Let's Play Dragon Ball Z: The Legacy of Goku

[Cadenza]

I'm quite fond of the Game Boy Advance. I didn't own many games for it as a kid, but I was still able to play stuff like Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, Mega Man Battle Network 3, and the 3rd gen Pokemon games. Then when I learned what emulation was in high school, I discovered a wealth of games that I otherwise wouldn't have gotten a chance to play, like the GBA Castlevanias. There were a lot of good games on this thing!

There was also Dragon Ball Z: The Legacy of Goku.

(the cover art and box copy)
​

For those who are unaware, Legacy of Goku is an action-RPG developed by a small American studio called Webfoot Technologies, and published by Infogrames (now known as Atari SA, a French game holding company). Webfoot was founded in 1993, and mostly put out budget licensed games; I'm honestly not sure if they're still active, since their website seems to have not been updated since 2018, but even still that's an admirably long time to run a successful studio of less than twenty people.

Legacy of Goku is something of an unlikely success story. There's not a lot of information about this game floating around out there, even from the developers themselves, but I think LoG was Webfoot's first time developing an RPG; I'm also like, not sure how they got the license?? That part is unclear. But it sold pretty well - probably due in no small part to the fact that, as far as I can gather, LoG was the first Dragon Ball Z game on the GBA - and that success led to two sequels, Legacy of Goku II and Buu's Fury. They also made two other DBZ games - Dragon Ball Z: Taiketsu (a faux-3D fighting game) and Dragon Ball GT: Transformation (a beat-em-up with comically huge sprites). I will not be covering any of those other games beyond this post, but they're at least worth mentioning for added context.

I had a physical copy of this game as a kid, and I played the hell out of it, largely because it was the only game in town at the time. I have fond memories of it to this day, which is why I'm revisiting it in this thread. But as the first game of its kind, it has some growing pains; that box copy posted above is doing some pretty generous up-selling of its features. I'm fairly certain that bullet point about there being 75 characters to interact with is just counting the number of NPCs and enemies there are in the game, for instance. It's a pretty rough game in general, but it's not all bad, and we'll be looking at it in reasonable detail throughout the course of this thread. If nothing else, I'll be playing it so you don't have to!

 

[Cadenza]

A note: This game contains brief, bright screen-flashes during level transitions, certain cutscenes, and every time you pause the game. Proceed with caution if you are affected by this.

In which Goku visits his old friends, sets out to rescue his kidnapped son from his long-lost brother, and passes through a forest.
​

Another note: this first video is a little loud, so you might want to turn on the auto-generated subtitles; also the title screen is just louder than the rest of the game, for some reason. I'll have the music turned down more in future videos.

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Kame House: This is a short little intro to give the player time to acclimate to the controls without having to fight anything, and it teaches you how sidequests work. I say this in the video, but there's not like, a quest log or anything; you can only check what sidequests you've already completed, and that's it. Nevertheless, we will be doing all the sidequests, primarily because they give exp rewards, which in turn means I'll have to spend less time fighting enemies.

That music tho: Yeah! The soundtrack was written and arranged by Ariel Gross, a composer and sound designer who's been working in the games industry since 1996. He's been pretty busy! I haven't listened to any of his other music, but I'm pretty fond of the soundtrack to this game. I'll be posting links to each track as it comes up throughout the playthrough.

Wow that was an abrupt scene transition: Yeah, get used to those! This game covers the events of DBZ from Raditz's arrival to the end of the Namek Saga, but in an extremely abridged fashion; like, you can finish it in two-and-a-half hours. It's at least breezy!

The forest: This first part of the game introduces the player to the intricacies of its combat, which are few. You have an annoyingly precise melee attack, or you can fire Ki blasts as long as you have the energy for it (and if not, the bar recharges pretty quickly). We'll be learning two other energy attacks over the course of the game, and... that's it! This is also the most difficult section of the game, combat wise; your Ki blasts are individually rather weak, and getting up close to punch enemies puts you at risk of dying really fast, at least until you get a few level-ups under your belt.

