Budokai 2 - Extensive DragonBall Z Retrospective┃History and Analysis

[@shreddybrek]

The board game in this gets so much hate online. I loved it as a kid. Gutted this wasn't included in the HD remake, as its a much superior game over the first (minus the cut scenes loss)

[@anigamerreviews3136]

I'm gonna take a guess and say it would've required new ost's to be composed for the boardgames component as none of the tracks they reused would've worked and that would've required effort from Bandai, something that did not go into the hd collection

[@AngeVNs]

I think Budokai 2 is underrated for what you stated, actually really unique and interesting what if scenarios without using non-canon characters

[@davidburton4836]

Another great video, dude. I'm back again to share a little fun Dragon Ball trivia to you and my fellow commenters. Dragon Ball's locations are named fairly generically, so the "Arctic" stage is part of what is called the Ice Continent, and it's not just a random location. For those of you who've only seen Z without watching the original Dragon Ball anime, the location is Jingle Village. Goku crash lands here while looking for the 4-star Dragon Ball during his earliest conflicts with the Red Ribbon Army. The Army had built a base here and forced the villagers to look for a Dragon Ball the army wanted. This base, the tower knocked over in an avalanche as a stage transition from the upper part of the arena to the lower part where Freeza resides, is called Muscle Tower. The plane located in this lower area is presumably the one Goku stole and crashed to get here originally. There is an explanation for why the androids are called androids and not cyborgs. In Japanese, the catch-all word used for all of them is 人造人間 (*jinzōningen*), literally "artificial human(s)". It's a phrase that can and does refer to humanoid robots, cyborgs, and androids alike. The English word "cyborg" is actually used a few times in the Japanese Dragon Ball script, specifically referring to someone like Tao Paipai (Mercenary Tao) upon his mechanized-return, and even Trunks uses it in relation to 17 and 18. Certain other countries use different terminology. The French fandom has always used "C____" (e.g., "C18") as a shorthand to refer to the characters. "Android" just happens to be the catch-all word that caught on with English fandom, and did so long before FUNimation got their hands on the series. To reflect the catch-all meaning of the term, sometimes fans and official translations alike in English will straight-up just use "Artificial Human(s)". Freeza's son is named Kuriza. He first debuted in Nekomajin, a gag manga created by Akira Toriyamathat in it's later half became a self parody of Dragon Ball. Whether this is canon to Dragon Ball itself is debatable, especially given the addition of Dragon Ball Super, but given that Kuriza has only appeared here and in a few video games, usually as an alternate skin for Freeza, it's not particularly relevant anyway. I hope everyone who reads this finds this type of stuff as interesting as I do!

[@WTFisTingispingis]

The main takeaway I got from this was "Wait back up Frieza has a kid!?'

[@MattCraftDotDerp]

yes! in the Neko Majin gag manga that Toriyama wrote as a non-canon follow-up to Dragon Ball! that's also where Nappa's alt in these games with the sleeves comes from, a reference to a Saiyan from that manga called Onio

[@user-bv8fr4to8k]

Thank you so much for reviewing this. Distinctly remember many a summer day as a kid burning through this after getting it on loan from a mate's brother. Despite not being a DBZ or Anime fan I loved it and you covered it really well.

[@ceilingsintheireyes6288]

I bought this when it came out and then pre-ordered 3 when that was coming out. 3 is still the best dbz game imo

[@cartoonvideos5]

Dragon rush is a terrible mechanic though especially against the AI

[@cartoonvideos5]

I had never watched Buu Saga as a kid, only played this game, so as far as I knew, both Cell and Freiza becoming resurrected was canon...it's silly to think about that now

[@sanseb5196]

I think it looks like it's Gohan, Vegito and Goku on the Japanese cover art. It's the one armed stance that gives me that thought. But yeah, it really does just look like 3 different versions of Goku XD

[@tapeboi9498]

This was actually my favorite game as a kid. I played this game every day and loved it. The thing I hated though was how there was no cutscenes in the story mode but growing up, the board game theme grew on me. I also had a hard time unlocking all the characters transformations, and techniques because you had to do so many random stuff to unlock them and I didn’t know how to use the internet to look at cheats.

[@SpiderBen]

Eagerly awaiting your Budokai 3 video! Has to be my favorite Dragon Ball game ever. Big fan of your work! Easy to put on in the background while doing something but also great to pay full attention to and that’s not an easy feat!

[@evprince]

Working on it!

[@kiz5562]

14:18, cool feature is if you get Vegeta to land on Buu's square, it'll end the chapter by him doing the final explosion.

[@evprince]

RIP Vegeta

[@danteshollowedgrounds]

My favorite of all time especially the kickass intro.

