TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi

Go To

  • Accidental Innuendo: In Budokai Tenkaichi 3, Babidi's strongest attack has him holding his lamp in front of him and... er... rubbing it vigorously until a laser shoots out of it... Okay...
  • Awesome Art: The graphics for Sparking! ZERO look incredible, where it is taking cues from Dragon Ball FighterZ and Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, giving the characters cel-shaded textures that make them pop against the background and give a crisp anime-styled look.
  • Awesomeness Withdrawal: Both the Sparking! ZERO trailer (which was just a little over a minute) and teaser (which was under a minute) managed to set the fanbase on fire and truly show what to expect.
  • Best Level Ever: Sparking! ZERO's "What if Gohan holds his own against the resurrected Frieza?" Sparking! Episode has garnered a near-universal praise from many a Dragon Ball fan, and especially Gohan fans, and for good reason, with Gohan undergoing a Character Rerailment from his Cell Saga days when facing off against Golden Frieza, and he resolves to keep training after the battle. But the next part is even better. While the tournament against Universe 6 where Gohan joins as a contestant and fights Hit sadly isn't playable (mostly because the Universe 6 vs 7 stage isn’t in the game), the Future Trunks Saga more than makes up for it with the introduction of Gohan Black. And yes, he can even transform into Ultimate Gohan Black. Even though most of the arc plays out similarly once Fused Zamasu appears (complete with different hairstyle) with the exception of Vegito Blue, Gohan and Trunks defeat his Corrupted form with a double Masenko and finish him off by successfully sealing him with the Evil Containment Wave, saving Trunks' timeline. Kyle Hebert's performance as Gohan Black is also worthy of praise, as he channels his inner Sosuke Aizen which really conveys how menacing and terrifying Gohan Black really is.
  • Broken Base:
    • Which is better, Tenkaichi 2 or Tenkaichi 3? On one hand, the story mode for 2 is seen as significantly better due to being similar to the Budokai 3 story mode with fun What If? fights that are surprisingly deeper than one would expect, while having several gameplay elements that are easier to get in to, and has superior music. On the other hand, 3 is seen as the best roster, fun inclusions to the story mode that are more authentic to the story of the series, while still having fun What If? fights, and having to some the best gameplay in a Dragon Ball for a while. The debate rages on without end. Except in Latin America, of course, where the debate was settled a long time ago with 3 coming out on top.
    • In general, there exists something of a broken base between people who favor using the most popular and canonically powerful characters (particularly fusions), and people who favor oddball or obscure characters (particularly minor villains who aren't playable in any other series). The fact that the former characters tend to be deliberately overtuned doesn't help matters, as it means anyone looking to main characters like Cui or Videl are going to have their work cut out for them.
    • Between those who see Sparking! Zero as a worthy sequel to the original trilogy and those who don't. Common arguments are the poor balancing between characters, lack of single player modes, underwhelming story modes, smaller returning character roster, and improvements made in the Raging Blast games (also made by Spike) not being brought into the new game. There's also conflicts on if the DLCs are even worth the price, as the first pack with characters from Super Hero is $18 US for no real reason, as it contains only 5 new characters with 2 of them having 2 transformations each. The next DLC pack with characters from Daima had its price cut down to $10 afterwards.
  • Casual-Competitive Conflict: The rather unbalanced roster in Budokai Tenkaichi 3 doesn't seem to cause much issues for many players, but when online and competitive play have become mainstream when Sparking! ZERO was released, the problems became more prevalent with its online mode was plagued with many broken characters as well as numerous exploits such as Vanishes and Instant Sparking abilities, causing many players to constantly Rage Quit with no penalties to prevent it. As a result, the game has lost a whopping 90% of its players on Steam, one month shortly after release. The Dramatic Showdown tournament drew a lot of criticism due to these issues, including exploiting certain gameplay mechanics such as using Androids' ability to dash without consuming Ki to stall an entire match until time runs out, as evident by this clip here. Casual players, on the other hand, have a hard time getting into this game because the gameplay is more fast-paced compared to previous entries, which also factor in the game's massive player drop on Steam. Despite Sparking! ZERO fixing many of the issues players have with the game, it could never regain the player count as it was before when it was launched which, unsurprisingly, leads to many unfavorable comparisons with past Dragon Ball games.
  • Complacent Gaming Syndrome:
    • Despite the whole selling point of the series being its massive roster, about 70% of the playerbase uses a handful of traditionally "cool" characters: mostly the major Saiyans and fusions in their strongest forms, with the occasional movie villain for flavor. Tenkaichi 3's heyday saw a lot of Gogetas, Vegitos, and Brolys, and the online mode of Sparking! ZERO looks to continue that trend with the monstrously common UI Goku.
    • In Sparking! ZERO due to their high DP and power many players online tend to choose the fusions to play online so the online meta is dominated by them. However almost immediately the community has come up with different tactics to counter this such as a team full of Cell Jr.'s or Lethal Joke Characters such as Yajirobe and Ginyu.
  • Contested Sequel: Sparking! ZERO has slowly become subjected to this after the initial hype train died down after release. Be it the missing characters from the previous games that people feel should've been in the game (Super 17 from GT, Babidi's henchmen, any OG DB rep outside of kid Goku, etc.), a lack of single player content after the story modes are done, story modes missing content (the Universe 6 Tournament and Super: Broly from Goku's, all of Vegeta's Super story moments, Trunks' Z stuff missing, etc.), and the online modes being improperly balanced and full of people who mostly play the really strong characters. The player count on Steam notably died down almost immediately and a lot of people blame it on the online modes.
  • Fandom Rivalry:
    • A minor one with fans of Budokai 3. Fans of Budokai cite its more polished combat engine and better balance, while seeing Tenkaichi as bloated by comparison, while fans of Tenkaichi favor it for the larger roster and better simulation of the series' combat, while claiming that Budokai isn't that much better as a fighting game. They're mostly content to say that both are good games, though.
    • While there are Friendly Fandoms between the Budokai Tenkaichi/Sparking! series and the Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm series, there is also some tension between the two. This has gotten more heated with Sparking! ZERO and Ultimate Ninja Storm Connections, which were announced around the same time. The latter game often got compared unfavourably with the former, despite releasing almost a year before.
    • The series had a rivalry with nearly every other anime arena fighting games that came after it. While many tend to ridicule arena fighters in general for being bland and repetitive, games like One Piece: Burning Blood and My Hero One's Justice has its own fair share of fans. It doesn't help that while Sparking! ZERO revived the usually forgotten genre, especially after the disaster that was Jujutsu Kaisen: Cursed Clash, its just proves that the Budokai Tenkaichi/Sparking! series is better than any other anime fighting games in the eyes of many.
