After playing Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero, I'm convinced it has what it takes to reinvigorate anime arena fighters

GamesFightingDragon Ball: Sparking ZeroAfter playing Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero, I’m convinced it has what it takes to reinvigorate anime arena fightersWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. GamesFightingDragon Ball: Sparking ZeroAfter playing Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero, I’m convinced it has what it takes to reinvigorate anime arena fightersWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. (Image credit: Bandai Namco Entertainment) Going overboard (Image credit: Bandai Namco) Balanced? Vegeta-bout-it(Image credit: Bandai Namco)Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is delightfully unbalanced and “definitely not an esports game,” so the devs had to find a unique approach to ranked online Balanced? Vegeta-bout-it (Image credit: Bandai Namco)Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is delightfully unbalanced and “definitely not an esports game,” so the devs had to find a unique approach to ranked online (Image credit: Bandai Namco) Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is delightfully unbalanced and “definitely not an esports game,” so the devs had to find a unique approach to ranked online The game’s scripted version of Custom Battle, Bonus Battles – much like Dragon Ball Z: Super Sonic Warriors’ story mode – are a mix of what-if and expanded canon scenarios. These scenarios range from original battles like Perfect Cell teaming up with Goku against Babidi’s cronies, Kefla and Caulifla battling the entire roster of Super Saiyan fusions, or Future Trunks training with Piccolo. While any other game’s version of this system would be a breezy affair, Sparking Zero’s difficulty ceiling is surprisingly high, making these battles feel more like dungeon runs than light work. Sparking Zero’s battle system is deceptively simple to understand yet challenging to master off the jump, and a significant contributor to that difficulty curve is how strong the game’s computer is when on an average setting. Unlike other games where you can figure out an exploit like spamming beam attacks to get cheap damage off of a CPU character to turn the tide of battle, Sparking Zero’s CPU will deflect beam attacks and chain teleport behind you faster than unversed hands can muster. (Image credit: Bandai Namco) Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more According to Furutani, two of the objectives the developers had while making Sparking Zero, aside from bringing the game to modern consoles, was to deliver a fast paced game with satisfying combat. To that end, Furutani also revealed that, unlike most arena fighters – which take a page out of traditional fighting games’ penchant for making characters balanced – Sparking Zero instead opts to make characters’ respective power levels as accurate to the anime as possible. On the light end of this metric, the cyan palette swap of Gokus and Vegetas making up much of Sparking Zero’s elusively large grid of mythos-spanning characters not only play in a distinct way from one another, they also have attacks that scale as their respective characters reach the end of Super. Whether that means SSJ4 Goku and Vegeta – the cooler design of any Super Saiyan form – can hold their own in a fight against Super Saiyan Blue counterparts begs to be explored. On the opposite end of the non-power scaling spectrum is the reality that characters like Hercule won’t be able to do much damage against anyone, let alone fellow human characters like Krillin. While any other game would designate characters of Hercule’s ilk as “joke characters” to be left on the bench of the dream scenario matchups that Sparking Zero is in heavy surplus of, they actually lend themselves to the fun of the game’s replayability through the form of a character proficiency ranking system as well as the game’s shareable tournament modes. Fighting chance (Image credit: Bandai Namco) “Sparking Zero’s depths are as deep as its Gokus and Vegetas are numerous” “Sparking Zero’s depths are as deep as its Gokus and Vegetas are numerous” Undoubtedly, the death nail for any anime arena fighter is its lack of combat depth and replayability. Fortunately, Sparking Zero is teeming with both in its custom and Episode Battles. Each Bonus Battles has objectives like winning a gauntlet match against a string of characters on an unreplenished health bar in a set amount of time. Successfully completing objectives rewards players with secret cutscenes and alternate battle paths in a similar fashion to Dragon Ball Z Budokai 2’s ownMario Party-esque game board. (Image credit: Bandai Namco) Camera gripes notwithstanding, Sparking Zero is poised to not only be a Dragon Ball game for the ages, but a paradigm shift in how far the subgenre of games can go beyondrun of the mill arena fightersthat lose steam in a single session. Sparking Zero’s depths are as deep as its Gokus and Vegetas are numerous, and the only thing that can make the title soar to even greater heights is if it extends its gargantuan roster to include creator Akira Toriyama’s other characters, like Arale from Dr. Slump and Beelzebub from Sand Land. Overall, Sparking Zero feels like it will raise anime arena fighters to blisteringly new heights, all while emphatically asserting itself to the top of the totem pole as the definitive Dragon Ball video game. We’ve not got long to wait until Sparking Zero’s launch on October 11 - pass the time with thebest fighting gamesyou can play right now. 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review: “Secures its place as one of the best shows on television right now” 2Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat” 2Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat” 2 Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat” 3Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses” 3Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses” 3 Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses” 4Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist” 4Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist” 4 Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist” 5Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands” 5Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands” 5 Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands”