Dragon Ball Z Budokai Tenkaichi 3 is the latest iteration of the video game extension of the Dragonball Z cartoon television series. With scores of characters from the series, including their background information, and an imbedded storyline, the game is a faithful extension of the cartoon world. While the American version of the show is aimed at kids, and this title is primarily kid-friendly (the language isn’t bad, there’s no blood, and no one dies), the fighting model is definitely not child’s play.

The premise is all about fighting, held loosely together by a generic but well-developed save the planet from invading alien race storyline. The fighting action is very fast-paced, with heroes and villains alike having basic melee attacks, ki attacks (energy or “magic” attacks), and special attacks. Defensive moves and counterattacks are also available. Fighter movement plays a big role in the battles, as combatants can rush, fly, teleport, and descend across the breadth of the varied and at least partially destructible environments.

The extreme pace of the action and movement makes executing attacks and defensive moves with purpose difficult in real time. The result is that the fights can devolve into a button-mashing fest, at least until you learn to time some of the counters and attacks as reactions to your opponent’s moves. It’s a shame, because there is great depth to the fighting model, and some variety to the moves available between characters. The game should be more accessible on the easier levels, because you will experience some frustration until you get comfortable with the controls and the speed of the fights. Ironically, younger, inexperienced gamers will struggle just to get their first win, even though to some degree younger gamers are a big part of the intended audience of the game. Eventually, you’ll have to learn the moves, because button-mashing will only get you so far, especially on the harder difficulty levels.

There are tutorials available to teach you all of the moves, but most of them are delivered like a PowerPoint presentation, with little opportunity to practice. You can fight training fights, but it’s nothing more than a battle against an opponent who doesn’t fight back. A series of training fights or sparring sessions that focus on just a few aspects of the fighting, at a slower pace, with feedback and real time instruction, would be most helpful. As it stands, unless you’re experienced with the previous versions of this game, you’ll have to invest some time getting beat down until you master some basic offensive and defensive moves.

Fortunately, for a game that moves at such a quick pace, the controls are responsive and for the variety of moves available they’re fairly simplistic, making quick recall in the heat of the battle instinctive. At first, you’ll find yourself relying on a few basic offensive and defensive moves just to survive. To resist falling into the trap of repeating the same moves, or button-mashing, you need focus on learning a couple of moves at a time and slowly growing your repertoire to be successful.

Several game modes are available, from a straight head-to-head battle, to a tournament mode, to modes based up on the story, including a scenario mode allowing you to fight some of the main battles from the cartoon series. The story and history of Dragon Ball Z is really fleshed out amongst these modes. One frustrating factor is that you can be called out of the ring in the tournament mode, yet the ring really isn’t clearly defined. It’s too easy to accidentally leave the arena, especially since you are fighting in the air and on the ground, making it easier to lose your point of reference. Your successes in all modes will earn you “Z” points that allow you to customize your character by purchasing improvements to your character’s main skills. You can then use your customized character in the fights.

Online play isn’t available, and only a maximum of two players can play at one time in the Duel mode. Also of note, owners of a previous version of the game are rewarded with exclusive game adventures in the Disc Fusion mode.