    • There is one with the Dragon Ball FighterZ fandom. Those on FighterZ's side values quality over quantity, citing the fast-paced combat as the best in the series, while those on the Tenkaichi's side preferred the much larger roster over FighterZ's 42 fighter roster. It gets even more heated with the release of Sparking! ZERO (which is essentially the successor to Budokai Tenkaichi 3), with some pointing out several issues that this game has, and unfavorably compared to FighterZ, which had just implemented rollback netcode months before Sparking! ZERO's release.
  • Fan Nickname: Before Sparking! ZERO's title was officially revealed, many had referred to the game as Budokai Tenkaichi 4 (despite the name already being used for the fan-made mod) as the marketing referred to the old title in the reveal trailer.
  • Fountain of Memes: The Latin American modding community for Tenkaichi 3 is flooded with this. While there are some mods that are genuinely impressive, such as the fan-made Budokai Tenkaichi 4, which overhauls the story mode to include Super content up to the Broly movie as well as Dragon Ball Heroes-themed mods filled with characters from that series, a lot of them run under nonsensical Cool Versus Awesome matchups that take Refuge in Audacity, with numerous Crossover mods adding in characters from other franchises like Naruto and Pokémon as well as Serial Escalation mods that let you play as Super Saiyan 10 Vegito and the like. A lot of these mods are also entertaining as they are either hard-locked to Japanese voice clips from the original game or use badly compressed Spanish voice clips that can and will clip your speakers. There is no in-between.
  • Franchise Original Sin:
    • A big complaint about Sparking! ZERO is how the quality of cutscenes differ greatly, sometimes having fully rendered and first person cutscenes, to having what amounts to a slideshow with a bunch of text detailing the events of what happened. This was an issue ever since the very first Budokai Tenkaichi, and remained a staple of the franchise ever since. However, back then, this was accepted due to various limitations, and budgetary constraints meant this manner of cutting corners with certain cutscenes was accepted as no big deal. By the time Sparking! ZERO was released, not only was Dragon Ball's sagas fully rendered in cutscenes in games like Xenoverse 2 and Kakarot, but the game itself advertised its campaign purely with fully rendered cutscenes, making it seem as if the entire campaign was going to follow suit. The fact that it did not, in addition to the slideshow cutscenes (in some campaigns more often than in others), caused many a fan to quickly become disappointed or exasperated in place of anything else.
    • Fans complain about Sparking! ZERO's character roster feeling bloated with multiple incarnations of characters from the different eras and Bandai Namco counting transformations that aren't fusions as their own characters in the marketing. Previous games (especially BT3) in the series also did this. It's just more pronounced and obvious here, especially when considering the cut characters from the previous games and the only new ones being added to the base roster were from Super. Plus, the initial way to view the characters in the character select screens had every single character (including transformations) in rows right next to each other before the game was patched to have an alternate viewing method that put transformations with the base forms of each character they came from like 3 had.
  • Game-Breaker:
    • Original trilogy:
      • In the first two games, Beam-type Supers/Ultimates pass right through and destroy most Ball-type Supers/Ultimates instead of beam struggling with them, so characters with Beam-type attacks tended to far outpace those without. This was fixed in 3, where beams can now struggle with ball attacks.
      • In 2 the Kiss of 18 is one of the best equippable items in the game, boosting all stats by four. Good on its own, but amazing when stacked in multiple copies. The drawback is that it can only be obtained through Shenron's wishes, requiring a fair bit of patience and Save Scumming to obtain several copies.
      • Fusion characters have their separate slots starting from 2. If you decide to have Gogeta or Vegito with Goku and Vegeta on the same team, you can potentially have two Gogetas and two Vegitos. You can have two Gotenkses if you have Goten, Trunks, and Gotenks on the same team as well.
      • Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta, due to having very good all-around stats, a fast Rush Attack, and two of the most powerful beams in the series. Given that it's Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta, it's probably intentional.
      • Following suit is Omega Shenron, who has very high healthbars, powerful Blast Attacks, and a very damaging Sphere move. The only character he truly is outclassed by is Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta, and even then, he can still win.
    • Sparking! ZERO:
      • Afterimage Strike in general went into this in Sparking! ZERO. In Tenkaichi 2 and 3, Afterimage Strike allowed you to automatically dodge any attack for 15 counts, but it had a huge Blast Stock cost, and activating it automatically inflicted you with a heavily cut-down Ki charging debuff, making it Awesome, but Impractical given how long it takes to generate Blast Stocks in those games, while in Raging Blast, it was altered to only go off against specific heavy attacks. Not only did Sparking! ZERO circumvent the high Skill Count cost from how quickly the Skill Count gauge fills compared to prior entries, but the developers removed the reduced Ki charge caveat, allowing it to be used with no drawbacks, and reverted its activation trigger to go off against any attack. Any characters with that skill, most notably Super Vegito, quickly earned the ire of online players for this reason alone. The December 2024 update saw to it that this skill got nerfed as not only does it lasts 10 counts now, but having Perception be used against you would immediately cancel out the skill.
      • Sparking Mode overall boosts the damage of all characters by a large margin with the increased combo speed, access to new strings from this arrangement, and, of course, a character's Ultimate that does massive damage. The balancing mechanic is that it requires you to have five bars of Ki and then keep charging until it triggers, the bar decreasing if you are forced to leave the charge state for whatever reason. However, quite a few characters have abilities that let them enter Sparking Mode at the cost of Skill Points, which load passively. While not as overwhelmingly powerful as the aforementioned Afterimage Strike, the fact that you can have your Ultimate ready at a blink of an eye is a tempting prospect for many.
      • Fusion characters are yet again broken. While you can't have multiple of the same like in 2, they are still incredibly strong, especially if you keep the component characters in your reserve at full health before combining them. It is not uncommon to see a bunch of fusion-focused teams online.
      • Yajirobe. Not only does he have an unblockable charged ki attack, a very easy to combo into ultimate, but also a skill where he eats a Senzu Bean and fully recovers his health. While it takes 5 skill stocks, gaining such stocks is very easy to do in this game even for a low DP character like him. This is even more noticeable in Ranked: due to his low cost as a character and how the tie-breaker mechanism for this game is dependent on how much health you have at the end of the match, you can set other strong characters to grind down at the opponent, then use Yajirobe as your anchor to win the game simply by having more health. He dominated the Ranked scene so badly, he holds the honor of being the only character to be nerfed in the first major update of the game (lowered health pool, starts with 0 Skill Counts instead of 2, and a much higher cost to use Senzu Bean).
