Dragonball FighterZ..."Poised" for Greatness

P.O.I.S.E - An acronym that covers these five essential steps for giving constructive criticism: Praise, Overview, Issues, Strategy, and Encouragement. The principle behind P.O.I.S.E is that you provide the artist with valuable feedback on the concept(s) they executed well, but also detailing, in a constructive manner, the area(s) in which you feel they can make improvements to their work. Through your comments, a blueprint will be laid out for the artist so they know the direction they should go in order to make the revisions which will ultimately lead to them producing a better version of their work.

I'll start my "criticism" of Dragonball FighterZ by stating this disclaimer: I'm going to be extremely BIASED when I talk about this game and you will witness complete nostalgia as I discuss a franchise that has pretty much defined a large portion of my childhood so fair warning because I'm about to fan boy like crazy.

P - THIS GAME IS TOO CLEAN! It's been a while since I've been this thoroughly impressed by a fighting game, in fact the last fighting game that surprised me this much was Super Smash Bros. for the Wii U (affectionately called "Smash 4") which was released in 2014. Since that time, there have been numerous fighting games released that were very good, but not to this extent. It's being said that Dragonball FIghterZ is the greatest Dragonball game ever, and I'm not one for hyping a video game so early into its life, but I'm starting to agree with those sentiments. From gameplay, to the graphics, to the story and dialogue, and much more, this game fulfills so many of the "go-to" areas to which gamers pay close attention.

O - Now that I'm done geeking out over how great this game is, I can come back to earth and say that some areas could use some improvements, however small these improvements may be. So with all of Dragonball FighterZ's successes, it does leave some excellence on the table when it comes to game mode transition and animation.

I - Let's jump right in with the first area I mentioned, game mode transition. In past Dragonball fighting games, you would normally transition from one game mode to another via a standard game menu where you scroll and select the game mode you want. However, in FighterZ they decided to get a bit more creative and developed a lobby-style area that acts as the main method of navigating from one game mode to another. Now I appreciate the new direction that Arc System Works, the developers of FighterZ, decided to go in when it came to game mode transition and I like the vision, but this lobby area is still a bit bland. Yes, you can see and interact with other people that are in the same region as you; yes, you can customize your sprite with a Dragonball character of your choosing; but beyond that, you can't really do much else. I get that this lobby area is just meant for choosing a game mode; however, I would have liked to see some more interactivity for the players such as maybe adding mini games to this area.

Now let's talk about animation. When I say I have concerns about the animation, I'm not referring to how the animated characters look, but rather the functionality of the animations for the characters. Let me explain, the functionality of the animation just means are the characters disjointed when they speak or are there visible inconsistencies with the animations such as a character walking, but looking like their "gliding" or "sliding" as opposed to taking one step at a time. So far. the only issue I've seen in regards to the animation is that during the cut scenes before the battle starts, the characters speak to one another, and once they finish their dialogue, you can still see their mouth moving indicating that the animation for their mouth is behind the pace at which the dialogue is delivered.

S -  As far as strategy is concerned, my recommendations are pretty straightforward. I would like to see Arc System Works improve the lobby area by adding some mini games, character gestures such as break dancing, or any other options that will engage players more while they decide which game mode they want to play. In reference to the animations, I just need a patch to be released that will fix the discrepancy between the mouth animation and dialogue.

E - I'm going to refrain from telling you guys how many life hours I've already lost to this game because to be quite honest, it's not enough. I've already procrastinated my homework to spend some quality time with this game, so believe me when I say, that even if these improvements aren't added, I will continue to misplace my priorities in favor of beating people up while they're trapped in the corner of the stage, sending my opponents flying through buildings, and raising my sodium levels as the salt builds from losing close matches. In all seriousness though, Arc System Works has done an amazing job with Dragonball FighterZ and should continue on this path in the future, I'm just your typical picky gamer who would like to see a couple of adjustments.