Anyway, before you head out of the forest and into the village, you'll want to gather some stones to rescue an old man stranded in the middle of a pond (never mind the fact that Goku could just fly him back to shore) and rescue a pterodactyl's egg for some free exp.

New tunes:
Title screen theme
Kame House/Safe area
Indoors
A threat is near
Dangerous area

I'm not sure where the uploader is getting the fancy track titles from; there's not an official soundtrack release or anything like that, to my knowledge, nor do any of these tracks have official titles as far as I'm aware (although I would love to be proven wrong on this). As such, I'm going with more utilitarian titles (with the obvious exception of the fourth track linked above, which is pretty much only used in cutscenes). Also, you should give these a listen! I do genuinely think they're well written and make pretty good use of the GBA's sound capabilities.

 

[Cadenza]

In which Goku picks some flowers, brings a lost cat back to its owner, and fights Raditz.
​

Spoiler: Notes on the video

"There are several disturbances in this forest": We head straight to the village elder's house from where we ended off last time; the way to Raditz lies past him, but the elder won't let us through until we quiet the disturbances in the forest (aka do all the sidequests here). Most of the game's sidequests are actually mandatory parts of progression - which I guess is why the game itself doesn't differentiate between main and side objectives. You'd think they could've at least awarded more exp for the mandatory ones, but nope!

Anyway, to proceed, you have to bring the elder's cat back to him, bring a boy's toy boat to him from where it's stuck in the center of a pond, bring a lost little girl back to her parents, then pick some flowers for said girl. You can also talk to Yamcha and Puar up in the north of the village for some free exp. Doing all this takes up more than half the video!

"I almost forgot about your reward!": For helping out around the village, the elder opens the way through to Raditz, but more importantly, he teaches us Solar Flare, the single most powerful technique in the game. This one move will be the cornerstone of our offense from here till the credits. Also, I don't think Goku ever learned Solar Flare in the show? I remember Tien and Krillin used it, but not anyone else that I can recall.

"Now you will see the wrath of a true Saiyan!" We're immediately dumped into the Raditz boss arena once we exit the elder's house, although the fight doesn't start until you talk to him; you should go around gathering herbs beforehand if you need to. Also, Raditz (and all bosses from here on out) will attack you as soon as his dialogue finishes, so you might want to start mashing the R button to fly away and save yourself from taking a cheap hit right as the fight starts.

Speaking of which, Raditz himself isn't terribly difficult - he'll chase after you to do melee attacks, and occasionally charge up a Ki blast for several seconds before shooting it at you. The latter move has a pretty big hitbox, so you should give yourself more room to avoid it than you think you'll need. The main strategy to use both here and literally everywhere else from this point on is to charge up a Solar Flare - which will stun any onscreen enemies for a length of time proportional to how long you charge it - then run in and start punching. Make sure to give yourself some time to get away before Raditz can start moving again, or he'll immediately hit you out of the stun.

Special Beam Cannon: Of course, after we defeat Raditz, Goku sacrifices himself so that Piccolo can kill him, and then we're immediately sent off to King Yemma after the cutscene. Told you to get used to those abrupt transitions!

New tunes:

The village elder's house
Vs. Raditz
Goku's death

The first two tracks linked above only play once in the whole game, at their respective locations. You should listen to them both, they're pretty good!

 

[gogglebob]

Goku used the solar flare in the anime against Tien in one of the martial arts tournaments, and then again against Great Ape Vegeta when that was happening. Oh! And against fused saiyan lady in that last tournament in Super.

Also! Let's Play! Yay!

 

[Beowulf]

I had never heard of this game before, but I am very entertained by this.

 

[Cadenza]

Goku used the solar flare in the anime against Tien in one of the martial arts tournaments, and then again against Great Ape Vegeta when that was happening. Oh! And against fused saiyan lady in that last tournament in Super.

