Hyper Dragon Ball Z might look like a forgotten arcade game of the 1990's, but it's actually a modern Dragon Ball game made by super fans in the indie fighting game engine, Mugen. And boy does the game look fantastic (the way it plays, sure, but also: dem sprites, tho.)

(Skip to about :45 seconds, if you want to see gameplay.)

"Our motivation was born from seeing the many official and unofficial games that DBZ has spawned over the last years," the developers, Team Z2, said. "Usually packed with tons of characters, those games have always left us with a bad taste in our mouths."


Enter Hyper Dragon Ball Z, which mixes Dragon Ball's cinematic fights with the gameplay of Street Fighter and Darkstalkers. Sounds excellent, right?

"Gone is the sensation of every character being interchangeable and having the same style of fighting," Team Z2 writes. "Instead, we have characters with beautiful animations, cinematic moves, skillful combos, interesting movesets, unique traits and the kind of fanservice that'd make any Dragonball fan smirk. We drew from all sources and we committed to our vision, which we share with you."


The game features stuff you'd expect from a fighting game, plus stuff that is unique to Dragon Ball, like combos, counters, air combos, dash collisions, super projectiles, beam struggles, character introductions and win poses, as well as five characters and 11 stages. Three more characters are in-progress, and more stuff is expected to be added in the future. What they have in the moment already looks impressive, though, as you can see in the footage.

You can keep up with the game's development here, or download the characters and stages here.

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