[@howilearned2stopworrying508]

With the stock music I keep expecting Cliff Grabowski to show up

[@marievjing]

By the way, I forgot to mention than for me it's the best looking dbz game for the ps2 thanks to the improved shell-shading. For exemple, Goten & kid Trunks (who are my favorite characters) are their best looks in it imo. Also, I might add that each dbz game on the ps2 has their own unique feature, meaning that neither of them are obsolete and you have to own each of them for differents reasons (something so rare for long franchise) : - Budokai 1 : the story mode with amazing cut-scenes just like the anime - Budokai 2 : the board game with differents inroads and unique characters (fusions and buu's absorptions) - Budokai 3 : a different story mode for each character (for example since android 19 isn't in this game, when you play as goku and you reach the android saga, you only have to beat Cell since canonically he never fights the androids and was sick for all the saga. Another hint that the original plan was to goku to retire and let his kids (gohan & goten) to be the next main heroes, but that's another topic ;) - Super Dragon ball z : For its street fighter fight style and arcade style - Budokai Tenkaichi 1 : Is unfortunetly the only skippable of all of them, the story mode isn't very interesting and it only introduced the tenkaichi (free-camera) gameplay - Budokai Tenkaichi 2 : Introduced RPG-elements and probably has the most complete and longest story mode of all ps2 dbz games, almost a hundreds fights, they're all there (dbz, the oav, GT). And you can travel on the map just like Budokai 3 - Budokai Tenkaichi 3 : The characters are talking during the fights (something that never happened) and introduced a script system : For exemple, at your 1st fight with Raditz, it's almost impossible to win with goku and piccolo, you just have to wait to push R3 to make the strory continue. Same with Nappa, you fights as tien, chiaotzu, gohan and piccolo and you lose all of them just like the anime. It's a great immersion for dragon ball fans ;) - Infinite world : Introduced mini-games just like the only one in Budokai 1 and just like Budokai 1, you have to beat the story mode one time with only the fights of goku and gohan and then you unlocks the second part of the story mode with all the others characters. The map is also very similar to the board game of Budokai 2 - DBZ sagas : has cut-scenes straight from the anime with unique objectives Sorry for the long comment and for my bad english ;)

[@cincymutt]

Considering some of the exclusions, it is a little surprising they put the Supreme Kai into the game. But, I guess the focus on the Buu era and the use of the Kai world as a stage justifies it.

[@Megaman.ExE7]

The story mode in this game is underrated. I always love the _AF_ vibes that it gave off. In addition to that, the music/fusions and other aspects make this one of the most underrated games in the franchise for sure. From a purely casual perspective, I'd even argue that Budokai 2 is even more fun to playthrough then Tenkaichi (Sparking) 1

[@AD.THE.HITMAN-nc8qj]

us has a foil holo to it. us takes it

[@saschaberger3212]

The only game in the series i haven't played. The story is all over the place^^ interesting watch

[@startown4814]

10/10 i used this vid to sleep

[@c-st4r]

Maybe... its 2am but I'm enjoying the commentary too much tho 😅

[@DudeLoopNoob]

this is the one i played to most

[@doug9358]

A minor correction/ comment about the dbz b2 Japanese version. The Japanese version you are referring to is Dragon Ball Z 2 V. That’s what has some extras, not the base game for the Asia audience. 2v only had only around 2000 copies made and is pretty rare.

[@marievjing]

My favorite of the original budokai trilogy but also the first dbz game I owned :) The cinematics of the first game are amazing and we had to wait dbz kakarot in 2020 for having those kind of cut-scenes again but once you finished dbz budokai 1 story, well ... That's it. Budokai 2 has so much replayability with a lot of differents intereractions. For example, if Frieza kills krillin in chapter 3 you unlocks super saiyen 1 for goku or if vegeta encounters fat buu in chapter 6, he blows himself with him and you don't have to fight him, etc ... Each budokai and tenkaichi are unique in their own ways but Budokai 2 is the most unique by being the only dbz game where you can play as the fusion between goku & hercule or all differents versions of buu (frieza, cell, vegeta, etc). By the way, Evan, if you want to do a review of star wars episode 1 the phantom menace the game, please don't pick the re-release of the ps5 store because it's only the re-release of the already bad ps1 port. It's a little bit harder to find the PC version but it's the only one that really works :)

[@evprince]

I actually AM planning to do that one, and rest assured won't be using a port.

[@marievjing]

@@evprince Great news :) Thank you ;)

[@mattb6369]

@@marievjing Infinite World had some very impressive cutscenes just not as many of them as Budokai 1 had. Budokai Tenkaichi 2 in it's own right did a decent effort despite not being anywhere near as impressive as Infinite World and obviously Budokai 1.

[@MetalFreezer3000]

In regards to why it released in Japan last in contrast to the rest of the world, it ties to why the first game only had up to the Cell Saga. The Budokai series were games made for American Audiences first and foremost And at the time of Budokai 1 release, America was airing the first episodes of the Buu Saga and during Budokai 2 Release, GT was just begging to Air. So, the reason why Budokai 1 only had up to the Cell Saga was just to avoid Spoilers for the American Audience

[@derekknowles5805]

This was my 1st Dbz game on ps2 I got on my 11th birthday its an OK game kinda hard at times I hate shaking the Joystick when doing special attacks Budokai 3 is much easier had a GameCube version but it stopped working

[@Maximusisherenow]

37:28 While I think the music is great...its likely a large amount of it is stolen since Toei did publicly admit that Yamamoto was stealing music from other artists. Still a bop tho.

[@JMartNotKMart]

DBFighterZ’ board game sucks ass compared to this game’s.

[@windows98alpha35]

Budokai 2 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Budokai 3. IDGAF