Also! Let's Play! Yay!

I see! I haven't watched DBZ since I was a teenager - or Super at all - so I appreciate the clarification.

I had never heard of this game before, but I am very entertained by this.

Happy to be of service!

 

[Cadenza]

In which Goku defeats the Snake Queen, gathers some lost spirits, and eats a delicious fruit.
​

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Snake Way: It's quite long and twisty, and there aren't any flight orbs to restore your energy, so you can't shortcut your way across either. If you touch the sides of it you'll take damage; lose enough HP and you'll trigger a certain event early.

Once you travel far enough along the path, you'll run into the Snake Queen, who's an optional boss that doesn't take many hits before going down. Regardless if you defeat her or not, soon after you walk past her area you'll fall off Snake Way, and straight into...

HFIL: Aka the Home For Infinite Losers. (I learned while playing Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot recently that it is, in fact, originally just called Hell. Good game, by the way, you should check it out if you're into DBZ!) We can't leave until we help an HFIL assistant gather some lost spirits; in return he'll lower the magical barrier that protects King Yemma's fruit trees. Those fruits are the only thing that'll let us get back to Snake Way, so they're kind of important! This area isn't very big, so you should be able to find the spirits relatively quickly, but you can only escort one of them at a time, and the enemy spirits hit pretty hard, so be wary of that.

Once we eat the fruit, we're indeed taken straight back to Snake Way, where we'll pick things up next time.

New tunes:
Snake Way

 

[Cadenza]

In which Goku plays tag, stops a bank robbery, and fights the invading Saiyans.
​

A note: thanks to the video editing mentioned in the intro, this episode looks a little weird; something about how Da Vinci Resolve rendered the footage made it come out a bit strange. Future episodes will be back to normal.

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Snake Way, again: Yep, we really have to do it again. Thankfully this time there are flight orbs scattered along the path to make it quicker. Once you get to the end of it, you have to fly over to the left of the screen to reach King Kai's planet; I think you just get warped back if you run out before you get there, but I'm not positive on that.

King Kai's training: Like in the anime, you have to tag Bubbles the monkey (or punch him, in this case), and wack Gregory the cricket with a giant mallet. Neither of these tasks are too difficult - theym both move faster than you, but you can fly towards them to quickly close the gap between you. After you complete both tasks, you get some exp and learn the Kamehameha, Goku's signature energy beam. I will use this technique maybe three times in the whole game. Nifty sound effect, though!

After a crusty FMV clip, you're warped to Kami's Lookout, where you can talk to him, Mr. Popo, and Korrin, and also stock up on herbs. I think Korrin only gives you a Senzu bean here if you don't already have three of them.

Back on Earth: We're deposited in some random frozen wasteland, and have to reach the Saiyans on foot from here. Along the way we'll rescue a little boy, give a man in the nearby city some capsules, and stop a bank robbery. (I didn't notice while recording, but I think the slouched-over guy in the bank is actually dead, instead of taking a nap; you can just barely make out what look like bullet holes in the wall behind him.)

Following this we pass through a military checkpoint, and then it's time for...

Nappa and Vegeta: The two Saiyans operate like every other boss in the game: they either chase after you to punch you, or charge up a Ki blast from a distance. (Vegeta's is blue!) They also only fight you one at a time, which I'm thankful for; I'm sure with this game's engine it would be tricky to handle both of them at once.

Once you defeat them, after some lengthy cutscenes (for this game at least), Vegeta mentions the planet Namek - which has its own set of Dragon Balls - and takes off; everyone decides to follow him, and then we cut straight to Goku's arrival on Namek. This is not a very long game!

New tunes:
Tense situation
Vs. the Saiyans

You should give that second track linked above a listen if you can; it's my favorite in the game!

