Dragonball Z Budokai 1

Dragon Ball Z Budokai 1 (also known as Dragon Ball Z 1) has been published in 2003.
It is a game for the Playstation 2 and Gamecube consoles which is in 3D but uses a 2D combat system.
Budokai 1 is famous for the quality of its Story Mode and for its background musics.

The Games modes in Budokai 1

Duel mode

This is a classic 1 Vs 1 mode with which you can select your fighter and have a 1 Vs 1 match against the console or another player.
Making both characters be controlled by the console is also possible.

The Scénario mode

The story mode in Budokai 1 starts with Raditz's arrival on Earth and ends after Teen Gohan's victory over Perfect Cell.
So excepted Great Saiyaman, the game doesn't have any Buu saga characters.
But the games includes a few alternate scenarios and the most famous one is the one where Cell absorbs Krillin and becomes Cellin.

The Tournament mode

In this game mode, the player selects a fighter and must win 3 or 5 matches against opponents until he reach the tournament's final. If he wins, he will get 10,000 zenies and if he finish second only 5,000.
All matches take place in the Budokai Tournament Ring.

The Training mode

This game mode familiarizes the player with Budokai 1's gameplay mechanisms.

Budokai 1 Characters

Dragonball Z Budokai 1 has 21 characters who are all from the Saiyans Attack saga as well as the Freeza and Cell Saga.

But in true, the game has 23 playable characters because if the player selects Gohan, then he will have the choice between Kid Gohan, Teen Gohan and Great Saiyaman (who is the only character from the Buu saga in the whole game).
And in the game, Gohan is the only character who can transform into a Super Saiyan 2.

Another particularity when it comes to the characters of Dragon Ball Z Budokai 1 is that it is the only game who has buff Perfect Cell.

The non-playable characters in Budokai 1 :

Some of theses non-playable characters are used as enemies in the Story Mode :

- Saibaimen.

- Cell Juniors.

And another one, Cellin (Cell-Krillin Absorbed) is even playable in a What-if mission during the story mode.

But thanks to cheat codes created by the community, all theses non-playable characters can be made playable in the dueling mode.

Also, that there are also a LOTS of fully rendered 3D unplayable characters who appear in the cutscenes (like Bulma, Master Roshi, Oolong, etc...).

Budokai 1 Arenas

There are 9 arenas availables in Budokai 1 but most of them have an alternate version.
A few of them can even be played during the evening.

- Cell Ring / Grass field near the East City.
- Namek Planet (2 differents areas).
- Valley (2 differents areas).
- Tournament Ring.
- Hills.
- Time Chamber.
- Rocky Mountains.
- Isles (grass ground and beach).
- Divine Palace / Plains below.
- Devasted Earth (When the Earth arenas have been destroyed by an ultimate attack).
- Planet Namek in fusion (Replace the Namek Planet area when it has been destroyed by an ultimate attack).

Budokai 1 Gameplay

In Budokai 1, the characters can't fly but during the fight they can be thrown in the air and continue to fight there.
There are also no fight underwater.
The characters always start the fight in their base form and go back to it when they have been knocked out.
There are no team battles : All fights are 1 Versus 1 matches.
When the two characters who fight each other send a charged melee attack at the same time, it becomes a clash and the character who wins it will give a big hit to his opponent.
The characters can throw small energy blasts but to perform bigger moves (like Kamehameha), they will have to do melee attacks first, like Square x4 and then E (= 4 punches followed by Kamehameha).
When it comes to the Capsules system, some of the capsules give bonus and transformations to the characters stats and other ones are enabled only when some conditions are met.
For example, the Senzu capsule will only activate when the character who has it in his inventory will have been knocked out.
When this happens, the character will eat the senzu, recovers his life and resume the battle.

Tips and Tricks for Dragon Ball Z Budokai 1 :

Codes for Budokai 1 :

For the players who have the Playstation 2 versions of the game, there exist numerous codes which can make the game even more entertaining:
- Invincibility,
- Infinite ki,
- Have 999999 zenies,
- Make all character have up to 7 lifebars (which will results in longer fights),
- Play with unplayable characters like Cell Juniors, Cellin, Saibaiman and the story mode costumes for normal characters in the duel mode.

How to play with the alternate versions of the arenas

The arenas "Cell Ring" and "Valley" have an alternate "Evening" version. To play in the evening version of theses 2 arenas, select them with "Square" instead of "Cross".

And for Destroyed Earth and Planet Namek in fusion, to see theses arenas you have to use an ultimate attack to destroy any Earth maps and Planet Namek.