Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero lets you witness Goku's death in first-person: "That's a special experience"

(Image credit: Bandai Namco)

As with many games based on the series, Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero will let you live out iconic moments from across the franchise, but there's an extra twist this time around. You'll be able to see some of these moments in first-person, including Goku's death at the hands of the Special Beam Cannon.

Yes, when you play through battle mode - the story-driven single-player content where you select one of eight characters and play through their biggest fights - you'll be able to see some cutscenes in first-person. That includes Goku's early battle against Raditz, where he holds the invading Saiyan in place while they both get perforated through the chest by Piccolo's Special Beam Cannon.

"During some cutscenes you will be able to switch to the first-person camera," producer Jun Furutani told me via translator at Summer Game Fest. "We really want people to immerse themselves into the character that they're playing and look at their friends in a different way. Look at the scene in different ways. For example, maybe you've seen when you're getting hit by the Special Beam Cannon from Piccolo to Raditz but that goes through you, in your chest. That's a special experience that you can have in the game thanks to this feature."

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"Special experience" is an, uh, interesting way to describe seeing a beloved character's death - temporary though it might have been - in first-person, but it's perfectly in keeping with the goofball fanservice that Sparking Zero is set to provide in spades. The devs aren't trying to chase the esports scene, and like the Budokai Tenkaichi games that preceded it, this is a game dedicated to being a love letter to perhaps the most iconic manga and anime franchise of all time.

I played a giant ape and tore down a city in Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero and I haven't had this much dumb fun in a fighting game since the 2000s.

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Dustin Bailey joined the GamesRadar team as a Staff Writer in May 2022, and is currently based in Missouri. He's been covering games (with occasional dalliances in the worlds of anime and pro wrestling) since 2015, first as a freelancer, then as a news writer at PCGamesN for nearly five years. His love for games was sparked somewhere between Metal Gear Solid 2 and Knights of the Old Republic, and these days you can usually find him splitting his entertainment time between retro gaming, the latest big action-adventure title, or a long haul in American Truck Simulator.