Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot

 PlayStation 4
User Score
8.1

Generally favorable reviews- based on 939 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 708 out of 939
  2. Mixed: 132 out of 939
  3. Negative: 99 out of 939
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  1. illuvatar_1st
    Jun 25, 2020
    7
    if for some reason someone didn't watch dragon ball Z this is a great way to experience it. You re playing the main story and seeing the events that occur while you control the characters.
    the music is nothing more of a nostalgic tone . I believe its the first RPG dragon ball since the original Game boy Legacy of Goku games. The worlds look massive and huge , and your interaction with it    if for some reason someone didn't watch dragon ball Z this is a great way to experience it. You re playing the main story and seeing the events that occur while you control the characters.
    the music is nothing more of a nostalgic tone . I believe its the first RPG dragon ball since the original Game boy Legacy of Goku games. The worlds look massive and huge , and your interaction with it its amazing, from breaking the ground/mountains to rage the waters.
    battles are fast pacing and extremely good, the cutscenes gorgeous.
    Also worth mentioning that the way they combined the 2 Xenoverses into this with the secret boss is amazing

    HOWEVER
    this game cut some important scenes such as the final flash,rage form trunks and others.
    The game does not have the replay ability value (for me), some rpg elements such as food and Z board shouldn't even be there since they re useless :')    … Expand
  2. Fl4kattack
    Jun 24, 2020
    8
    Great game kept me going for weeks the dlc is pretty decent too just can wait for the rest to appear
  3. dash383535
    Jun 23, 2020
    6
    #DashReviews

    Completed Game: 1/31/2020 Played Game Time: 55 Hours Intro The long-running Dragon Ball franchise has delved into its first attempt into an Open World Action RPG which is a route many longtime fans have wanted for decades. Dragon Ball Z story has many retellings and this game follows in the same footsteps. While many anime games have a stigma of not being that great,    #DashReviews

    Completed Game: 1/31/2020
    Played Game Time: 55 Hours

    Intro

    The long-running Dragon Ball franchise has delved into its first attempt into an Open World Action RPG which is a route many longtime fans have wanted for decades. Dragon Ball Z story has many retellings and this game follows in the same footsteps. While many anime games have a stigma of not being that great, can this game break the mold like Dragon Ball FighterZ?

    Story/World Building – 2/3

    I have never seen the Dragon Ball Z anime but this game does a good job retelling the story in a way that someone like me could still follow and enjoy. If you have never seen the anime, most would tell you to watch that instead but this is not a bad substitute if you don’t have the time. If you have seen the anime, you’re missing nothing in the story department. While it is told competently, there is a varying level of quality between cutscenes. Due to the overwhelming amount of DBZ games retelling the anime story, this might burn out fans wanting to pick this title up.

    Gameplay – 2/4

    Exploring the vast landscapes or fighting one of the many iconic villains from DBZ can be a lot of fun but there is a lot of fault with it. Fighting mechanics consist of an easy one to two-button press combo that looks flashy but can become repetitive especially when grinding for EXP if you want to max out all 7 playable characters. Most fights will not be difficult because characters automatically level up with the story making side quest pointless. Side quests are boring fetch quests with uninteresting stories and no voice acting. Other side activities like fishing and crafting are almost an afterthought and have little bearing on anything else in the game. There is fun to be had in the 40 to 50 hours you will spend in the game, but mix in the negative of the gameplay and a story you most likely have played though before, the game offers very little for a 2020 release.

    Technical/Performance – 2/3

    LOAD SCREENS! Load screens are a major issue in this game to the point that you will spend 1/3 of the game in just load screens. Graphics look nice some times and look a little dated in others. It’s pretty disappointing to see almost flawless looking cutscenes, and then static characters with little to no life right after. The soundtrack is pretty generic with most songs lifted straight from the anime but it gets the job done. It’s not the worst technical performance I have seen from a game but improving load times would help.