      • The remainder of the top three is just as surprising, being composed of Master Roshi and Spopovich. Roshi, like Yajirobe, is a cheap character that is carried by having Afterimage Strike as one of his skills, and the busted combo of Thunder Shock Surprise for stun into Evil Containment Wave (which is unblockable), meaning that, for his cost, he can punch way above his supposed class weight. Meanwhile, Spopovich is a character good in being a singular thing: a Stone Wall. His offense is lacking, but he can stack so many defensive buffs that it doesn't matter and he can stall for time-outs. And, again, he's a cheap character, meaning you can run him with Roshi and Yajirobe!
      • If you don't mind beating Frieza into a pulp over and over again, the game rewards you with a torn alternate costume for Goku (Mid), but just beating him once gives you this costume. If you already unlocked it, the game automatically rewards you with 300,000 zeni, which is more than enough to let you get other characters and costumes if you're tired of low tournament pay, which often only gives you 2000 zeni.
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Budokai Tenkaichi 3 is beloved in Latin America, so much that there is a huge modding community for the game.
  • Heartwarming Moments:
    • If you play Future Gohan against Goten, he is baffled to find out that he has a brother since Goku died in his timeline before Goten was conceived. If Future Gohan beats Goten, we get this little gem.
      Future Gohan: "Even if it was just for a moment, I'm happy to have met you. Take care."
    • Ditto for if you put Goku against Future Gohan. If Goku wins, he says this:
      Goku: "Stand tall, Gohan! You’ll have to protect everyone in the future!"
    • Chi-Chi's description for Grandpa Gohan in the character viewer.
      "This is the wonderful man who took Goku in and raised him. I sure would like to have met him."
    • Chi-Chi's getting nostalgic over both her younger self and Goku's childhood self is a rather fuzzy moment, showing that despite how he may frustrate her, she still fell in love with him.
    • Many what-ifs in Sparking! ZERO have a lot of sweet character moments where they manage to help each other to overcome some of the dire outcomes in the series such as Vegeta and Future Trunks gaining a respect for each other that allows them to team up to defeat Cell with a dual Final Flash. Piccolo encouraging Gohan to defeat Cell in the former's what-if. And in Gohan's what-if him teaming up with Future Trunks to defeat Zamasu, with said route ending with a sweet moment of Gohan cradling baby Pan while Videl looks on lovingly.
    • Pitting Android 17 (Super) against Android 16 shows that 16 feels proud of where 17's gone in life, with 17 reciprocating appreciation with the implication 17 pursued the job in 16's memory.
      Android 16: "Now you're a ranger on a wildlife reserve. I must say, it suits you, 17."
      Android 17: "Yeah? If anything, I figured it's the kind of job you'd appreciate."
    • One of Future Trunks' what-if scenario during the ToP arc in Sparking! ZERO! has him fight Dyspo and Toppo. With the help of Androids 17 and 18! They have a conversation about the Future androids being evil and destroying all life in contrast to the present androids being all concerned about the other universes getting erased. Trunks is surprised by their behavior but he's obviously appreciative of these 2 well-loved cyborgs. Aww!
    • Gohan Beast has this to say if he wins a fight against Orange Piccolo:
      Gohan: "Piccolo, I don't think I tell you enough, but...you've been the best teacher I could have possibly asked for. Thank you."
  • Hilarious in Hindsight:
    • To make up for Future Gohan's limited moveset, the developers gave him access to the Special Beam Cannon attack despite there being no opportunities for him to use it in the Bad Future. Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero wound up giving Gohan the ability to use the Special Beam Cannon for real, with Gohan explaining that he was teaching himself the move in secret.
    • In 3, the game's term for Namek Saga Goku is "Goku (Mid)," short for middle. Around the 2010s, "mid" became a slang term meaning "mediocre or bad", which naturally led to a lot of jokes about the game insulting Goku.
    • 3 highlighted how much Vegeta depends on Beam Spam in his fights. Not only do his variants of the "Super Energy Wave Volley" take less Ki to use than other fighters, but his jumping Ki attacks lets him fire out 8 quick shots instead of 4 or 5 like everyone else. Enter the late 2010s, where jokes about "The Vegeta Technique" started and has since run rampant, making it seem like Spike was way ahead of the curve a full decade before anyone else. Sparking! ZERO's opening movie featuring both Super Saiyan Blue Vegeta and Baby Vegeta fighting each other using a flurry of ki blasts also didn't go unnoticed.
  • Improved Second Attempt:
    • One of the three endings in Jiren's Saga has him winning the Tournament of Power and using the same wish that Android No. 17 used in the canon ending. A lot of people praise Jiren's Character Development in that alternate path and it might have been a better ending to the Tournament of Power arc than the canon one, and it would give more weight to the lessons taught by Jiren's opponents.
    • Gohan's Saga is this for many people, especially during the Future Trunks arc, as Gohan asks Piccolo to teach him the Evil Containment Wave to deal with Zamasu, and taking no chances against both Gohan Black and Zamasu without making any of the foolish decisions his father Goku did in canon. In addition, Trunks and Gohan being the ones to finish Zamasu is also praised for not needing Zen-O to erase Trunks' whole timeline. Even Gohan Black's Ultimate Form also ties to the Kais, and Videl and Pan's deaths made a perfectly reasonable catalyst for Gohan to transform into Beast out of rage (though Goku calms him down before he goes out of control, with Beast Gohan himself not part of the base roster). Many people agree that a lot of the changes are much more thematically fitting and make much more sense involving Gohan instead of Goku, as well as giving Trunks more emotional weight on having to fight someone with his mentor's body, and the ending being a more successful take on The Power of Friendship and Passing the Torch akin to the Cell Saga, proving that mortals can overcome any and all obstacles, even gods, and the next generation can still hold its own, even in a world without Goku and Vegeta.
  • It's Short, So It Sucks!: Vegeta, Gohan, Future Trunks and Piccolo's Episodes in Sparking! ZERO's Episode Mode are criticized for beginning later and/or ending sooner than they should, despite their involvement in prior/subsequent arcs:
    • Vegeta's Saga only covers the Namek, Android, and Buu Sagas, leaving out the Saiyan Saga and all of the sagas from Dragon Ball Super despite Vegeta being the Arc Villain of the former and the Deuteragonist of the latter, and being in almost every fight alongside Goku. It's odd as well since they have dialogue and cutscenes for his parts in Super in some of the other story modes, so it's weird how they didn't add that part of the story.
    • Gohan's Saga only covers the Android Saga onwards, leaving out the Saiyan and Namek Sagas, even though he's a pivotal character in those two arcs and his kid version is fully playable.
    • Future Trunks' Saga only covers the Future Trunks Saga and if the player chooses, the Tournament of Power Saga, leaving out both the Android Saga and his timeline’s version of the Buu Saga. While the latter at least makes a little sense given it was only a flashback, there was still plenty of stuff to include that he was involved with, as Kakarot built upon and fleshed out that arc.
