Summary
- The Budokai Tenkaichi games have always been known for offering a challenge, but Sparking Zero is on another level.
- I probably don't have to tell you that Great Ape Vegeta is a massive pain, but things only get worse from there.
- Shout-outs to Goku Black, Jiren, and Merged Zamasu for raising my blood pressure over the past week.
How you turn Super Saiyan has changed over the years (), but 🅠it first happened in because of Goku’s intense and . We see how important anger is for the transformation once again in the Cell Saga when after giving into his true anger following Android 16’s death.
I’ve never felt loss on the same level as Goku, Gohan, and the res🧜t of the Dragon Ball Super Saiyans, but over the past week, I’ve felt like I could snap and go Super Saiyan at any given moment. Why, you might ask? Because ’s story mode is surprisingly brutal and painfully reminiscent of the toughest sections Budokai Tenka🥀ichi 2 had to offer.
Dragonꦆ Ball: Sparking Zero Review - And This Is To Go Eve🌸n Further Beyond
Like a request for Shenron, Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is pure wish-🦩fulfilment and exactly what fans have spent a decade and a half waiting for.
When I first booted up Sparking Zero, I was pretty confident that it wouldn’t give me any trouble. Not only because I’m a Budokai Tenkaichi and Raging Blast veteran (cool I know), but because I’d gone hands-on with it at multiple e💮vents and had around four or so hours to get used to its controls. That cockiness 𓆉disappeared the moment I jumped into Go♛ku’s story mode.
"I'll Break You!"
Going up agai🅰nst Raditz as a Kaioken-less Goku was a harsh lesson that Sparking Zero was taking canon power levels very seriously, as he wiped the floor with me without any trouble. That was a tough p🍬ill to swallow, but since it was canon to the story I was allowed to move on to the battle against Vegeta.
The Prince of all Saiyans was easy enough to take down in a Saiyan-on-Saiyan match, but things quickly got rage-inducing as he cheated and transformed into his Gre🌼at Ape ꦡform. Giant characters are a returning feature from Budokai Tenkaichi 3 and they’re just as broken and annoying to fight in Sparking Zero since they don’t get staggered 🌳by most normal attacks, deal a ton of damage, and are somehow just as fast as r⭕egular fighters.
Giant enemies are by far the worst part of Sparking Zero’s roster, even though they’re a really cool thing t📖o include. If I see anyone using them online, it’s an instant-quit f🎃or me.
This led to the big monkey beating the everloving snot out of me multiple times in a row and forcing me to listen to the same monologue about Grandpa Gohan on ༺loop. Since Goku doesn’t technically win this fight against Vegeta in the manga and anime, I figured Sparking Zero would throw me a bone and let me lose, but it’s one of few fights you have to clear.
What followed was 30 minutes of muffled swea꧅ring and sweaty palms as I tried to have a fair fight with Vegeta, before throwing in the towel and dishonourably going for the good old Kamehameha spam. I eventually won the battle, bu🌄t I’m not sure it’s a victory Goku would be proud of.
I Can't Wait To See The Back Of Goku Black
Those early encounters were enough to tell me that Sparking Zero wasn’t messing around with its story mode, but things got a lot easier as I tried ou🍨t some other modes and came to grips with the mechanics. With a new mastery of vanishing and countering under my belt, I jumped right back in and ploughed through almost all of Goku’s story mode once more with f🍸ar less trouble.
That was until I came face to face with Goku Black and Zamasu. While most normal fights give characters three or four health bars, Episode Battle goes classic Budokai Tenkaichi🌠 by doubling that number, making the fights much longeﷺr. Combine that with their AI clearly being on the hardest difficulty setting and not giving a damn about letting you breathe, this made for a truly painful time as the pair kicked my Super Saiyan Blue butt all around the city.
It gets even worse when🍌 Fused Zamasu rears his ugly head, as he’s got some attacks that can clear multiple bars of health at once.
After feeling my hair stand on end like I was going Super Saiyan myself, I eventually cleared the chapter and found myself in the Tournament of Power. This saga has never been seen in a BT game before but has some of🍰 the strongest enemies Goku has ever gone up against, including Jiren and Kale. The fight against Jiren might be one of the sweatiest I’ve had in a game in a very long time and was reminiscent of s🌱ome of the toughest moments in BT2 and 3, and one that gets even worse when you do it in reverse as Jiren himself.
Future Trunks (Won't) Be The Death Of Me
Goku’s Episode Battle is the longest in the game and full of tough fights, but it’s not the one that gave me the most trouble. That honour goes to Goku Black’s story mode, which has you playing as him and Zamasu against Super Saiyan Blue Goku and Vegeta a♌nd eventually even Vegito Blue. This was pure hell because they’re some of the most powerful characters in the game with the biggest health bars.
That’s bad enough, but the worst of it comes in the final fight against Vegito Blue and Trunks. Those two are tough, nevermind having to take a Spirit Sword Slash from Trunks in order to beat the fight, which means waiting around for him to use his ultimate move and somehow keeping your health bar stable enough after having just taken on Vegito Bꦉlue.
As of the time of writing, I still haven’t cleared that fight because the requirements are so specific and annoying and leave it all up to🅘 Trunks’ AI. Spoiler alert: he doesn’t like to dဣo his finishing move much and will take you out before he ever goes into Sparking mode, no matter how much you run away and hide.
You can get an alternate ending for𝕴 defeating Trunks𝄹 and Vegito Blue, which is ironically easier than letting them finish you off in such a specific way.
This all might sound like a point agains🅘t Sparking Zero but, just like Goku himself, I love the challenge of a tough fight. Sparking Zero has some mechanics to help you along like Dragon Orbs to make secondary objectives easier to clear, but it mostly doesn’t hold your hand and expects you to learn it inside and out.
Even if I respect the grind and love how classic Sparking Zero can feel at times, tha🎃t doesn’t fix the irreparable damage that Great Ape Vegeta, Jiren, ♛and Goku Black have all done to my blood pressure. I don’t even have golden glowing locks to show for it.
Silent Hill 2 And Dragon Age: The Veilguard Both Offer The Opportun🍨ity To Fi𒉰nally Get Into Series I’ve Never Cared About
Silent Hill 2 and꧂ Dragon Age: The Veilguard are tempting me to give their respective serie💞s a chance.