    Verdict

    Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot is a game I want to like due to how much I got into the story and this game being my gateway into watching the Dragon Ball Super anime but there are quite a few flaws that show up in this RPG despite its potential. If you want to experience an Action RPG in the DBZ universe, this is still the best one (only because it's the only one) but I would wait for a price drop and for the game to be released with all DLC before making a purchase.    … Expand
  4. ZzjimbozZ
    Jun 23, 2020
    7
    Story 8/10
    Gameplay 8/10
    Graphics 6/10

    I Enjoyed the game overall but the combat is very repetitive and the graphics is just above average
  5. Inuyasha17
    Jun 22, 2020
    10
    The Dragon Ball RPG game is so much fun!
    Moreover, the story was even better because the original cartoon was the same.
  6. RIEZE
    Jun 22, 2020
    8
    Simple and quick review, If you love dragon ball, this is for you. If not and have played dragon ball games before, you may not like this one.
  7. EdgarMttz
    Jun 22, 2020
    8
    Los fanáticos que disfrutan de Dragon Ball y / o disfrutan de un buen juego de rol disfrutarán de este. Hay algunos defectos, pero el juego es excelente en general. Si te gusta destruir el medio ambiente, tener increíbles batallas contra jefes o incluso cultivar para convertirte en un dios, ¡este juego es para ti! ¡No puedo esperar a que se active el parche de la máquina del tiempo de esteLos fanáticos que disfrutan de Dragon Ball y / o disfrutan de un buen juego de rol disfrutarán de este. Hay algunos defectos, pero el juego es excelente en general. Si te gusta destruir el medio ambiente, tener increíbles batallas contra jefes o incluso cultivar para convertirte en un dios, ¡este juego es para ti! ¡No puedo esperar a que se active el parche de la máquina del tiempo de este juego!… Expand
  8. Anturs
    Jun 22, 2020
    10
    The DB games franchise needed something brand new, innovative. So, that's what Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot did. It ain't the best RPG, or the best Sandbox, but the game fulfilled its objectives. I think that Budokai Tenkaichi 3 and DBZ: Kakarot are the 2 best DB games ever made.
  9. bersi84
    May 30, 2020
    8
    DBZ Kakarot is a worthy installment for all fans of the franchise. To me this game is a 8.5. As usual I go with my gut feeling whether to go up and down. This time I would say it is a worthy 9 for fans and a decent 8 for casual visitors to the series. I ve been playing DBZ Kakarot on my PS4 Pro with SSD and will give you some heads-up with my personal game experience.

    First of all I    DBZ Kakarot is a worthy installment for all fans of the franchise. To me this game is a 8.5. As usual I go with my gut feeling whether to go up and down. This time I would say it is a worthy 9 for fans and a decent 8 for casual visitors to the series. I ve been playing DBZ Kakarot on my PS4 Pro with SSD and will give you some heads-up with my personal game experience.

    First of all I have to admit that the DragonBall franchise has been a large part of my childhood, still I did not play any of the predecessors because I m not that much of a button-masher-fighting-game-dude. This time I tried my luck because the emphasize seemed to be more on the world and a bit less on the combat.

    The presentation of the game is very good. The visual experience, the effects, the sound and also the voice acting is really really good. You can choose between english and japanese audio which is a worthy addition for fans and might be a let down for people not able to speak or understand english at least. The loading times from saves, starting the game or warping around the semi open world was surprisingly good. It took mere seconds before the loading was done. During my game experience I did not encounter larger frame drops although there seemed to be very minor texture popups during cut-scenes, which is a bit surprising considering I used a pretty decent SSD. I still want to add that this happened scarcely and did not interfere largely with the game experience. The only bug I encountered was that sometimes I was not able to talk to people if fights happened next to them. So I had to save and reload in place to fix it. Nothing too bad overall.

    Gameplay toggles between traversing the semi open world, doing story tasks and sidequests, grabbing orbs to level up or gather new skills during training ground missions. The game loop feels a little bit dull and misses a great opportunity to give this game a real open world touch although it is not a complete let down. For me being not a fighting expert the mechanics are okay. You control your character with a handful of skill buttons and can toggle to party members skills with shoulder buttons. Mix up skills are also available making the fighting experience interesting. You dont have to mash combos as you would in full blown fighting games. More or less you mash between dashes, strikes and punches, build up your ki and fire designated skills at the enemy. Whether that is enough for you might be very subjective. It feels mashing heavy at times but for me still sufficiently complex. Some boss fights might be a little bit too hard for casual players. To me it felt largely okay.

    Fights go in different alterations such as 1v1, 1v2, 1vX or XvY, so there is also some variety here and in free roam mode you can also customize your party you want to go out with. The game feels a little drawn out at times quite as you would expect it knowing the old series. Still I have to say it was a worthy experience because you can enjoy the stages of DBZ in a more direct and somewhat condensed feeling without loosing too much of its original depth. Everything you loved (and probably hated) is in here for you to re-discover.

    One of the biggest let downs for me (as it was back then) is that the game is pretty cut in terms of gore and violence. They tried to manage it well with setting decent scene cuts but for hardcore fans this might be a re-ocurring nightmare of old times where you had to go with imported versions to see the actual movie experience. I wished they had an option for this or an uncut version to buy because it made me really sad to live through the disappointment again. Decide for yourself whether this is a no-go or not but it is to me also a deciding factor to why I choose the 8 on my side.

    I would recommend this game for franchise fans and people who enjoy semi casual fighting combined with semi open world story elements. Maybe grab it at some discount but I feel that it is a game that has a decent production value. It would ve been kinda cool if they took an even more RPG-ish approach to leveling or evolving your character because it feels overly simplistic at times. Knowing the franchise the next appearance might be already in the works and who knows what will come next.    … Expand
  10. BlackLotus
    May 28, 2020
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. So many great ideas for this game, poor execution. One of the more aspects for me was cooking setup. Only make one item at a time, takes way too long. The constantly switching between characters was also annoying. Artificially extending boss fights by adding lame mechanics that make them invulnerable almost. The power curve for levels and exp is way out of portions as well. The biggest annoyance was how bad the voice acting and lip sync was.… Expand
  11. VendonJura
    May 8, 2020
    10
    This is by far the best Dragon Ball game in many many years. I was so hoping to see an RPG game that is kinda like the anime and not like 99% of the Dragon Ball games we had to play all these years which was just normal Beat em up games like Street Fighter skinned as a DB game and had 0 to do with Dragon Ball the Anime itself. Goku hitting Hercule with a 10x Ka Me Ha Me Ha and he gets justThis is by far the best Dragon Ball game in many many years. I was so hoping to see an RPG game that is kinda like the anime and not like 99% of the Dragon Ball games we had to play all these years which was just normal Beat em up games like Street Fighter skinned as a DB game and had 0 to do with Dragon Ball the Anime itself. Goku hitting Hercule with a 10x Ka Me Ha Me Ha and he gets just some scraches?

    I was hating all these Dragon Ball games we've been feeding all these years and FINALLY a Dragon Ball RPG game with quests, allot of exploration stuff to do, several character to lvl up, some mini games and much more. A Dragon Ball game where you FINALLY could train that strong that you could one shot most enemy who are much weaker than you just like in the Anime itself so the point of training makes finally a sense.

    A Tip for beginner. When you are 5 lvl above the enemy on the map, you can finish the fight without even starting it by Super Speed flying into them. This method saves you allllllllot of time lvling up your character from the beginning of the game. If you love Dragon Ball then this is in fact a MUST HAVE.    … Expand
  12. TrasteroDPablo
    May 6, 2020
    9
    8.7 Sin duda alguna el videojuego que recrea mejor la historia del Dragon Ball. Me flipó las mecánicas de combate, los gráficos son tan buenos que llega un punto que casi te confundes con el anime. El principio del juego espectacular, a partir de la saga de androides empieza a decaer el juego.
  13. lelouch6
    May 5, 2020
    10
    dragon ball z kakarot é sem dúvidas o melhor jogo de todos. mas da próxima vez equipe poderia fazer um remake do dragon ball budokai tenkaichi 3 , disponibilizando algumas melhorias e gráficos, pois foi muito popular no ocidente até hoje
  14. Limari
    May 1, 2020
    8
    Buen juego , algo repetitivo , pero tiene la mía de dragón ball, se nota qué hay un trabajo por detrás. El precio que le doy es de 30 dolares
  15. Syfin
    May 1, 2020
    0
    Боевая система в этой игре перекрывает все её плюсы до 0 из 10. Это просто ужас какой-то. Ни в одной игре хуже боевки не встречал. И эта игра имеет оценки намного выше one piece world seeker? Не смешите меня. Да на фоне её ван пис вообще шедевр. В этом dragon ball ничего хорошегокроме сюжета сезона Z больше ничего нетБоевая система в этой игре перекрывает все её плюсы до 0 из 10. Это просто ужас какой-то. Ни в одной игре хуже боевки не встречал. И эта игра имеет оценки намного выше one piece world seeker? Не смешите меня. Да на фоне её ван пис вообще шедевр. В этом dragon ball ничего хорошегокроме сюжета сезона Z больше ничего нет
  16. bawer2019
    Apr 29, 2020
    8
    Viciante, divertido, tão com ótimas animações, já até adquiri o DLC tanto que gostei.
  17. ChrisKirigaya
    Apr 29, 2020
    10
    Best db game ever. The first dlc is pretty dope too. If you like Dragon Ball, don't even bother reading reviews, just buy the game and enjoy the hell out of it
  18. Swagkiller
    Apr 26, 2020
    10
    A good game
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  19. Junierto
    Apr 23, 2020
    8
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Good DBZ game, very inmersive in this world. Side quests are a bit repetitive.… Expand
  20. Johnso
    Apr 12, 2020
    10
    I love the game. Great art style. I wish there was coop on single player. I also with there was multiplayer. Also wish there was vs against your friends. But other than running around in open world is fun. Great game rat 10/10
  21. draxter
    Apr 6, 2020
    8
    realmente nostálgico, increíble la calidad del juego gracias a la colaboración de cyberconcect2 se nota la calidad de el, la razon por la cual no se le puede dar una mayor calificación, es debido a errores garrafales en lo que son la continuidad de la animaciones a ratos se queda pegado siendo que se jugo en una xbox one ,la nostalgia que produce el juego es realmente hermoso por esarealmente nostálgico, increíble la calidad del juego gracias a la colaboración de cyberconcect2 se nota la calidad de el, la razon por la cual no se le puede dar una mayor calificación, es debido a errores garrafales en lo que son la continuidad de la animaciones a ratos se queda pegado siendo que se jugo en una xbox one ,la nostalgia que produce el juego es realmente hermoso por esa razón un aplauso para los creadores.… Expand
  22. zorkeon
    Apr 5, 2020
    0
    Db cacarot is a game of cheat, it's a fake rpg
    The game graphismes are so disgusting
  23. sphirit
    Apr 5, 2020
    7
    Juego solo recomendado para fans de Dragon Ball. Yo lo he disfrutado durante bastante horas pero tiene muchas carencias, faltan momentos epicos del anime, a veces la historia esta muy resumida, faltan musicas, los combates son todos iguales, el mundo abierto es soso....
  24. 123sebastian
    Apr 4, 2020
    8
    este juego es una completa maravilla me encanta volver a revivir mi infancia y poder disfrutarla al máximo es de los mejores juegos de dragón ball que he visto
  25. Pandaprio
    Apr 1, 2020
    10
    Vraiment c'est le meilleur jeu Dragon Ball Z que j'ai joué de toute ma vie je le donne 10 pcq jai passé 30h de bonheur absolu
  26. betakritic
    Apr 1, 2020
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. It's under 9,000

    Enjoyed the game overall, but there are problems. Graphics are mostly good and there's a huge amount of detail and lore in the game's Z Encyclopedia, plus plenty of post-story content and a huge world to explore. Unfortunately, it's plagued by stability issues ranging from frame rate drops to crashes and failing to recover when returning to the game from the PS4 dashboard. Gameplay is what we've come to expect from over-the-shoulder DBZ titles. Ultimately it becomes button mashing and nothing but beam attacks because the controls are unresponsive and the camera is broken. You can't record certain gameplay segments and you're forced you to agree to an in-game EULA before you can play at all. I'm done w/ Bandai Namco.

    Audio

    1. No VO in side-quests besides repetitive, awkward grunts or random mono-syllabic phrases to represent entire paragraphs of subtitles. The final VO for many conversations is "hi." Disgustingly obvious shortcut.

    2. Idle VO is repetitive and often nonsensical; within seconds of eating, characters complain of hunger. Every time a mob gets close, the same character VO plays. It's annoying.

    3. Bad dialogue pacing and usually too much pause after each line (see item 7 in gameplay).

    4. Mostly original voice cast.

    5. Frequent sound dropout, most noticeable with team finishing moves and transformations.

    Gameplay

    1. Some NPC interactions seem like they're going to be sidequests but aren't, which is confusing.

    2. Battle camera is completely broken--no better than it was in the Tenkaichi series. Doesn't help that you get pinned against scenery and the player character disappears completely when multiple opponents are shooting particle fx.

    3. Driving is awful. No matter how much you upgrade your car, the driving never improves because the camera doesn't turn with the car therefor you can't see where you're going. You have to move the camera manually as you turn so that you're not looking at the side of the car.

    4. Feels like every enemy attack stuns you, and you get attacked through your own beams. When attacking a stunned enemy at close range, no matter what you do, you will get knocked back as soon as their stun period ends.

    5. Mini map is useless. It's too small and everything on it looks the same. Can't even tell which direction you're facing. When certain items are added to the larger map screen, it might be impossible to find them because they overlap other map icons.

    6. Lazy development lead to in-game healing items. There's no limit to how many you can buy or how many you can use in a fight. It's as if the devs played the game, realized it was broken, and threw healing items in at the last second as a "fix."