    • Piccolo's Saga only covers up to the Android Saga, leaving out all subsequent sagas, likely because many of the characters he fights in Super not being in the game or the arc not being adapted.
    • Due to Goku Black and Jiren's story modes only having the canon and alternate paths for just 1 arc each (and the alternates are just them winning where they lost, and for Goku Black some of the endings are the exact same as others). Both could take you about 2 hours to beat each compared to most of the others.
    • Super as portrayed in the game in general. The game skips over Battle of Gods, the Universe 6 Tournament, and severely truncates the Tournament of Power to the point of leaving out a lot of the fights and character developments, despite the important characters from said arcs and areas for them to fight in being in the game that the devs could've used or altered to use for them.
  • It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: While Sparking! ZERO has been highly praised, there are a few players who feel the game didn't make enough changes in some areas, especially when compared to the Dragon Ball: Raging Blast series that felt like an evolution of the series, and thought the game should have borrowed more ideas from it beyond a couple of gameplay mechanics. For specific examples:
    • Some players dislike that the game retained the multiple versions of the same character system instead of merging them into a single version like in the Raging Blast games, as it creates a lot of bloat cast wise and feels like it was done simply because it was a remnant of the original games. This isn't helped by the fact some characters have new versions that feel like they could be merged into one character, such as Goku, Vegeta, Frieza, Future Trunks, and Android 17, all of which had a new version made for their Super movesets.
    • On a similar note, the game still restricts each character to only two supers and one ultimate, and you can't change them, despite being something even fans of the prior games felt was a bit annoying. This makes some sense for characters with less moves but a lot of characters show moves that are not in game, with Cell especially being a good example since he only has two supers despite having potential for the most from a story angle.
    • Several characters had little changes in movesets beyond visuals or presentation, something some players feel was a waste of the chance to update past characters, either because they had gaps in their moveset, or they've had new source material since then that they could draw from. Characters like Piccolo, Adult Gohan, and Android 18 for instance easily could have gotten new moves to reflect Super or other moves they don't have, while some characters still don't fully represent the character, such as Scouter Vegeta's moves being up to his fight with Zarbon.
  • Magnificent Bastard: In Tenkaichi 2's Fateful Brothers, Raditz is far more honorable than his canon counterpart. Initially amnesiac after a fight against Piccolo, his brotherhood with Goku instills him with honor. Despite attacking Earth to recover his identity as a planet conqueror, Raditz spares his enemies and shows genuine respect to them upon his defeat. As a final act of love for his brother, he collides his space pod with the arriving Vegeta and Nappa, taking them down with him.
  • Memetic Badass:
    • In spite of the meme surrounding his name, Goku (Mid) has been declared a god among men to Tenkaichi fans, thanks to his high-tiered stats and very flexible skills, especially in Super Saiyan. Chances are, if Goku (Mid) shows up to any battle, the opposing team is already screwed.
    • Cabba, in spite of his rather low popularity in the West, is made into a Memetic Badass due to the "potential" he has to beat Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta as the two are in the same game and the ludicrous idea of someone like Cabba beating what was commonly seen as the strongest fusion in Dragon Ball. As a result has had many twitter posts or art pieces made of him beating the latter, often with ease.
    • Chiaotzu, albeit to a lesser degree. Due to Chiaotzu's visceral scream when he reaches Sparking Mode despite not being an impressive character overall, has led to people making him out to be far more impressive than he had ever been in his decades of existence beforehand.
    • Great Ape Vegeta, due to being a very brutal Wake-Up Call Boss (to the point of crossing into That One Boss territory), has been portrayed as unbeatable and a staple of an indicator as to how a player should change their approach or suffer defeat after defeat. It's common to see him instantly defeat any challenger in artwork, no matter how they attempt to down play him.
  • Memetic Mutation:
    • Outside of Japan, Chi-Chi's commentaries in the third game became this due to her sheer overuse of the word "delinquent" thanks the localizers retaining the idea in Japan where coloring one's hair blond indicates being a troublemaker (a stigma that persists in Japan). Because this idea was lost to many in the English speaking world, especially children playing the game, numerous comments roasted Chi Chi constantly saying the word delinquent and memed the idea it was just another word for "Super Saiyan", except for Super Saiyan 4 where one can't use that word since there's no blonde hair. This trend returned for Sparking! ZERO's "Girl Talk", and while Bulma and Videl don't really agree, when they're talking about Caulifla, they'll both point out she was already a delinquent.
    • Goku (Mid)Explanation
    • "YOU FOOOOOOOOOOL!!!"Explanation.
    • Sparking! ZERO revealing its Story Branching mechanic for Episodic Battle Mode along with the user-generated Custom Battle mode has lead to people joking that the developers are wanting to cash in on the radically insane What If? videos made by Dragon Ball fans online. Many have joked about the endless amount of "X Betrayed and Trapped in the Time Chamber" stories that will pop up online in-game, or that MasakoX will go out of his way to painstakingly recreate some of his more iconic What If stories in Sparking! ZERO.
    • Piccolo leaking the Dragon Balls' existence is a Canon Event.Explanation
    • Base Form Cabba vs SSJ4 GogetaExplanation
    • Ginyu Force MetaExplanation
    • Great Ape Vegeta’s fight in Sparking! ZERO became infamous quickly for being That One Boss, so memes around him quickly spawned.
      • "Just for that, I'm going to crush you like a grape!"Explanation
      • "I'LL BREAK YOU!/I'LL VAPORIZE YOU!"Explanation
      • "This monke got hands!"Explanation
      • Lower difficulty and retryExplanation
      • "NO! MY SAIYAN PRIDE WON'T ALLOW IT!"Explanation
      • "IF I CHOOSE EASY THE MONKEY WINS!" Explanation
      • Maybe Frieza was on to something. Explanation
    • The Racist Trio Explanation
    • EdgarExplanation
    • Turles is ShadowExplanation
    • "No cap?! Let's go!"Explanation
    • Sparking! ZERO is finally out of betaExplanation
    • "I'll beat you in 5 seconds'' Explanation
    • DLC 3 Explanation
  • Narm: BT3's story mode has a system that allows fighters both watching and participating to spout off lines based on how the character is performing in battle or under certain conditions, but due to the lines triggering a few seconds afterward can get ridiculous because they tend not to match the action on screen (e.g. a fighter making a Badass Boast while getting their ass royally kicked).
