Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2

Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2
Also known as: Dragon Ball Z 2 (JP), Dragon Ball Z 2V (JP) Developer: Dimps Publishers: Atari, SA (US/AU), Bandai (JP/EU) Platform: PlayStation 2 Released in JP: February 5, 2004, September 16, 2004 (PlayStation 2 the Best), 2004 (2V) Released in US: December 4, 2003, 2004 (Greatest Hits) Released in EU: November 11, 2003, August 27, 2004 (Platinum) Released in AU: November 23, 2003 This game has unused graphics. This game has debugging material. This game has regional differences. This game has revisional differences. This game has unusual dummy files.

Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2 is the 2nd game in the Budokai series and the only one in the series with what-if fusion characters Tiencha and Gokule being playable along with unique Super Buu absorption forms (Vegeta, Frieza, Cell, and Tien and Yamcha simultanaeously.)

Debug Camera Display

Applying the below code will enable camera information before fighting an enemy on the world map.

USA SLUS-20779 code:

Enable Debug Camera Display (When about to fight an enemy on the world map)
203A4D54 00000001

(Source: Punk7890)

Unused Logo

On the root of the disc is a file named DUMMY.DAT. The first 8MBs of the file is this raw bitmap image of the Dimps logo. The rest of the data is padding.

(Source: Punk7890)

Fighting "Babidi"

In Stage 5 and 6, Babidi appears as per the main antagonist for the first half of the Buu portion of the story mode with his own dedicated board piece, but is always placed in areas where Goku and allies can't reach him, being placed behind Buu's cocoon in the former and Majin Frieza and Cell in the latter and is killed off in a cutscene when he retreats into the upper half of stage 6 by Buu. By hacking however, it's possible to "interact" with him. Due to developers not quite anticipating this encounter, the fight with "Babidi" has no programmed confrontation dialogue and immediately skips to the Battle screen, with the opponent being Dr. Gero/Android 20 as a placeholder for him to function. Defeating him offers no rewards, and completely prevents progression due to the proper story flags not being set, forcing a restart of the story mode.

Unused Characters

To do: Upload the necessary graphics.

Every character in the game has the capsules that they are able to equip as part of their texture files (located within DATA_US.AFS), with each character being given dedicated files. However, amongst these files are what seems to be leftovers for scrapped characters, most of which would be returning characters from Budokai 1 that did not return for this game. None of these characters have any Death/Physical skills and can only use Equipment capsules, but going off of what Equipment capsules they are able to use, it's easy to guess who they were meant to be.

• Preceding Teen Gohan in the list is a character that can only use the "Tribe Uniform" and "Saiyan Heritage" Equipment capsules, which are normally unique to both forms of Gohan and Piccolo. It's easy to tell that this was meant to be Kid Gohan, returning from Budokai 1.

• Between Captain Ginyu and Frieza, there are two characters that are only able to use the "Armor" and "Scouter" capsules that are exclusive to Frieza's underlings. These were most likely intended to be Zarbon and Dodoria, more returning characters from the first game.

• Located between Android 18 and Cell is a character who is only able to use the Android Equipment capsules. This is obviously Android 19, the last character from Budokai 1 who did not return for this game.

• There are two characters between Hercule and Great Saiyaman, however, they are only able to use the default Equipment capsules that every character can use, making it impossible to guess their identity. It's unlikely these were meant for Saibaman and Cell Jr., since they have valid Death/Physical moves that can be viewed like any other skill.

• There is another character between Videl and Supreme Kai that shares the characteristics of the last two, however, based on some evidence, it's possible that this character slot may have been planned for Kibito, a character that was never playable in the Budokai series and is otherwise completely unfeatured in the game (or any other Budokai series game, for that matter) outside of the fusion cutscene for the Kibitoshin capsule.

Another reference to Kibito seems to be in the files for the Kibitoshin fusion character's textures. Every character that uses another character for one of their moves (eg, Vegito has icons for both Goku and Vegeta regardless of who is being played as) has an icon for said character in their texture files. While Supreme Kai is there as expected, there is a placeholder icon between him and Kibitoshin, most likely meant to represent Kibito, the other half of the fusion, as is the case for all other fusion characters.

In addition, there are 22 placeholder files used for character portraits, featuring Goten, Trunks, and every form of Gotenks, using imagery taken directly from the original Dragon Ball Z manga. While it's easy to guess who some of these characters were meant to be, due to the list being in alphabetical order (example, Android 19 coming before Android 20), there's far more placeholder files than characters that are known to have been planned for inclusion.

Regional/Revisional Differences

Dragon Ball Z 2

The Japanese version of the game, Dragon Ball Z 2, released after the US version, contains a few bonuses not found in the original release of the game. These include:

- An additional Dragon World stage after defeating Kid Buu, featuring visual cameos of characters from Akira Toriyama's manga "Neko Majin Z", and also includes an otherwise unseen story graphic for Tiencha.

- An additional costume for Goku (Battle Damaged outfit) and Piccolo (Cape with Turban).

- A new difficulty for Dragon World, Z difficulty.

- A new costume for Frieza, based on his son Kuriza from the "Neko Majin Z" manga. This is an entirely new skin rather than a simple costume, and even has visual changes to Frieza's Death Ball attack, as well as Kuriza turning into his Final Form when using the Frieza's Spaceship capsule.

Dragon Ball Z 2V

A later (and still Japanese exclusive) version of the game, titled Dragon Ball Z 2V, was given out as a promotional item from V-Jump in 2004. While the game is mostly the same to the Japanese PS2 release, there were a few more additions made to this version of the game. These include:

- The game starts out with all capsules, characters, and stages unlocked by default.

- Saving the game is permanently disabled.

- A new title screen and logo, showcasing the game's main feature (Frieza's new Cooler costume).

- The World Tournament stage has been retextured to advertise V-Jump.

- Frieza and Cell both have their Majin costumes made playable (normally used in Dragon World, but unusable by the player before this release).

- As previously mentioned, the game's main attraction is a new skin for Frieza, turning him into his brother, Cooler. While this also changes the name displayed for the character to "Cooler", all of Frieza's attacks and voice lines stay exactly the same as they would normally. However, using the Frieza's Spaceship capsule will turn Cooler into Meta Cooler.

European Version

While not as extensively changed as other versions, the European version is essentially the same as the US version but with Japanese voice-overs, and the intro theme ("Kusuburu heart ni Hi o Tsukero!!") retains its lyrics as well.

GameCube Version

The GameCube release of Budokai 2, released a year after the original PS2 release, also has its own changes made to the game. These include adding in previously Japanese exclusive features (specifically, the Z difficulty for Dragon World and the new costumes for Goku and Piccolo).