A port of Dragon Ball
Dragon Power is an action-adventure game developed and published by Bandai for the Nintendo Entertainment System on March 3, 1988. It is a heavily localized version of the Japanese game Dragon Ball: Shenron no Nazo. Although some of the European releases retain the Dragon Ball assets (under the title Dragon Ball), the North American release removes most references to the franchise. The game follows the first two volumes of the Dragon Ball manga, as the young monkey-tailed boy Goku (along with his teenage friend, Bulma, known in the North American version as Nora), embark on a quest to find all seven Dragon Balls (Crystal Balls in the NA version), in which it is believed that collecting them grants the user any wish they desire. Along the way, they encounter various characters, including turtle hermit Master Roshi (Hermit in the NA version), shapeshifting anthropomorphic pig Oolong (Pudgy in the NA version) and desert bandit Yamcha (Lancer in the NA version). This port also has less stages than the original game.
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Playing Dragon Power has been pure misery. It's not fun in any way, shape, or form, which is absolutely tragic considering this is one of the first Dragon Ball games. None of the unmatched fun and excitement from the manga is translated here, especially if you're playing the western release.
As an adaptation, this is fine I guess? The first story arc is ran through mostly accurately, playing like an abridged version of the manga as it cuts out a lot of exposition. You also don't get Oozaru at the end, but I guess that's understandable when you want to make a game where you purely play as Goku.
Then, the game kind of goes all over the place in terms of adaptation. They try to do some sort of tournament to at least feel like the 21st Tenkaichi Budokai, but everything is all messed up. You at least fight against Krillin and Yamcha, characters who were present during the arc but ones Goku didn't actually fight against, but then you also have to fight against sergent metallic and Buyon from the Red Ribbon Army arc? It's weird. You don't even fight Roshi as Jackie Chun. I found it kind of disappointing.
Then after that, they kind of just do their own thing. It's understandable because, by the time of release, the Red Ribbon story arc hadn't been completed (Toriyama was in the middle of the Baba tournament, with Goku stepping up to fight the Mummy Man, so the arc was almost finished). Still wasn't any actual fun to play though.
Yeah, that actual gameplay is pretty frustrating and I couldn't find a single thing to enjoy about it. Your health is tied to a lowering power meter. It only goes up if you eat food which you really just find randomly. I can commend the developers for tying health to hunger like Dragon Ball did up until around the point where Senzu Beans were introduced, but it just plays as really frustrating. I never feel like I have enough health or enough time to actually accomplish anything, so by the time I'm near the end of a stage, I'm nearly out of life. I know that's mostly me being inexperienced, but the game is no fun to play without experience. Most challenging games on the NES like Castlevania are extremely fun to play even if you suck at them.
I guess it kinda just comes down to fighting not being any fun. I kind of end up just slamming myself at enemies and hoping a punch is registered rather than a hit on myself. I try to be more strategic during bosses but with the constantly depleting health to take note of, I end up not having time to take it slow. It kind of just feels like you have to know exactly what you're going to do at all times and it's not fun, especially when you're in the process of learning what it is that you want to do.
Please do not play this game. Please play Dragon Ball: Advanced Adventure instead.
2/10