Did Gohan say SS4 Gogeta beats Ultra Instinct? FighterZ's line

Gohan never said Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta was stronger than Super Saiyan Blue or Ultra Instinct in Dragon Ball FighterZ. A Japanese screenshot of his line shows that the English version of the game, the 2018 fighting game developed by Arc System Works, mistranslated what he said, and that mistranslation has left many fans believing something the original text never claimed.

This builds on an argument I made previously about that same line. In the English version, Gohan describes Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta as a power and transformation never felt before, one that surpasses Super Saiyan Blue and Ultra Instinct. My point then was that you should never take game statements as part of the main anime or manga continuity. Now there is a second reason to set that line aside: it was never what Gohan said in the first place.

Why Dragon Ball games are not part of the anime or manga continuity

Games have nothing to do with the anime or manga, and it does not matter if Akira Toriyama works on them. I've been saying this for years. That includes Dragon Ball Fusions, Dragon Ball Xenoverse, Dragon Ball Heroes, Dragon Ball FighterZ and Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot.

Toriyama works on games because he is the grand creator, so the developers have to go to him to consult with him and ask him questions. But just because he tests something or draws something does not necessarily mean it is part of the main continuity. Japan doesn't care about that kind of thing. It's a game.

What Gohan says about Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta in the Japanese version of FighterZ

DBS Chronicles has now shared a Japanese screenshot of Gohan's line, and I also want to credit the original translator who found it. The line goes all the way back to when FighterZ first came out.

FighterZ has always had a historically terrible translation. The English version is full of cringeworthy, Facebook level memes, like Yamcha jokes, that were not in the Japanese version of the game. Whoever at Bandai translates this material is trying to be cute and funny, and it winds up confusing people or coming off as cringeworthy.

In Japanese, Gohan says: "That form of my dad and Vegeta is so different from Super Saiyan Blue and Ultra Instinct. I can't believe such a transformation exists." That's it. He never said Super Saiyan 4 was more powerful than Blue and Ultra Instinct. He says it's a different transformation, which it is.

The FighterZ translation error may have been an honest mistake

If you want to argue that Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta is stronger than Ultra Instinct, that's fine. That debate will probably go on forever. My concern is getting to the bottom of the bad translation in the game, and the reality is that Gohan never said it. The original line was a mistranslation, with the people handling the translation getting it wrong.

I'm not going to say it was done on purpose. It could have been an honest mistake. But it confuses people, because many Dragon Ball fans playing this game now believe Super Saiyan 4 is more powerful than Super Saiyan Blue or Ultra Instinct with nothing other than this line to back it up. If you're going to debate somebody on that, don't use a game.

Dragon Ball games are their own stories, like Miles Morales or Assassin's Creed

Even if Toriyama works on the games, that does not make them part of the main story, the manga or the anime. They're a separate thing, no different from the Miles Morales game, which has nothing to do with the Spider-Man movies. It's its own little story, like the Assassin's Creed games or whatever you're playing, with its own universe.

FighterZ, Fusions and Heroes are all separate from the anime and manga. They take material from them, like characters and storylines, but they always add things, such as Android 21, the Dragon Ball Heroes fusions and Super Saiyan 4.

The Goku and Beerus line that fans misread

So many Dragon Ball fans are caught up in canon, and I've been in this community for 25 years. It doesn't matter. The Japanese do not care about canon, so you shouldn't either, and you should never think a game statement has any validity in proving a point about the anime or manga.

There's a precedent. In a game, Goku told Beerus that the gap between them was starting to shorten, and people took that as Goku being stronger than Beerus. He wasn't; Beerus is stronger than Goku. That line was never said in the series. It was a game. Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball Super, the stories Toriyama wrote, are separate from the games, and even when he works on a game, it's a separate project.