Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2 - hands-on

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Space karate takes on a new dimension as we hurl giant fireballs with the Wii remote

Similarly intuitive motions will pull off other, even more devastating attacks, ranging from powered-up punch combos to giant, world-shattering fireballs. We were able to execute one of these, the Spirit Bomb, by raising the controller over our heads and slamming it downward. Not only did this devastate our opponent, but sometimes it reshaped the whole stage into a blasted, rocky wasteland.

For all the coolness, though, sometimes using the Wii controller is a drag. Aiming the remote's onscreen cursor to select characters or menu choices slowed things down considerably, and having to keep said cursor onscreen in order to do cool moves just makes for one more confusing thing to worry about.

Weird new controls aside, the Wii version of Tenkaichi 2 is largely identical to the PS2 version - just with noticeably better visuals. And like the PS2 version, this strives to be the definitive Dragon Ball experience.

As we've covered in ourearlier preview, the game features a total of 120 playable characters culled from all the various DBZ sagas and series - the most ever crammed into a fighting game, according to publisher Atari. From Goku to Garlic Jr. to the regrettable GT characters, they're all here, and they're all voiced by the anime's US cast.

Mikel Reparaz
Mikel Reparaz
After graduating from college in 2000 with a BA in journalism, I worked for five years as a copy editor, page designer and videogame-review columnist at a couple of mid-sized newspapers you've never heard of. My column eventually got me a freelancing gig with GMR magazine, which folded a few months later. I was hired on full-time by GamesRadar in late 2005, and have since been paid actual money to write silly articles about lovable blobs.