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Fast, furious and frantic fighting at its best, DragonBall Z:
Shin Budokai is a One-On-One Beat-‘Em-Up game. Based on the
ever-popular anime series of the same name, DragonBall Z:
 Shin
Budokai is akin to the Street Fighter and Mortal
Kombat series; in which opponents fight until their Energy Bar
is depleted. You achieve this using punches, kicks, Special Moves
and by being quicker than the opponent to defeat them, before moving
on to the next character.
Two Meters are present on-screen, determining both Health, and a
second which measures how much Ki Energy you have for a Special
Move. You must keep charging this Bar as when it runs out you will
not be able to move temporarily, leaving you open for attack. With a
full charge, your Special Move is available which takes an enormous
amount of Health away from your opponent. Special Moves vary between
characters and range from shooting fire to sending ghosts to attack
your opponent. There are animated scenes that cut into the game when
you use your Special Move, which run very smoothly.
There are five gameplay modes; Dragon Road, Arcade, Z Trial, Network
Battle and Training. Dragon Road is the Story Mode of the game and
contains five Chapters. The dead have been coming back to life due
to a hole between hell and this world, and you must battle between
friends and enemies to close the gap forever. Within this mode there
are choices to go different routes to get to the end and, depending
on the route, the opponents change.
Arcade Mode puts you up against several random characters from the
game and lets you choose the difficulty level, how many rounds you
will be fighting and how long the round lasts. Z Trial contains two
modes called Survival and Time Attack. Survival Mode selects
challengers to battle against randomly, with the idea being to see
how many opponents you can beat without dieing. Your Health does not
return to normal for each new opponent, but it is topped-up. Time
Attack sets out seven courses of opponents to defeat in the quickest
possible time.
Network Battle allows you to challenge a friend wirelessly using two
copies of the game. You have the chance to play as any of the
characters that you have unlocked against your opponent. Points are
awarded to the winner that can then be used to purchase Cards in the
Shop. This mode is very addictive and entertaining, and gives you a
chance to show your friends which moves you have learnt and which
characters you have won. This mode can be played again-and-again,
and is a great game to have when you have lots of friends close to
hand.
Training is there for you to practice your skills against a
character that will not fight back. This feature is there to learn
Special Moves and combinations to defeat your opponents in the other
modes.
There is a Menu called Profile Card. Throughout the game you are
collecting Points for wins and making Cards available by completing
different modes for the first time. When you enter the Profile Card
section there is an option for Shop. There are hundreds of cards
available to collect and some of them are not available unless you
have achieved a virtually perfect fight. You must buy all of the
cards in order to complete the game; everybody wants 100%, right?
The music is unique to the game. Featuring background Dance music,
it is fairly repetitive, but you are so busy fighting that it often
seems to disappear. The animation is amazingly clear and fast with
no glitches. Pleasing Character
 Models and some of the best
animation yet seen on the PSP, however, don’t detract from the often
sparse fighting arenas.
The titles’ gameplay is superb with the characters responding
quickly with nice movement. It make take some Beat-‘Em-Up
aficionados some time to adapt to the handheld variation of the
DragonBall Z series, especially with the title being a far-cry
from the simply irresistible
DragonBall Z: Budokai Tenkaichi on the PlayStation2, however
it would be very hard to discredit DragonBall Z: Shin Budokai
in it’s own right. All-in-all, this is a great fighting title that
is highly addictive, and will still have you playing it in years to
come.
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