    • This can be quite apparent with the battles based on Dragon Ball GT. In this game, Super Saiyan 4 Goku is now a transformation for the newly-included GT Goku. If the deep-voiced SS4 Goku is getting beat up in a story battle, there's a chance that he will comment on this situation in his much younger voice that he would've otherwise had in any of his other forms. This isn't a noticeable problem in Japanese voice track, as Goku's voice remains the same regardless of his age, while the English dub has different voice actors for Goku depending on how old he is (Stephanie Nadolny voicing the kid version of GT Goku and Sean Schemmel voicing Goku while he's in his adult body as SS4). Since the game is programmed to use a catch-all line for the character currently in battle, it will always play the same line used for GT Goku (which is while he's in his kid form).
    • The player can set the game to be in either Japanese or English. The English voice actors give it their A-game, while the Japanese seiyuus just read their lines out loud. In a fighting game.
    • In Cell's What If? story from the first game, every single opponent (except Super 17) says the exact same line in a rather disinterested voice (English only) after you beat them.
    • In Sparking Zero's What If? story for Trunks participating in the Tournament of Power, he realizes his Super Dragon Ball-induced wish to bring back everyone who died in his Bad Future is selfish. This becomes Hilarious in Hindsight given that, shortly after said tournament, his mom would go off to look for those very same Super Dragon Balls to make herself younger.
  • No Problem with Licensed Games: The first three games are considered to be competent, if simple, fighters, with many considering their gameplay to be the most faithful to classic DBZ action, and the sheer amount of content helps add to their appeal. 2 and 3 in particular are in the running for the best Dragon Ball game ever. Even with the complaints had about Sparking Zero, it's still considered to be a competent and fun version of the game by many.
  • Older Than They Think: Sparking! ZERO isn't the first game released in the west to refer to the Dragon Ball iteration of Goku as "Goku (Teen);" Super Dragon Ball Heroes: World Mission did so 5 years prior.
  • Pandering to the Base: The developers took in suggestions as to what or who should be in the games, which resulted in fan favorites like Nuova Shenron making it in, as well as some alternate costume choices (such as Goku's Yardrat outfit and Gohan's orange Gi from Bojack Unbound.)
  • Salvaged Story: Despite the premise of playing as a Time Patroller in Xenoverse and Xenoverse 2, the diversions in the timeline are merely along the lines of "make the villain super strong" or "some backups" throughout the course of the main story, which many found to be a wasted potential for the games to explore more absurd and interesting story-branches. Even when more story contents are available through DLC, they are also considered somewhat lacking, especially since previous games, particularly the original Budokai Tenkaichi trilogy, already have "What If" scenarios that can be used as baselines for story content. Fortunately, Sparking! ZERO, being the direct continuation of BT3, finally gives tons of branching stories that can be accessed on the base game alone, with diverse scenarios such as "What if Goku unlocks Super Saiyan earlier" or "What if Future Trunks joins the Tournament of Power". And if that's not enough, the game also allows the players to create custom scenarios of their own, massively increasing the replay value just from sheer creativity alone.
  • Scrappy Mechanic:
    • Unlike the previous and future games, Budokai Tenkaichi 3's World Tournament mode uses an in-game timer that goes up by 10 minutes if you even so much as enter and exit a menu screen. Depending on the time, a new Tournament will be open in World Tour mode (World Tournament, Cell Games, Martial Arts Big Tournament, Otherworld Tournament, and Yamcha's Game). However, while the Tournament times are pre-determined, the difficulty you play them on is not, so trying to unlock that one character or stage for 100% Completion could be made unnecessarily difficult. There is a Free Mode where you can choose any tournament you want at any difficulty, but completing a tournament that way gets you jack squat.
    • In the Budokai trilogy and Tenkaichi 1, Ginyu's Body Change ultimate was a Game-Breaker, being able to switch positions with a stronger opponent to gain the upper hand. The Body Change fell into this come Tenkaichi 2 and 3, where it was nerfed horribly to the point where it became useless, borderlining Ginyu in the Joke Character zone. Rather than switching bodies with the opponent, Ginyu will randomly switch with another character off the field (mostly from the Frieza Saga). However, not only are his stats worse than before, he loses access to all of his special attacks, even from his original body. Sparking! ZERO restores some of its former glory by allowing Ginyu to change bodies with the opponent's character albeit with the caveat you are unable to use any skills from the stolen character, which means that the skill needs to be used in the right moment to be effective.
    • In Tenkaichi 1 and 2, Goku has some... archaic conditions in order to use some of his attacks. In the first game, his Kaioken Attack was locked unless you were in Kaioken Mode... which requires 3 Blast Stocks and constantly drains your Ki at an alarming rate (which in turn, can make the battle with Nappa in Z Battle Gate more troubling than it's worth). In Tenkaichi 2, you couldn't use his Spirit Bomb Ultimate at all unless you spend at least 2 Blast Stocks to do one "Please Share Your Energy With Me!" to charge it. Thankfully, these restrictions were dropped by the time 3 rolled around.
  • Shocking Moments: After nearly 13 to 16 years of silence following the last major Budokai Tenkaichi game, fans had rightfully came to terms that the series had long since passed, especially after it looked liked Xenoverse would be here to stay... then everything changed with a special announcement from Dragon Ball Games Battle Hour 2023. A teaser trailer showing gameplay footage from Tenkaichi 3, before shifting to modern footage of Goku transforming into his Super Saiyan Blue form in the style of the Broly movie. The ending image then informed us that, "A New Sparking/Budokai Tenkaichi Begins." (The title for this would later be revealed as Sparking! ZERO.)
    • Some of the what ifs in Sparking! ZERO can fall into this. While some were predicted by fans, some come as a genuine surprise such as in Gohan's where due to resuming his training with Piccolo and the Kais, he gets the attention of Zamasu, so eventually he has to do his own version of the Goku Black arc but instead of Zamasu choosing to steal Goku's body he does it with a version of Gohan, thus creating a Gohan Black.
  • Signature Scene:
    • Goku and Vegeta smiling at each other at the end in the Budokai Tenkaichi's opening cinematic became a meme because of their face expressions.
    • Oozaru Baby and Cell chilling out together in Supreme Kai's world in Budokai Tenkaichi 2's opening cinematic.
  • Special Effect Failure: In Sparking! Zero, characters that uses a Battle Aura in their introductions or using certain Ultimate moves makes it look like it's not part of their character model and looks like an effect part. The first three games has the auras being part of the model when the characters are at full ki, but in the fourth game, it looks detached from the fighter you're using. This is notable with Super Saiyan Goten and Kid Trunks.
  • Stress-Relieving Gameplay: For those upset at the Zamasu Saga's ending, Sparking! ZERO provides a great deal of catharsis as several of the What If? scenerios see Trunks successfully save his future. The best is Trunks sealing Zamasu away with the Evil Containment Wave and then obliterating Goku Black alongside his father with a Father-Son Galick Gun.