    7. Just like in Dragon Ball Fighterz, you're forced you to press X after every line of subtitled dialogue which breaks the pacing of the exposition. Turning off subtitles only affects a handful of cut scenes, it doesn't actually do what you'd expect.

    8. Unavoidable mobs which spawn infinitely and yield little XP. Just annoying, avoid them.

    9. Leveling is mostly scripted so that each character is at a minimum level at each point in the story. Not much customization.

    10. At certain points through the story you're boxed into an area w/ invisible walls, but there's no indication that this is the case until you automatically turn around when you hit one. Worst on Namek.

    11. First person ki-firing mechanic is terrible and unless you aim above your target you end up blasting the ground.

    12. Often difficult to find things and you might fly in circles for 20+ minutes searching for items or people.

    13. Baseball game needs a restart option to avoid completely unnecessary fumbling through menus and NPC conversations.

    14. When a sidequest requires a specific character, it's not enough that he be in your party, he has to be the player character. Rather than auto-switch for you when attempting to start the quest, you have to manually reconfigure your party. This happens a lot.

    Visuals

    1. Game looks nice overall. Some cut scenes are gorgeous while others are little more than talking heads with exaggerated breathing animations. Because of the aforementioned dialogue/pressing X issue, a lot of the animation comes across as unnatural (or even creepy) while characters hold a pose and an expression waiting for your controller input. Most noticeable w/ Mr. Satan's laugh...

    2. Load screens begin and end with a full white screen, be prepared to shield your eyes frequently. 3. English lip sync virtually nonexistent    … Expand
  27. Kaydenbooup2u
    Mar 25, 2020
    5
    DBZ: Kakarot.. should be DBZ Gohan. I basically played the whole game from Gohans POV not Goku's. Felt like I rebought the dbz DVD series and got to button mash. Include the extra movies at least or make the fighting more than smash smash smash Super end.
  28. Kriser333
    Mar 25, 2020
    10
    Perfect game for DBZ fans..you can re-live the best moments of your childhood.Lengthy enough to get lost in a good way.
  29. JulianPope
    Mar 21, 2020
    10
    Must have for OG DBZ fans. Especially now that the time machine feature has been added!
  30. Deependra
    Mar 17, 2020
    9
    Finally, completed all saga of Dragonball z kakarot, and got to admit that the story mode of this game is best ever you can experience in entire Dragonball based video game.
    This game is must to play for Dragonball fanboys/girls.
    Couple of negative points that I have noticed which you may or may not agree with. 1) stupid/less combat system. 2) easy gameplay ( even kids can complete it    Finally, completed all saga of Dragonball z kakarot, and got to admit that the story mode of this game is best ever you can experience in entire Dragonball based video game.
    This game is must to play for Dragonball fanboys/girls.
    Couple of negative points that I have noticed which you may or may not agree with.
    1) stupid/less combat system.
    2) easy gameplay ( even kids can complete it )
    3) irritating interference of bots/enemies while exploring the world.

    As a fanboy, who has been following Dragonball series since childhood, I will rate it as 9/10

    Otherwise, it is somewhere around 7-8/10.

    Who should get it?

    If you are new to Dragonball ball series or never ever watched Dragonball anime, then get it blindly, since story has been highlighted very well.

    Who can skip it?

    Well, fanboys like me will definitely buy it without giving a second thought. But still, if you have played all the Dragonball based games in past, and watched each and every saga of Dragonball, and want to save your money , I will suggest you to wait until price drop. :)

    Anyhow, I loved this game to core.     … Expand
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Awards & Rankings

20
#20 Most Discussed PS4 Game of 2020

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
73

Mixed or average reviews - based on 75 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 40 out of 75
  2. Mixed: 34 out of 75
  3. Negative: 1 out of 75
  1. RPGamer
    Apr 30, 2020
    60
    Despite the numerous flaws, Kararot still offers a wonderful retelling of the main story, above-average graphics, and a great soundtrack, so it’s worth picking up for established and new fans of the series alike.
    Read full review
  2. GameSkinny
    Apr 10, 2020
    70
    Even though DBZ: Kakarot retells the same story the franchise has been telling for decades, it manages to do so in creative new ways for hardcore anime fans.
    Read full review
  3. PLAY! Zine
    Mar 16, 2020
    90
    A very few games can compare to Kakarot in terms of sheer love towards the original series and storytelling qualities. Not without its set of flaws that leave only regret not being even greater, Kakarot still manages to be a great game for fans. No, scratch that. It manages to be an amazing game! May they not stop here, and deliver more and more of love-letters like this. If it goes in the right direction, the next one could definitely be legendary.
    Read full review
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