting scenes throughout the Saiyan, Frieza and Cell Sagas, but leaves out too much detail in between the fights. It would have been nicer to see a little bit more effort from Dimps to have implemented more fights and cut-scenes to the game just so the story would make more sense to all gamers. Because the way they have it setup is just for DBZ fans that already know the story line really well. Oh, and it would have been a hell of a lot more awesome if they would have added to Buu Saga too.

Overall, Dragonball Z Burst Limit is a solid fighting game, keeping up with the likes of the Naruto games for sure. However, there could have been a lot more done to separate Burst Limit from the likes of its Budokai predecessors. I just felt that there was a lack of innovation in Burst Limit and more could have been done to make it a better game. But still, the one thing they got right was to make DBZ fans happy because it’s an excellent game for them. On the other hand, if you’re not a major DBZ fan and are looking for a more in-depth fighting game look elsewhere. I can definitely see a sequel coming in the future; I just hope they put more innovation into it and please, for the love of DBZ fans, include the Buu Saga. I don’t think it’ll be that difficult.