When it comes to video games, the Dragon Ball Z franchise is mostly associated with the fighting game genre. The series’ very premise lends itself perfectly to the genre and has resulted in many beloved titles from the Dragon Ball Z: Budokai games to the more recent Dragon Ball FighterZ. The series has dabbled in many other genres too like RPGs and collectible card games, but the latest one to be announced will see the franchise’s take on the asymmetrical multiplayer genre.
Titled Dragon Ball: The Breakers, it was leaked beforehand on Twitter, but an official trailer was published online shortly after, featuring a mixture of gameplay and cinematics. To put it bluntly, the game is essentially a Dragon Ball version of the horror game Dead by Daylight. But instead of monsters and slashers, the survivor characters must escape from classic Dragon Ball Z villains.
The trailer only shows Cell, the main villain of Dragon Ball Z’s Cell Saga, as he hunts down survivors and absorbs them to transform into Perfect Cell. But publisher Bandai Namco has confirmed that players will also be able to take control of Frieza and Buu. As for the survivors, they mostly consist of wholly original characters, with the exception of Dragon Ball regulars Bulma (specifically a younger version of her from the original Dragon Ball) and Oolong, who retains his ability to transform and uses it to disguise himself as different objects.
Dragon Ball: The Breaker’s premise sees seven ordinary people finding themselves trapped in a Temporal Seam, where they are hunted by one of the Raiders (aka the villains). It’s up to the survivors to escape together or solo with the Super Time Machine using their own unique gimmicks and gadgets, while the Raider hunts them down through destroying the environment and using their abilities to transform and grow more powerful.
Bandai Namco says that players will be able to customize their characters with perks and skins, as well as choose their own progression path. While it’s still early days, fans can probably expect post-launch updates to add more playable villains. What’s more, anyone eager to try it out can not only look forward to it releasing next year, but a closed beta which Bandai Namco plans on sharing details on soon. The beta will only be available for PC, but the full game is releasing for multiple platforms.
Lastly, the game will link save data with Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2. Bandai Namco hasn’t explained what this will do exactly, but it will most likely unlock unique content.
Dragon Ball: The Breakers releases for Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One in 2022.
Source: Bandai Namco