Dragon Ball Z: Tenkaichi Tag Team Review

Before you read this review I want to make one thing clear. I am a huge Dragon Ball Z (DBZ) fan. I own the entire uncut series on DVD and when I received this game for review I was actually in the middle of re-watching the series (I was up to Trunks fighting Imperfect Cell, if that helps you out at all). So with that said, it’s fair to say that I like the DBZ universe more than the average person. Say what you want about the show, I’m fond of it because of the over the top action, ever stronger and more incredible opponents, and the general escapism it provides. So when a DBZ fighting game for the PSP showed up for me to review I was a little bit excited.

 

Dragon Ball Z: Tenchaichi Tag Team is a pure fighting game for the PSP, which tries to incorporate all of the action the series is known for. This being my first DBZ fighting game that I have played since the Budokai series I was anxious to see how far the DBZ games had come. What I discovered is that this particular game hasn’t really come that far at all.

70 Fighters Including The All Important Henchman

 

Dragon Ball Z: Tenchaichi Tag Team is a fairly loaded package. In total, the game has 70 fighters to choose from. The characters range from series favorites like Goku, Vegeta, Cell, and Tien, but you can tell that the developers really started to stretch to get the roster up to 70 fighters, as characters like

Am I Controlling Goku or Buu?

 

Where the game really starts to take a dive is in the gameplay department. As I mentioned earlier, the last DBZ fighting game I played was in the Budokai series and honestly the fighting engine hasn

Another huge problem with the game is that every single fight against the AI in story mode plays out exactly the same way. You punch the enemy a bit, try to daze them so you can charge up your kai, then unleash your special technique. Rinse and repeat and you can beat every single enemy in the game from Napa to Cell. And you can use the same strategy regardless of the character you are controlling. It

Authentic Looks

 

Artistically the game does a good job of recreating the look of the cartoon series. The characters are fairly large when viewed up close and they all look like they should. There is also a healthy number of fighting stages in the game and they generally look like they should as well. The cartoon isn

Voice Doubles?

 

The sound in the game is a bit odd. I can say for sure that a lot of the dialogue is spoken with the original voice actors. But at other times it seems like they use stand in voice actors. It