DS Fanboy hands-on: Dragon Ball Origins

by David Craddock { Sep 19th 2008 at 4:00PM }

The Namco Bandai Games-developed Dragon Ball: Origins for the Nintendo DS attempts to shed light on the origin of Goku, Dragon Ball's prolific spikey-haired protagonist. Controlling Goku is simple: tap the screen with the stylus, and Goku will set out in that direction at a walk or a run depending on the distance between him and your chosen spot. Tapping and holding the stylus will cause Goku to keep moving as you drag your pointer across the screen.

Gallery: Dragon Ball Origins

Attacking enemies is accomplished by tapping them. Goku's default attack is a wallop of a punch, but a selection square on the Touch Screen can be tapped to arm Goku with different weapons. Our preferred instrument of destruction is a staff is swung via drawing semi-circles on the Touch Screen. Drawing farther away from Goku causes the stick to extend to the point you tapped on the screen, allowing you to clobber enemies from afar.

Dragon Ball: Origins is meant as a simplistic action-adventure romp that Dragon Ball fans can pick up and play for a few minutes or even a few hours. Look for it to arrive in stores this November.

Tags: atari, dragon-ball-origins, joystiqfeatures, namco-bandai-games

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Lord Humongous @ Sep 19th 2008 4:46PM

ME WANT.

Mr Khan @ Sep 19th 2008 5:30PM

OK. OK. LET'S GO ON A TRIP.

Josh @ Sep 19th 2008 9:57PM

Nice.

I sold that game. =/

Josph @ Sep 19th 2008 5:42PM

Very Phantom Hourglass-ey. Me like.

Jak Logan @ Sep 19th 2008 7:07PM

So it's for sure gonna come to the US? All right! Is there any voice acting? I just want to hear Roshi say "kamehameha!"

Eddie @ Sep 19th 2008 7:07PM

The best of the DB world, before DBZ and DBGT.

I WANT IT!!

Puddles @ Sep 19th 2008 7:16PM

It's not yet clear how far into the original comic this game will go, but it appears to be the first 3-4 volumes. It also appears that they've added some bits, which makes sense because there's actually not much fighting in the early part of the story.

Zealot @ Sep 19th 2008 8:16PM

I read from people examining the trailers on another site that it appears to extend either through the end of the Pilaf saga or the World Martial Arts Tournament saga. That's not a lot as far as the entirety of Dragonball goes, but I still have faith that they can cram a satisfactory amount of content in.

Dustin @ Sep 19th 2008 10:22PM

"POWER POLE EXTEND!!!!"

scissors125 @ Sep 20th 2008 1:50PM

Can't wait for it.

I hope that it'll get the lost potential that I thought that Phantom Hourglass was missing and use it.

Ken Seang @ Sep 20th 2008 8:46PM

I am currently playing this game right now and it is awesome. Some of the best graphics I have seen on the DS. The gameplay is very much like Zelda PH, the only thing is that its in Japanese and I can't understand it but it doesnt stop me from playing it.