How Many Characters? Over 9000!
Another selling feature of the DBZ games that Tag Team adheres to is the staggering number of playable characters. Boasting over 70 characters in this iteration it contains one of the largest rosters of a fighting game, surpassing both Mortal Kombat and Marvel vs. Capcom 2. Apparently everyone in the Dragon Ball Z cast trained under the same sensei, as it becomes fairly evident that the characters do not have much variation between each other and are mere palette swaps. Giving a false sense of distinction between the character set really left me with a shallow feeling because it didn’t matter who I picked – the game would play out the same every time.
On the flip side the graphics are something to look at and the cell shading does wonders on the PSP. The characters are smooth yet crisp and you can really distinguish each and every animation that happens. It is one of the nicest looking DBZ games and even PSP games (I may have a slight bias for cell shading) but they have really transformed the anime into living figures in this game.
It really comes down to style over substance with DBZ Tenkaichi Tag Team, but unfortunately the style is wearing thin after a 10th iteration of their fighting game.
Verdict
Dragon Ball Z: Tenkaichi Tag Team is an attempt to put a new paint job on an old car. The depth just is not there and there is no attempt to innovate on the other titles in the DBZ timeline. Being able to team up with 3 other friends is pretty limited by the Ad-Hoc compatibility of the PSP and the fact that it is still the same tired old fighting mechanics the series has given us many times before. Tenkaichi Tag Team attempts to give the player a sense of diversity and depth but in the most superficial way possible. Being able to utilize the amazing powers of the DBZ universe is only fulfilling for so long and the repetition and primitive combat will turn all but the most hardcore DBZ fans away.
Verdict
Co-Op Score
Overall
The Co-Op Experience: Team up with a friend in the tag team style fighting mode.
Co-Optimus game reviews focus on the cooperative experience of a game, our final score graphic represents this experience along with an average score for the game overall. For an explanation of our scores please check our Review Score Explanation Guide.