Criticism: Beautiful and explosive, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot is a new way to discover Dragon Ball again

Once you have played almost Dragon Ball game with a story mode, you have probably lived the story of Dragon Ball Z. But Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot is a rare case where the formula works once again because people behind it, Bandai Namco and CyberConnect2, like the source material and were ready to expand many small details.

Although we think that the name does not match what the game is actually, Kakarot is a fun experience that helps build the world of the spectacle in a way that has never been done before. And even if the overseas world was ambitious, it works, and it is spoiled only by some basic defects.

Hello Hello

From the beginning of the game, Kakarot aims to revive the feeling you had when you watched the anime for the first time on television with a mixture of the original opening and moments of gameplay on the theme now classic Cha -The head-cha-the composer Chiho Kiyooka.

After briefly introducing Goku and Gohan, the game throws you in a tutorial that presents almost everything you need to know about the combat system, although it does not do a great job to teach every detail.

The fight is fluid and feels much more loose than in the XENOVESE GAMES, and this affects the controls of the world, which may seem floating once you take the control of Goku for the first time outside of a fight. Neither combat commands nor the orders of the world do not feel well at first, but the more you play, better they start feeling, outside the flight orders from top to bottom, which just stink.

You still need training

Things can become overwhelming at first because the game presents systems like cooking, collecting ingredients and community board from the exit. But just like the fight, it is quite simple to grasp after a brief overview.

Cooking and eating meals from the ingredients you find and Chasesez provides temporary improvements to meal-specific statistics, but also permanently increase statistics such as KI's health and power.

The Community Board is an interesting mechanism where, as you progress in history, you earn emblems of different characters. Each character has a defined value that can be applied to one of the seven different tables, each table providing increases in useful statistics and higher chances of additional effects, such as cooking more than one meal when you select it. .

As for the difficulty, the game is really easy until you reach the Raditz fight, which shows that scaling has a good curve. The game really tests you during this fight, giving you the impression of having learned a lot in your brief passage to explore and train you in the world.

A living world (which has not been wanted to return to life)

You will not be free to browse the different maps of the world before after a few missions, but once the world is open, it is pleasantly surprising to see how detailed and alive. One of the lowest parts of the deductible is the world itself because it is mainly used as a starting point for fighting. But in Karakot, the developers have been a lot of trouble to build a varied landscape with a lot to explore.

In this giant world, the game works well, for the most part, outside of a few models of NPCs that seem a bit jerky when they are far off or during the first load. There is rarely a slowdown by flying over the speed card, which is impressive.

For those who, like us, like the original series Dragon Ball, there are also many characters back from Goku younger. You will find yourself in secondary quests for people like Launch and Nam, while meeting people like the World Tournament Announcer and the Gang de Pilaf, which only adds to the life of every part of the world.

you might want to pack a bean Senzu

However, everything is not perfect. The generic robots of the red ribbon army are slammed in all areas, and they become very old after about the 15th time they are pursuing when you try to explore. They are not difficult, they have no narrative reason to be there, and they only serve enemies in the overmould that is not just wildlife. Nor does it help that they repeat the same two voice lines every time you get closer enough.

Similarly, the fight against dinosaurs is extremely disappointing and is simply to fly over them and explode with small explosions ki until they fall.

Most pieces played during the first 10 hours of the game are nothing special either. There are new arrangements of the anime soundtrack at key moments, but apart from that, most pieces are completely obligable.

But the greatest disappointment is by far that you can not actually follow the entire Goku trip. The whole story that takes place in Other World is told through cinematics and text boxes, which means you do not have to run Snake Way or interact with King Kai's planet. It looks like a tremendous missed opportunity and could have add an extra dimension that most dbz games do not touch.

Latest thoughts

Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot looks amazing and works very well, with very few cases of offsetting or problems. The developers have done a stand-up job doing the world of dragon ball seem animated and vibrant, which made us want to spend more time exploring all areas and to live in places that get screen time in the show.

And while the generic enemies fight in the outside world become repetitive and that the hunting mechanisms are very superficial, the game does a good job to work around this by adding interesting secondary quests with many faces that come back.

Global, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot is a fun experience with a fluid fight that improves almost all aspects of recent games of franchises, with a system that makes you feel as if you learn and grow as the game progresses, And not just artificially and based on numbers.