  • Surprise Difficulty: Budokai Tenkaichi/Sparking! might've been one of the earliest Anime Arena Fighters commercially released, but they're also far deeper and complex than they might seem on the surface... and the enemy AI will gladly take advantage of every mechanic in the game to run circles around you unless you buckle down and learn all the finger-twisting commands in your skillset and then some.
  • Surprisingly Improved Sequel: Tenkaichi 2 compared to the first one, which was considered a step down from Budokai 3, whereas Tenkaichi 2 is considered just as good if not better than Budokai 3.
  • Suspiciously Similar Song: Unsurprisingly, the first Tenkaichi game is rife with this due to its soundtrack (in the International release) being lifted wholesale from the Budokai trilogy, which in itself was infamous for housing Kenji Yamamoto's plagiarized tracks despite their popularity.
  • Tainted by the Preview:
    • While Kakunsa's reveal in Sparking! ZERO was a pleasant surprise to many, there is a subset of fans who are worried that she, a fairly minor and obscure character from Super, is a sign that the game will primarily focus on characters from Z and Super at the expense of one's from the original series and GT. The fears were mostly assuaged when it was later revealed that Dragon Ball GT characters would be included in the base roster, though it also drew some ire for the noticeable absence of Super 17 and Nuova Shenron, who were both present in the roster of Budokai Tenkaichi 3, along with the lack of pre-DBZ characters.
    • There were a number of rumors about how Sparking! ZERO would be excluding an offline local multiplayer mode, which fans were upset about, as the previous games had split-screen local multiplayer and it was one of the biggest appeals of the original games. These rumors were eventually dispelled, with Bandai Namco and Spike Chunsoft confirming that local multiplayer is in the game, but the Hyperbolic Time Chamber being the only selectable stage was a massive damper for fans.
      • The developers' reasoning behind the Hyperbolic Time Chamber being the only stage available for split-screen multiplayer is due to the increased graphic and environmental effects that allegedly will cause performance issues on other maps, and the Time Chamber is the stage that has the least amount of objects and effects, making it supposedly the only stage that can run on split-screen. However, even during the early-access, modders were able to put all available stages on the split-screen multiplayer, with very little compromise on performance on top of that, making fans once again question the point of locking other maps out of the local multiplayer. The December 2024 patch ultimately addressed those concerns by allowing all stages to be chosen in offline local.
    • When Sparking! ZERO's box art was revealed online, it features Vegeta in his Super Saiyan Blue Evolved form. Upon when content creators were able to upload their footage of Sparking! ZERO to YouTube, it showed that instead of Evolved being its own transformation, it is instead a temporary Skill buff, alongside appearing during Super Saiyan Blue Vegeta's Ultimate. Suffice to say, many fans and content creators were disappointed at this reveal, given that the Evolved form appearing on the box art seemed to imply that it would be a full transformation, meanwhile both Ultra Instinct -Sign- and Mastered Ultra Instinct are distinct transformations for Goku.
    • Similarly Future Trunks (Super) was also seen in his Super Saiyan Rage form in the box art. However, it is not its own transformation and has instead been merged with Trunks' Super Saiyan state and to make things worse he is also lacking his Super Saiyan 2 transformation.
  • That One Attack:
    • The first game had Captain Ginyu's Ultimate Attack "Body Change" function almost exactly as it did in the Budokai series, making him a formidable foe to fight if he lands the attack while he's at critical health and you barely even have Scratch Damage. While it quickly nosedived hard into the Scrappy Mechanic territory in 2 and 3, it came back with a vengeance in ''Sparking! ZERO", as it returned to work like it originally did, only with the caveat of locking the use of skills for the stolen character, serving as an ultimate reverse card to get out of a terrible situation.
    • "Mystic Combination", Kid Buu's Rush Attack, in Budokai Tenkaichi 2; the length of time in which he charges at you lasts an absurdly long time (enabling him to use it even at a major distance), and it homes in on the opponent. Exacerbated due to the fact Rush Attacks in 2 are unblockable and costs no Ki if you did not land the attack, as well as Kid Buu being one of the game's many Buus, which means he can charge his Ki up quickly and start the attack all over again after knocking the player across the stage, while they're still struggling to get up. The attack was significantly toned down in 3, lowering the time of the initial rush, requires half Ki consumption for the initial blast, the amount of damage given, the way the character lands prevents it from being used as frequently, and characters being able to block Rush Attacks at the risk of losing Ki.
  • That One Boss: Sparking! ZERO’s Story Modes have several difficult fights, some standing out more than others.
    • Great Ape Vegeta, while meant to be a Wake-Up Call Boss, became infamous very quickly for several reasons. For starters, the very beginning of the fight has Vegeta use the Super Galick Blaster, meaning you’ll likely take damage before you even get to move with how absurdly fast it is. One strategy that has been somewhat reliable is get Goku to Sparking mode, and then hit him with long-range Ultimates like Super Kamehameha or the Spirit Bomb, but that requires charging ki all the way up. If you attempt to get some distance from him, unless you stagger him (which is easier said than done, given that Great Apes in general have super armor, on top of him being seemingly immune to Solar Flarenote ) or he sends you far away, he'll constantly chase you and more than likely prevent you from charging your ki. And even if you get the chance to use a Kamehameha, Vegeta will more than likely dodge, block it, or hit you to stop it. On top of that, all of his attacks hit hard, including a grab he does if you get too close, which deals a ton of damage. The high damage is made even worse when he enters Sparking mode, meaning that if he manages to enter it, you’re done for. Even worse is the Sparking! episode right next door, where Vegeta and Great Ape Vegeta are one after the other while using the less powerful pre-Kaioken Goku moveset.
    • There are a couple of Dual Bosses that are consistent throughout the Episode Modes that will provide difficulty for players, especially first timers. The most recurring of these are Goku Black and Zamasu, and later during the Tournament of Power Caulifla and Kale. Because of the point of the Episode Mode they are fought they have harder to deal with AI, being able to counter a lot of attacks the player can throw and whittle down the player's HP. Even worse if you pick a route where they end up fusing in the same battle too.
    • One of the Sparking! episodes have Goku fight the entire Ginyu Force in one long Sequential Boss, with no time to recover or charge Ki in-between. It's just as hard as it sounds; they're fairly challenging on their own and you'll most likely lose at least one bar of health fighting each one. To top it all off, Goku can't switch with Vegeta to regain his health or turn into a Super Saiyan. Taking them down requires playing very defensively to avoid losing your health.
