Dragon Ball: Sparking!
Zero review
I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with arena fighters.
My recent (one-star)Jujutsu Kaisen: Cursed Clash reviewis probably a decent example of that.
Make no mistake, the name may be different butDragon Ball: Sparking!
The nostalgia-blinded 12-year-old in me is thrilled.
Thankfully, the fully-grown, arena fighter-jaded reviewer playing it is pretty happy too.
Arena fighters get a bad rap, which is unfortunately well earned.
They’re 3D, over-the-shoulder button mashers, and almost exclusively feature anime characters.
They’re simple by design, and in this respect Sparking!
Zero isn’t trying to rock the boat.
Zero is not a particularly complex game to learn.
One button is punch.
One button is a ranged attack.
But combos, although satisfying, aren’t where the fun or the challenge can be found in Sparking!
The real meat of the game is in its movement and its surprisingly in-depth system of counters.
You spend it by using your ranged attacks or your big, flashy super moves.
It all results in an uncharacteristically strategic arena fighter.
After a few hours of getting to grips with Sparking!
Zero, I came away feeling pleasantly surprised by this.
I’d say completing all of them took me around 15 to 20 hours.
Zero’s ‘what if’ moments.
Completing a bonus objective here will trigger a non-canon, alternate-path story.
Some of these earn you a little cutscene.
Others are an entire saga in and of themselves.
Well wonder no more, because Sparking!
Zero gives you two ways to see how things could have played out differently.
The Dragon Ball fanboy in me needs a moment here.
There’s clearly genuine Dragon Ball enthusiasm and knowledge informing the writing here.
Ahem, anyway - back to being professional.
Performance on PC was brilliant.
Outside of some momentary texture pop-ins when matches began, I cannot fault it in any way.
There wasn’t even a hint of frameloss in split-screen multiplayer with all of my graphical tweaks on max.
I expected worse, because Sparking!
It’s the lighting effects in Sparking!
Zero that sells the entire experience.
Nothing comes close to beating how stunning a beam clash looks in this game.
Frankly, I doubt it ever will.
The online also felt solid.
Zero is the exception.
It’s not all positive however.
It’s also just extremely unwieldy.
You’ll spend more time navigating menus than you’ll actually spend learning (in fact, Sparking!
Zero’s menus are generally cumbersome across the board, with muddled and inconsistent inputs).
Also, for some bizarre reason, your opponent in the tutorial can die.
This is tutorial 101 stuff.
A few of Sparking!
Zero’s 182 characters do also just feel like palette swaps as well.
In this sense, probably only half of the roster consists of wholly unique characters.
And variations, copies and near-clones are ultimately all part of the Dragon Ball experience.
Dragon Ball Sparking!
The former will play it safe.
Zero is the arena fighter antithesis in this regard.
Unlike countless other examples I could name, Sparking!
Zero is a polished, rich experience.
I feel comfortable recommending it to anyone based on that alone.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some childhood friends to message.
A copy of Dragon Ball: Sparking!
Zero was provided for review by Bandai Namco.
