I know, "dubbing" is basically the otaku "f-bomb" and fan dubbing tends to be all the more sinister but lets face it, anime dubbing has gotten better over the past years. With the advent of youtube, fan dubbing has been seen much more. Granted, like AMVs, fan-dubbing is a dime-a-dozen and its sometimes hard to find stuff that you just can't click away from amongst the sea of videos. Then there is stuff like the Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged Series. It's a very funny, fan-dub with practically all the voices done by the now famous dubber known as Little Kuriboh. If you haven't seen any of his stuff, I provided a few clips below. As of very recently, he's been guest staring in what has to be yet another very well done fan dubbing series, this one about Dragon Ball Z, also called an Abridged Series. Along with Little Kuriboh, a simply amazing group of dubbers known as TeamFourStar works these parody episodes. Danielle and I can't get enough of this fan-dub and already thousands of otaku have subscribed to their work. The voice of Vegeta, Lanipator sounds exactly like Chris Sabo and like Chris Sabo, he does a good chunk of the voices in the series. The other members of TeamFourStar, KaiserNeko, Takahata101 and the others and along with Little Kuriboh, couldn't be any better of a fan dub team. They really do give the real english dubbers (and writers) a run for their money.
One last thing about anime dubbing. As some of you might know, I was suppose to participate in the Bang Zoom! studio panel at Anime Fest 08 to hopefully get my foot in the door as well as an anime voice actor. That unfortunately was shot down due to the huge, huge crowd the latter two days had. No worries though, as I continue to break free from my job with my anime store, I'll be able to do Flash and dubbing myself to prove myself (please don't use my supposed podcast as an example ^^;, it sucked and wasn't really a podcast) plus I'm still in contact with Bang Zoom and will eventually attend their $300 lessons to get my old chorus voice back and improve my acting since both are a bit rusty. One of the other fellow attendees at Anime Fest 08, AnimeAlmanac was able to do an interview and in-depth report on the class when Bang Zoom did one in NYC not long after the festival. Check out the amazing blog post here and remember, if we american otaku are to get in the anime voice acting biz...its not all fun and games, its an art and must be done right.
TeamFourStar Convention Parody, LOL at last comment xD
First Episode of DBZ Abriged
Can't forget the amazing Yu-Gi-Oh Abrigded Series
LOL at the Beauty and the Beast Parody; f$%king birds! xD
Thanks to dragonballmovieblog I was able to get some screen shots of the upcoming Dragon Ball Movie trailer. You finally get to see what Piccolo looks like and basically....well you be the judge. To me it looks like Piccolo was recycled from James Marshers old Buffy make-up and costumes. It's also starting to make otaku across the web wonder if anyone making or staring in the movie even seen an episode of Dragon Ball, or Dragon Ball Z. For the good chunk of you that probably have a palm mark across your forehead after seeing this...I got great, great Dragon Ball Z news that I'll share in the next few days. Some of you might already know what i'm talking about but at least in November you will be able to feel alot better if think this movie will leave a bad taste in your mouth.
I was about to end my day online but I just had to show you all this. I know, many of us otaku are very scared about the Dragon Ball movie and we are all pondering how bad Hollywood will screw it up. Lets just hope for the best though... right ^^?
Anyways, in the picture you can see Bulma (top left), Goku (front and center), Chi Chi (Goku's right)..who BTW we haven't seen before this and is the better of the actor choices, I feel; Master Roshi...Chow Yun Fat, Mai(top right, also first time seen). Also if you look at the very top you will see the eyes of Piccolo for the first time also who we all know is being played by James Marsters aka Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
As a long time DBZ fan, this game was right up my ally. I was very excited to play a Dragon Ball Z game for the current generation systems and with all good reasons. This game has to be by far the best looking Dragon Ball Z game to date. The visuals have to be the most astonishing aspects of the game. I will go as far as to state that this game has the best cell-shading graphics of ANY game to date, even better than the current Naruto games which also boast great cell-shading visuals.I must also note that I played through the Xbox 360 version which as many gamers know is slightly less graphical in power to that of the PS3... of course only by a slight bit. So, in other words, Atari did a bang-up job on the graphic. The backgrounds also blend in perfectly with the character graphics. They have a very real and in-depth feel that you would never think would mix with the cell-shaded DBZ characters, but the background just couldn't be better not just in looks but in dynamics. When you fight back and forth with your opponent, the blur effects are done the way you would think the super sonic would feel in real life and the ability to fight all the way into space is a nice touch. The only thing lacking with the stages is that there are only 5 stages in total and the only real damage done to the environment is when you contact well with an Ultimate Attack causing a short cut scene. Other DBZ titles like Tenkaichi for example did have more in ways of destroyable buildings, cliffs and the like. That you will not see here but as a game programmer myself, this was most likely done to keep the backgrounds maintaining their real look and to not slow the in-game play. Definitely a tough trade-off that hopefully can be improved in future titles.