    • Android 18 in Vegeta's saga. One of the requirements to unlock Parental Bond, the alternate scenario with Trunks, is to defeat 18 in this battle instead of just surviving until time runs out, which is easier said than done, because 18's AI is incredibly good at vanishing, allowing her to dodge your attacks easily, counter with her own attacks (which send you flying), and in general waste your precious time. The only way to defeat her before time runs out is to be extremely aggressive, and go into Sparking mode when you can so you can get close, stun her, and spam Vegeta's Big Bang Attack.
    • To access the Sparking! episodes concerning his participation in the Tournament of Power, Future Trunks must beat a team composed of Vegeta, Piccolo, and Gohan in a very tight time limit, or else you fail the mission. You do have the mercy of only needing to cut the life bars of each character to half-point, but you still have a very uphill battle ahead.
    • The VERY second fight against Raditz is one. Not only does he have super armor (something hardly any other enemy in the Episode Battle has), but he easily sidesteps out of the way of your melee attacks, making trying to hit him head-on nigh-impossible, and forcing you to instead go behind him and hit him from the back. The worst part about this fight is that you're likely still learning the ropes of the game, which means Raditz is giving you a harsh reality check.
      • Even worse? Defeating Raditz instead of just "surviving" him is the ONLY way to unlock two of Goku's Sparking! Episodes. So you BETTER play aggressive and use Sparking mode as much as possible before time runs out if you want to unlock those scenarios.
    • In general, just about almost every fight where you have to defeat the opponent under a time limit in order to unlock the alternate scenarios. The enemy AI in these fights not only easily dodge or block your attacks most of the time, but they also sometimes hit very hard. If the time limit doesn't make you fail the level, then the opponent actually killing you will.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: The Japanese version of the games featured Shunsuke Kikuchi's score from the anime. Due to licensing issues, the international versions did not keep this. This irritated some fans. On the other hand, most people will agree that the scores for Tenkaichi 2 and Tenkaichi 3 were quite good.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Tenkaichi 3's story mode is heavily condensed, often skipping fights entirely like Piccolo's first encounter with Cell and Ultimate Gohan's face-off with Super Buu, and whatever fights are included are often victims of Broad Strokes, thus featuring inaccuracies such as Goku killing Super 17 in his Super Saiyan 4 form (in the anime, he reverted back to his base form and killed him with a Dragon Fist before firing a point-blank Kamehameha). Considering the changes to the gameplay engine that allows for more dynamic transitions mid-fight, as well as the lack of unique in-game cutscene animations for certain interactions (Goku's thumbs up at the end of the Buu Saga being a more egregious example of this), it can make the entire story mode system feel underutilized and makes Dragon History more shallow compared to the Z-Battle Gate and Dragon Adventure modes.
    • Tenkaichi 3 also marks the first time the Classic Dragon Ball story became playable in a main-line Dragon Ball fighting game. Unfortunately, it was fumbled hard, as many of Goku's more interesting fights like his first encounters with Yamcha, Tien, Mercenary Tao or his climactic duel with Jackie Chun were skipped. What were adapted for Tenkaichi 3 basically amounts to filler fights, like his fight against Nam and his brief clash with General Blue in Penguin Village. The only plot-important battles Tenkaichi 3 included were the rematch against Mercenary Tao, and the final fight with Demon King Piccolo, and even in the latter's case, it still passes over the epilogue battle between Goku and Piccolo Jr. at the 23rd World Tournament.
    • Sparking Zero has many interesting What Ifs in the game, building off of possibilities if the stories deviated one way or the other. Unfortunately, while the Sparking Episodes tend to be praised for being unique and interesting, a vast majority of What-Ifs are either one scant scene afterwards or simply a single battle with the results and implications of what may happen afterwards being far too up in the air to be a satisfying conclusion.
    • Given the Character Perception Evolution of Nappa, there were fans of the character that were disappointed that there's never been an official "What if" story where he's not spared his canon death, despite the fact he's A Lighter Shade of Grey than Vegeta and Raditz; with the latter getting his own "What if" story back in Tenkaichi 2.
  • Tough Act to Follow: Being the granddaddy of all anime arena fighters, Budokai Tenkaichi is seen as the golden standard all anime fighters should attain to in quality and faithfulness to the source material. As a result, it's not uncommon to see people use this as a measuring stick whenever a new arena fighter gets announced, even more so when they end up following the same template to a lesser degree as the more recent Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm series. Even later Dragon Ball games suffers from this, as titles like Dragon Ball: Raging Blast (a Creator-Driven Successor) and Dragon Ball Xenoverse gets unfavorably compared to Tenkaichi almost every other day. Predictably, Sparking! ZERO itself, a straightforward new entry in the Budokai Tenkaichi/Sparking! series, also suffers from this, with some fans questioned whether or not this game surpassed Budokai Tenkaichi 3 and the subsequent comparisons, both positive and negative, that have been made.
  • Uncertain Audience: Part of the reasons why Sparking! ZERO's player count drops significantly a few months shortly after its release is that it doesn't appeal enough to either casual or hardcore players. For casual players, the game is lacking content outside of story mode and the mode itself is missing a number key moments for some characters' story, most notably Vegeta's. For competitive players, battles are very unbalanced with several Cheese Strategy and exploits that made the fight feel repetitive and unenjoyable. The cancelation of the 2025 Battle Hour event, which where the game's official tournament took place, certainly did not help.
  • Underused Game Mechanic:
    • Physical clashes in Tenkaichi 3. Usually when the player clashes with their opponent, a button prompt will appear as both opponents will teleport and trade blows with each other, and the winner deals more damage. However, the game rarely allows the player to do so outside of Saga modes, which makes this mechanic under utilized. Sparking! Zero would bring them back and use them outside of story mode.
    • A fair number of players have expressed disappointment that, other than Goku, the What-If Scenarios in Sparking! ZERO are very underutilized. Making it all the more egregious is that Goku has altered versions of exactly what the other characters should have, like Vegeta becoming a Super Saiyan on Namek and killing Frieza, or Piccolo surviving the Saiyan Saga.
    • Not all costumes are purely aesthetic, as a couple allow you to change a character's moveset. Unfortunately, it's literally only a couple, being Goku and Android 18, and many lament that this could've been used on even more costumes to give more variety to certain characters. On a similar note, many lament the lack of customization on characters that are not given alternate outfits or accessories.
      • Speaking of cosmetics, despite customization being an option for Sparking Zero, there's very limited things that can be done to customize a character, which usually amounts to putting on or taking off a single accessory, or none at all. Many players have wondered why the option is in the game when it seems afraid to commit to the ability to customize anything, and others felt it should've never been an option if it had so little to offer.
  • Unexpected Character:
    • There are plenty of these to go around, given how big the roster is (Tenkaichi 3's in particular is enormous) but the most notable is probably Grandpa Gohan and Selypa/Fasha, with the latter not even having on-screen fight scenes in her only appearance, making the game's moveset original. Ironically, Fasha's Great Ape form has the most unique ultimate attack compared to other Great Ape forms.
