I’ve been working backwards, looking through the oldest info and/or videos and working my way up to the present. I cannot follow what is happening in a match yet. I dunno, part of me wants to be interested in Fighterz, but the interest comes and goes, if that makes sense. I’ve started to wonder if the game is throwing a few too many nods to the anime and manga. Granted, all that’s been shown and talked about is the fight engine. But it has a ‘fan-service’ feel so far.
I grew up with the Blue Popo(sadly). As far as I’m concerned, each version of Z is it’s own thing. I like to think of Funimation Z already ended while Super is a sequel to Kai if that makes any sense
Regarding the blue Popo, I actually have a fairly nuanced opinion on such things. Culture is such that some things really don’t work when transported elsewhere. People often pick and choose “interesting” bits from other cultures/mythos and then place them in settings or situations with no regard to how those things work within the context of the original culture. Sometimes the bit of appropriated culture is an interesting bit of trivia, and sometimes it’s something with deep historical or religious significance in its original form.
Virtually all artists/creators do this to some extent, but the Japanese are often pretty bad I’ve found in using things that have real and serious implications in their original cultures in pretty mundane or inappropriate ways. I suspect it’s due to the largely homogenous culture within the country (nearly all the people living in Japan are ethnic Japanese), whereby if something is exported in its original form to Japan, it’s taken at face value and without much regard to the original context within that culture.
Mr. Popo’s design hearkens back to racist caricatures that were prevalent in America in days past. While even I’m too young (30) to have really “experienced” Sambo representations of black people, when my dad walked into the room one time and saw the character on the screen he almost flipped out. Toriyama may not have meant anything by Popo’s design, but when that design gets put back into its original culture it means something, because it existed long before it was appropriated for the work in question. Cultural symbols are just that, cultural symbols, and that means that they don’t necessarily shed their meaning just because the creator was unaware of the symbol’s history.
I say all that just to say that while I tend to be fairly gracious about such cultural misunderstandings, I don’t really have an issue with translators changing those kinds of things to better suit the cultures they’re translating a work into. When Luffy puts on an afro wig because “blacks are the strongest people” to get ready for his fight, there’s a lot of cultural baggage and history being glossed over. When Itachi literally crucifies Kakashi with his mangekyou, you’re making a statement whether you want to or not if you’re showing Naruto in a Christian culture. If the core of the work isn’t changed (does it really matter if Usopp says something besides “blacks are the strongest” when he gives Luffy the wig, or if Kakashi is strapped to a board instead of an actual cross as Itachi psychically stabs him over and over again?), then I have literally zero issue with changed translations or censorship for cultural concerns.
Mr. Popo being blue instead of jet black changes nothing meaningful about the character, while also removing it at least slightly from some unfortunate implications of Toriyama’s original design. It may not be a “pure” version of the work in question, but in some instances such changes better fit the culture you’re bringing it into. Doesn’t mean that the suits always get it right, or that there isn’t a space for works to be presented completely uncensored, but neither do I think that any and all such changes are necessarily bad.
If there is something I could hope for in this game is charecter themes and different background music.
I would KILL to have the official Frieza theme played by maximum the hormone be able to be played in game as Frieza’s theme or even just a hidden waster egg
I’m not saying the game MUST have Faulconer music in all of its stages or anything, but it’d be really cool to have some of the tunes at least be unlockable type content (through play or through fishing or whatever random activity they give our chibis to do). So something similar to how old KI/KI2 music is present in KI 2013, but also give us the option to use those tunes in actual matches. I feel like that’d be a really nice touch.