 

[Violentvixen]

I think I borrowed this from a friend, or rented it or something? I have only the vaguest memories of it. So vague I'm not 100% sure I'm thinking of this game, but seems close enough, ha.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

Goku probably shouldn't be puttering around with bank robbers when two apocalypse men are murdering his friends and family. Just let them have some money.

 

[Cadenza]

I think I borrowed this from a friend, or rented it or something? I have only the vaguest memories of it. So vague I'm not 100% sure I'm thinking of this game, but seems close enough, ha.

Maybe future videos will help jog your memory? I kinda hope not with this next one, to be honest!

Goku probably shouldn't be puttering around with bank robbers when two apocalypse men are murdering his friends and family. Just let them have some money.

Hey, somebody's gotta do it!

 

[Torzelbaum]

Hey, somebody's gotta do it!

And by it do you mean pad out the runtime for the anime and the play time for the game?

(I'm assuming it's optional in the game.)

 

[Cadenza]

In which Goku plants some trees, beats up many of Frieza's henchmen, and navigates a teleporter maze.
​

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Planet Namek: Is in pretty bad shape by the time we get here. You start off in a ruined village, and immediately in front of you is the final sidequest: replanting some saplings so that Namek's trees might one day return. There's some meta-textual dramatic irony going on here, since of course we all know by now that Namek is going to get blown to smithereens at the end of the Frieza saga, and that plus the somber music paints a surprisingly melancholy picture for this game.

The Frieza Force are all over this area, and they give a ton of exp, so you should start gaining levels pretty quickly once you get here. Once you're done with the saplings and are finished exploring, exit to the north to find...

Namekian Temple exterior: An NPC in the previous area talks about there being three artifacts that belong inside this temple, and two of those artifacts are outside said temple in the surrounding area. What he doesn't mention is that you'll need all three artifacts to progress the game, so you'd better get to searching for them! You'll at least get more exp while you're looking. Once you find the artifacts, you'll head into...

The Namekian Temple: Aka the closest thing this game has to a final dungeon, and also hands down the worst area in the game. Every other level in the game is pretty straightforward, but this temple is a teleporter maze, and worse, it's a needlessly complicated one. Here's a map of the place so you can follow my explanation of how it works.

You start off at the big red A in the bottom center; your goal is to find the final artifact and then make your way to the artifact placement room (the red G room right next to the entrance, funnily enough), and place said artifacts so you can leave. Each of those colored squares you see on the mape is a teleporter that will take you to a different part of the temple. You might initially think that the different colors of teleporter are paired with each other - a white teleporter will take you to another white one, for instance - but that's not actually the case. No, instead every teleporter in the temple is paired with a different exit; every teleporter marked on the map with an A, for instance, will take you to the A exit at the beginning of the temple. There is no indicator of this in the game itself; you just have to trial-and-error your way through it (or follow this handy map!), potentially getting lost for hours. I honestly don't know why the teleporters are in different colors at all, besides just to mislead you into thinking there's a pattern to them that simply isn't there.

Oh, also, there are hidden pathways, one of which hides the artifact you absolutely need to find to finish the game. They're at least hinted at - the hand statues point directly at them - but even still, that's just mean. I know I finished this game as a kid, but I honestly have no idea how I got through this temple besides sheer dumb luck.

Anyway, once you get to the artifact room and place them, you get a chunk of exp and a speed increase, and the teleporter to the exit opens up, taking us out of this cursed level. At least the temple music is good!

New tunes:
Planet Namek
The Frieza Force
Namekian Temple

 

[Cadenza]

And by it do you mean pad out the runtime for the anime and the play time for the game?

(I'm assuming it's optional in the game.)

Y'know I've never actually tested that, but I would assume it is.

 

[Cadenza]

In which Goku fights the Ginyu Force, and that's pretty much it.
​

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Hold on a sec I gotta do some exp grinding first: There are various enemies scattered around the arena that you can use to gain a level or two before fighting the Ginyu Force. If nothing else, getting them out of the way now will keep them from interrupting the boss rush later.