    • Sparking! ZERO's official reveal trailer shows off the regularly expected characters like Goku, Vegeta, and Frieza, but then shows flashes of its playable roster. While some people expected Dragon Ball Super characters like Jiren and the Dragon Ball Super: Broly version of the titular character, Bergamo was among those quickly shown. Bergamo isn't that popular of a character despite his unique build, powers, and frame, not even making an appearance in Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 at the time of Sparking! ZERO's reveal (though he was a potential character addition based on an in-game character poll and his clothes were added to the game in a post-launch content update). Bergamo's inclusion has been used as the baseline example for how deep the roster is likely to be, just due to how unexpected he was.
    • Kakunsa was met with intrigue and shock, as the only one of the Little Witch Warriors that most fans expected was Ribrianne. To see Kakunsa represented over her threw many players for a loop, though it has also given hope for the depth of Tournament of Power representation. This continued with the reveal of several other characters from the same arc, including the likes of Roasie and Anilaza.
    • Many returning characters from Tenkaichi 3 fall under this in one way or another, given that fans were unsure about how many characters would be included, and if and how many would be relegated to DLC instead of being in the base game simply because of the changes in the gaming industry in the years since the original games.
      • Cui wasn't really expected to be playable in Sparking! ZERO after so many years. The last time he was playable was way back in 2012 with Dragon Ball Z for Kinect.
      • Both Mecha Frieza and King Cold qualify under this. Though the former was at least somewhat expected, having been a semi-regular playable character up until Raging Blast 2, King Cold being playable for the first time since his only other playable appearance in Tenkaichi 3 definitely qualifies him for this.
      • In general, the more secondary and obscure the character is, the more unexpected their return is, with Babidi, Spopovich and Evil Bu also qualifying for this.
      • Characters from GT also count, with many people dismissing them as relegated to DLC if not straight up cut in favour of characters from Super, with the possible exception of Goku, Vegeta and Gogeta in their Super Saiyan 4 forms due to their popularity. The penultimate trailer for "Sparking ZERO" would confirm the return of all but two of the GT characters that were present in "Tenkaichi 3" (the missing two being Super 17 and Nova Shenron).
      • The Non-Serial Movie villains were expected by some to be relegated to DLC for the game. The final character reveal trailer for Sparking! ZERO would instead reveal that at least most of them would return for the base game. And more specifically, while some were expected (or at the very least unsurprising) like Lord Slug, Turles, and Cooler, the trailer throws two curveballs with Garlic Jr. and Dr. Wheelo, neither of whom had been seen in a mainline Dragon Ball fighter since Budokai Tenkaichi 3. As a final surprise, the trailer also reveals the secret Pre-Order Bonus character to be "Goku (Mini)" — Goku as he appears in Dragon Ball DAIMA, which premiered the same day that Sparking! ZERO launched.
    • An IGN pre-launch preview revealed that the Encyclopedia will return in the same style as how it was in Tenkaichi 3, except now Chi-Chi is joined by Bulma and Videl, bringing a greater humorous depth for fans with their commentaries.
    • Shallot from Dragon Ball Legends was announced as a DLC character for Sparking! ZERO, which comes off as a surprise for many fans, including those who have not played Legends before.
  • Values Dissonance: A humorous example. In the third game, Chi-Chi's commentaries about the Super Saiyan transformations are chock full of "delinquent" words. This is because in Japan, students who dye their hair, particularly blonde, are stigmatized as such. The translation is pretty much lost in the west, especially in countries where blonde hair is considered natural. In ZERO, when Chi-Chi complains about them, Bulma and Videl both realize Chi-Chi is old-fashioned and there's no use trying to convince her otherwise.
  • What the Hell, Costuming Department?:
    • Sparking! ZERO has alternate costumes and equippable accessories for characters. However, they're more limited compared to the past, and some are only limited to certain variants of characters, or certain characters in general for no real reason, and they are also quite inconsistent, allowing for a few characters to share their outfits across different versions of themselves, but only in a few occasions. For example, wanna play Goku in the Saiyan armor he had in the Android Arc? You can only do that with him from the Frieza Arc (Z - Mid) and the Buu Arc (Z - End), despite only the latter being from that arc, which is still a step up from Tenkaichi 3, where it was available only for Goku (Z - End), but it still leaves out the 3 other adult Goku's who could have worn the outfit, all while the sleeveless gi and his Yardrat outfit are locked only to his (Z - Early) version. Even mere alternate colors are gone, with characters like Frieza, Cell, King Cold, and others, who were never shown with different outfits, having no alternate appearance at all.
    • And in terms of accessories, it's extremely limited. Not only are there very few actual accessories despite there being slots for more than 2, but the ones that are there are just scouters, halos, and the DLC that lets you change a character's aura when powering up into a V shape (referencing V-Jump, the magazine the manga was published in). The V aura changer is limited to Saiyans for some reason (and, even then, only the main & secondary ones, as Fused Zamasu, who's half-Saiyan, not being able to equip it even though Goku Black can equip it, nor can Cell despite having several bits of Saiyan DNA in him, or Super Buu after absorbing Gotenks or Gohan), but you can only equip halos to a small pool of characters who died [Goku (Z - Early and Z - End), Vegeta (Z - End), Freeza (Super), and Super Gogeta (Z)] for some reason despite there being a lot of characters who've died in the series in the game (basically everyone at 1 point or another, minus Mr. Satan, before Super) who were shown dead either in the manga (Krillin, Tien, Yamcha, Chiaotzu, and Piccolo) and Z anime filler (most of the villains and some of the heroes). Similar words can be said about the scouter. It can only be equipped to the characters who've ever worn one [Vegeta (Z - Scouter), Nappa, the Frieza Force, the Ginyu Force, Freeza (Z), Turles, and Bardock in his original Z special armor]. Wanna have a fight where your character is from a what-if where they died or where your character wears a scouter for fun? Can't unless maybe you get the PC version and there's mods for them. Admittedly, some characters wouldn't work for the scouters due to their head shapes or ears not being humanoid, but that's no excuse for the ones who can.
  • The Woobie: Everything about Future Gohan in Sparking! ZERO underwent more Adaptational Angst Upgrade than in any other game or spin-off featuring him, from him recognizing that the battles he fights in (especially against his canon-timeline brother and father) as nothing more than fleeting moments (possibly going as far as to recognize everything as a Dying Dream) to Videl in the Encyclopedia wishing she had a Bad Future counterpart fighting alongside him so he wouldn't feel as alone on the frontlines against the Androids.

Top