Dragon Ball Sparking Zero's Story Mode Has a Strange Problem With How It Ends Vegeta and Piccolo's Arcs

I really like Sparking Zero and I'm having a good time with it so far. It really is the fourth Budokai Tenkaichi game people have wanted for decades, and I'm happy it was made. It has a dream roster, even if some characters are missing, like Super 17, whose code is in the game but who isn't playable or even unlockable. Crossplatform play would have been nice too. I have it on Steam and a lot of my friends have it on PS5, and I can't really play with them because of that.

Sparking Zero is a massively successful game that sold a bunch of units, and I hope what I'm addressing here gets fixed with a patch or possibly with a sequel. The price tag for the higher end editions was pretty high and I know a lot of people were hesitant to pick up the game because of it, but since the game was a success, inevitably there will be another one down the road. My personal biggest letdown with Sparking Zero is some of the weird decisions made with the story mode.

The Eight Campaigns and What If Branches Show Real Fan Knowledge

I do love the idea of eight different campaigns following different characters on both the good and the bad side, and I love the idea of what ifs. Going back to Dragon Ball Z Shin Budokai Another Road on PSP and Dragon Ball Z Supersonic Warriors 2 on the DS, both had phenomenal what if stories, and there are branches in Sparking Zero's story mode that I truly loved. You can tell whoever created some of these branching stories is a genuine fan of the series who paid close attention to what people wanted.

When it comes to the Goku, Gohan and Trunks campaigns, I really can't complain too much. Those mostly follow the Dragon Ball Z anime into the Dragon Ball Super anime, and some of the what ifs were pretty interesting. Gohan got the infamous Goku Black what if, where instead of Goku being possessed by Zamasu, it's Gohan. Outside of modding, Goku Black isn't playable right now, maybe they'll patch that in later, but even with things they could have done to make it more interesting, I thought it was executed well and was fun.

The Trunks campaign is the one where I know they were paying attention to the fandom, or had very similar ideas, because there's an alternate branch where the ending of the Future Trunks arc has Trunks slice Merged Zamasu in half, use the Mafuba to seal one half while the other is destroyed. That's what I thought the finish was going to be back when Dragon Ball Super was airing, and it would have been the best ending to that arc because it would have given everybody something to do and been way more satisfying than what they did with the Zeno button. There's also a whole what if where Trunks fights in the Tournament of Power and has to work with 17 and 18, which was so cool and such a great character moment if you know where all of this started for Trunks. It was probably the most enjoyable story mode of the bunch.

Goku's Campaign Skips the Broly Movie and the Universe 6 Tournament Is Missing Entirely

A lot of the other story modes were a huge letdown, and some of it is strange. Goku's story ends at Dragon Ball Super with his fight against Jiren when he unlocks Ultra Instinct, which is fine, but Gogeta Blue and Dragon Ball Super Broly are both in this game, so why didn't they just add the Dragon Ball Super Broly movie? Why didn't we see Goku, Vegeta, Gogeta and Frieza up against Broly, all playable? It wouldn't have even been that difficult to do.

The strangest thing missing is that there's no Universe 6 tournament at all. Hit is playable in the game, and Frost and Cabba are in there too, but there's no Magetta, no Bergamo, and no version of that tournament. It feels very incomplete given how many of the pieces are already sitting in the roster.

Vegeta's Story Ends at Dragon Ball Z and Skips Everything He Did in Super

The biggest disappointment to me was the Vegeta story mode, because it ends with Dragon Ball Z and doesn't continue into Dragon Ball Super. To be honest, I'm pretty furious about it, and also confused. Dragon Ball Super has been labeled by many, including myself, as the Goku and Vegeta show, since Goku and Vegeta are major players in every single arc, unlike Dragon Ball Z, which was mostly about Goku and Gohan.

We have Vegeta's moment in Resurrection F, his part in the Universe 6 arc, which could also have been interesting, and the battles between Goku, Vegeta and Goku Black, some of which did play out in the Goku and Goku Black story modes. But there's a missed opportunity to tell that story from Vegeta's perspective and show more of what he was thinking. The characters and stages are already in the game, so it wouldn't have been that hard.

When God Toppo was announced as being in this game, I really believed the Vegeta campaign would end with Vegeta versus Toppo, since that's roughly where Vegeta's story ended in the Dragon Ball Super anime. But no, it's not there. The arena is there, the characters are there, and Vegeta versus Toppo is still missing, along with other fights and moments that would have been nice. I wonder if the team didn't get to finish this on time, whether they were so focused on sharpening the gameplay and graphics that they didn't have time for it. It could be, I don't know, I didn't program the game, but it was so surprising to see missing, and there's no announcement from Bandai right now about doing this as a patch or DLC. Vegeta's story just ends at the Boo arc, which we know isn't the full picture given how many great moments he got in Super.

Piccolo Doesn't Get Past the Cell Saga, Not Even as a What If

Vegeta isn't the only character who got shortchanged. Piccolo doesn't even go past the Cell Saga, not even in what if form. I know Piccolo didn't do much in the Majin Boo arc, that's objectively true, but in Dragon Ball Super he was involved in the fight with Frieza's soldiers, fought in the Universe 6 tournament, and was in the Tournament of Power. They could have at least skipped ahead to that and worked in some Gohan material there too.

The one shining light is that Piccolo got more to play with when the Dragon Ball Super Super Hero DLC arrived for Sparking Zero in January 2025, bringing in Orange Piccolo, Beast Gohan, the Gamma fighters, and giant sized Piccolo from the movie who fought Cell Max.

The Missing 23rd Tournament and OG Dragon Ball's Absence

A lot of people who play Sparking Zero are casual fans who have only seen Dragon Ball Z dubbed and don't have a full understanding of the story, and I get that. But one of the other big missing points, given that all the characters and maps already exist, is Goku versus Piccolo at the 23rd Tournament. They could have started campaigns there instead of Raditz, since even Dragon Ball Z Kakarot treated the 23rd Tournament as important enough to include as DLC. Some Goku and Tien material would have been fun too, since they had great battles in the original Dragon Ball.

The 23rd Tournament is my favorite story arc in the entire franchise and Goku versus Piccolo from it is my favorite fight in Dragon Ball, but beyond my own taste, it's undeniably part of the story. I always appreciated that the older Tenkaichi games included characters like King Piccolo and Nam, giving love to original Dragon Ball. It seems like with this release that part of the story got shut away in favor of just Z and Super. If they didn't want to include everything from that era, I understand, but at least having that tournament would set up things for the future and could have made another what if branch for Goku or Piccolo.

My Overall Verdict

There's a lot of fun to be had from Sparking Zero and I don't hate the game. I'm not an online competitive tournament player, I never have been, that's not really my thing, I'm much more of a 2D fighting game guy when it comes to being competitive. The options in the game, especially the story mode, are what I was really digging, and while I like a lot of the strides they made, it still feels very incomplete.

Do you agree?