Whereas other 3DS owners might be happily designing homes this month, my pick for October’s Game of the Month is a 2D fighter, developed by Arc System Works and published by Bandai Namco Games. This particular fighter is based on a particularly famous manga and anime series by Akira Toriyama.
As you can see, Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butoden is my chosen 3DS game of October.
When you first load the game up, your first port of call will be Z Story mode. The entirety of the Dragon Ball Z series is condensed down into just 10 battles, which are pretty easy to blitz through.
Once you’ve cleared those, you unlock several ‘what if…?’ sagas focusing on the different playable characters, as well as an Adventure more.
The Adventure mode is a lot more involved than Z Story. You travel between 8 different areas, fighting a variety of opponents. Each battle has it own objective to achieve, and you can unlock Assist characters depending on your rank after each battle.
Following completion of the Adventure mode, you unlock Extreme World Tournament.
Compared to previous Dragon Ball Z games, the roster is quite small. However, if a character isn’t playable, then they are probably a Z Assist character – a character you can call on during battle to assist you in some way.
In addition to the Dragon Ball Z characters, several from Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball GT are available, as well as those seen in the Battle of Gods and Resurrection ‘F’ films.
Extreme Butoden also has StreetPass functionality, as well as the option to battle other players with the game over local wireless. Whilst the lack of an online mode is quite a major flaw, it’s not something that particularly bothers me – I don’t really have much joy playing fighting games online, Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo Wii U & 3DS aside.
The controls are simple, and are all the same for whichever character you’re using. Whilst it doesn’t really offer the same depth as say BlazBlue for example, the game is still fun. After all, it’s quite enjoyable to blast your opponents with a Kamehameha.
Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butoden is definitely a game that fans of Dragon Ball Z can appreciate a lot – and I happen to be one of those people, hence it being my pick for October’s Game of the Month.
Rory Muses 