Introducing "Episode Battle" and "Custom Battle" modes.
Publisher Bandai Namco and developer Spike Chunsoft have released a new gameplay showcase video for Dragon Ball: Sparking! ZERO showcasing the game modes “Episode Battle” and “Custom Battle,” as well as limited split-screen multiplayer battling.
Here is an overview of each mode, via producer Jun Furutani:
Episode Battle
“In this single-player mode, you can take the point of view of eight different characters, including Goku and Vegeta, and enjoy famous battles from the anime. For each stage, you’ll be playing through an introduction before heading into some of the most iconic fights in Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball Super. The number of stages and battles vary by character. For example, Goku has the largest number of stages, beginning from when he fights Raditz up to and including his fights in the Tournament of Power Saga. Our goal for this as a mode is to allow players the satisfying challenge faced by characters and their friends. Additionally, certain cutscenes allow players to experience parts of the story form a first-person perspective, which we hope will allow players to further immerse themselves in the characters’ experiences. On certain stages, depending on your actions and choices, players will be able to change the outcome of the story that differ from the anime series. Play as a character to experience these new and different episodes!”
Custom Battle
“In this mode, players fight in battles that each have their own original scenes. Within the Custom Battle, there is Bonus Battles, a mode where we’ve prepared several original battle situations developed for you to enjoy. In this mode, some battles will have different victory conditions, and some might have event cutscenes pop up mid-way, so you’ll be able to enjoy battles different from the norm. In Edi Mode, you’ll be able to freely set the characters to be played, as well as the pre-battle and post-battle cutscenes to make your own original battle. What you’ve made will be able to be uploaded and viewed online for the whole world to play, so hope you enjoy sharing the battles and situations you’ve thought up! You will also be able to edit exiting content along with Bonus Battles to use as a base, so try your hand at making a whole variety of battles!”
“Our focus for this game was seeing how far we could get players to really become Dragon Ball series characters. We wanted to show effects like the wind blasting around and the weather changing, just by charging your Ki, and rocks and buildings being dynamically destroyed by the force of battle, and take advantage of the power of the latest generation of consoles. With that in mind, it was difficult to implement local split-screen multiplayer while retaining those core elements, so we developed this game with online multiplayer and an offline single-player mode in mind. However, we have always wanted for as many people as possible to enjoy the game in various situations. After careful consideration, we have decided to implement the split-screen multiplayer mode exclusively within the ‘Hyperbolic Time Chamber’ stage. As character selection was originally designed with single-player gameplay in mind, there will unfortunately be a slight inconvenience during character selection before a split-screen battle. However, we hope this mode will allow players to enjoy local matches with friends and family.”