Now, onto the gameplay. As stated before, the dynamics are fast and furious. I enjoyed the fact the game was balanced into being able to preform major attacks in a quicker amount of time. Yes, this can allow a player to be a bit cheesy but a quick reaction to a big attack with get you right behind your opponent and cancel their attempt to blast you. The controls are easier than previous titles and if you go through the Tutorial mode, you'll see that it does have a great load of depth. Tenkaichi fans might be disappointed though since the overall feel is very much like the older Budokai scheme but with wonderful energy struggles and dodging abilities. Personally I love being able to hit the dodge button and watch my character sit there and quickly dodge every fast punch very much like you see in the anime. Fans of the series might be surprised though that there is no manual Ki charging...sorry, no sitting in the corner of a stage and charging up. Your Ki is charged automatically and charges fast, but this allows you to activate the cool Aura Burst feature more often and fighter gamers will enjoy one less thing to worry about. Your Ki grows even faster if you get attacked to the point of activating a Drama Piece with that effect. Drama Pieces are little cut scenes that happen when you attack or get attacked a certain way, opening deferent effects like a dodged attack or regenerated health. DBZ fans will enjoy this bit but some gamers might find them a bit irritating. Either way, Drama Pieces add a nice customizable and unlockable slew of features to your fighter. You also have the ability to unlock a bunch of transformations and different final attacks for each player using the main story mode. Before I get into the story mode, known as the Z Chronicals, I must also state to other features that game has. First is the online play. This is always a welcomed addition and as with any game that could go online... make sure you play through the main story a bit to unlock more characters and features that will allow you to be at par with other gamers. The second feature to mention is the Survival Mode which would be better if it wasn't for the game's one major flaw that I'll go into in a bit.
Now onto the Z Chronicals, or the main story mode of the game. Fans of DBZ like me will love it; non-DBZ fans will probably be ok with it. There are six different difficulty levels: very easy, easy, normal, hard, very hard, and Z ; so there's alot to do if you are to get all the achievements. Only the first three are available on your first time through which unfortunately is rather short. There is only the Saiyan Saga, Frieza Saga and the Cell Saga. No sign of Majin Boo or any characters from there either. The one major flaw of the game is that the roster is at about 30 characters which is mainly the different variations of the main characters and of course the shortened story line. One might feel that the game is incomplete if you are used to the other DBZ games that had a much larger roster and all the sagas included. For a regular fighter, this would deem pretty good since the causal fighting gamer won't look for anymore but as both a hardcore fighter and gamer, its a a bit lacking in that aspect.
Overall though I still give this game a 7 out of 10 because the visuals and the fighting will make any DBZ fan and fighting fan happy. The engine is pure but would be perfect if it had more characters, more levels, more destructible items, and the entire DBZ story. I would recommend renting first if you are unsure but I am glad I have it and that I can face all of you online. If you got an xbox 360, look for user: Chuck Gaffney, that's me (yes I know I used my whole name ^^;;). As long as its not my brothers (or me) playing Halo 3 or Gears of War I will face you as the character I resemble the most...Future Trunks.
Out today is the new DBZ fighting game from Atari, Dragon Ball Z Burst Limit. As an avid DBZ fan, I'm excited about this one. It's for the PS3 and Xbox 360 and boasts very nice graphics. I like how fluid it all looks and seems very true to the series. From the looks of it, the stages are done very well and the formula seems much like Tenkaichi, which to me is a good thing. There is promise of some new fighting skills and other coll stuff.
I'm going to be doing a full review on it in collaboration between rocketxl.com and Atari so we'll see if it makes itself stand out form the previous games. Check out below at some of the videos and bring back your DBZ spirit.^_^