The Ginyu Force: They all operate like the other bosses, y'all know how this works by now. Since Guldo (the green guy whose name I didn't remember at time of recording) had already been defeated by this point in the anime, he does not make an appearance in the game. You also fight Jeice and Burter one at a time instead of simultaneously, and Captain Ginyu doesn't do any body-swapping shenanigans.

Rambling about that one episode of DBZ where Goku and Piccolo get their driver's licenses: I think you'll all be happy to know that said episode was adapted in Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, and indeed you can participate in racing minigames around the game world for prizes. Not especially relevant to this game, but since I talked about it in the video I thought I would mention it here.

Rambling about fighting games with extensive single-player modes: More of these should exist! I've seen that Street Fighter 6 has a World Tour mode that fits the criteria, which makes me happy.

One more video to go! Or perhaps two...?

New tunes:
Vs. the Ginyu Force

 

[Cadenza]

In which Goku battles Frieza for the fate of the universe.
​

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Frieza Force outpost: This is your last chance to get some level-grinding in before the final boss, if you feel you need it (and Goku even helpfully spells this out for you later in the area). It's broken up into two separate areas; flying into Frieza's ship in the second one and using the medical machine will trigger the endgame.

Ranting about the different DBZ anime soundtracks: The fact that Western localization companies felt the need to replace the already perfectly good - great, even! - soundtrack with entirely different music that sounds like it belongs in a different show leaves a bad taste in my mouth the more I think about it. It's not lost on me that you could say the same thing about this game's music, but I don't know, I think it's more expected for a video game adaptation of a media franchise to have original music - even DBZ: Kakarot, which I've mentioned in several videos now, has some new tunes to go along with the original anime score. Taking what's literally the same show and entirely replacing the music that was written for it just doesn't sit right with me.

Frieza: Unlike in the anime, where Frieza was already in his final form by the time Goku shows up to fight him, here you have to fight each of his forms in succession. I misspoke in the video; instead of gaining exp for beating each form, defeating Frieza's third form just gives you a level-up for free, along with a final movement speed increase. I think the level cap is 25? I'm not about to check though, lmao.

Anyway, Frieza's final form isn't any different from the other bosses, although he does hit like a truck, so be wary of that. Once you beat him, the ending plays out and the credits roll.

New tunes:
Ending theme

The game itself is done, but I'll be posting one more video in this thread on Monday.

 

[Cadenza]

Taking a look at a few extra things now that the game's over.
​

Spoiler: Notes on the video

Cheat codes: Or rather, just the one. Inputting Up, Down, Left, Right, B, and A during the intro movie will activate an invincibility cheat until you reset the game. It doesn't work on the spiked pathways on Snake Way though, presumably for scripting purposes.

Shortcut warp: Flying into the upper left corner of the Ginyu Force arena will warp you to the next area, letting you skip the fight completely. I imagine that's handy for speedruns, assuming anybody actually runs this game.

Debug menu: This is the meat of the video. Going into the Options menu, holding L, R, and Up for a couple seconds, then pressing A will take you to this menu. From here you can listen to every music track and sound effect, look at all the splash screens (including a couple that go unused), warp directly to any screen in the game, and - my personal favorite - view all the different enemy and NPC sprites. I'm glad this was left in! It's pretty cool to be able to dig around like this in a game.

You can read about other miscellaneous things that got left out of the game on its Cutting Room Floor page.

----------------------

And that's it! Thank you all for coming with me on this little trip to revisit one of my childhood games. Special thanks go to the Cutting Room Floor (linked above), as well as Video Game Atlas user Shiny for ripping all the maps; made the temple section a lot easier for me! (There's not a Legacy of Goku page to link to directly, but you can scroll down this page and give it a look if you want.)

See y'all in the next thread!