Dragonball + Dragonball Z: Il gioco di ruolo
Summary courtesy of Andrea Angiolino, used with permission.
The RPG of Dragonball is an Italian project of an easy RPG and two boardgames, that can be used independently or to enrich the RPG.
The setting is the famous comics and cartoon world of Dragonball, by the Japanese artist Akira Toriyama. Martial arts play an important role in the game, that keeps the humorous style especially typical of the first part of the story.
The boardgames have been distributes in Italian newspaper kiosks. At less than 10 euros each, both the full colour boardgames and the RPG have been a successful way to promote the hobby among non-players enthusiasts of Japanese cartoons, that are very popular in Italy since the state television started to broadcast them in 1978.
A quite deep research work has been needed to make those games to depict the world of Dragonball and all its characters. This has been even more difficult since the Italian translations of comic books, TV serials and movies have been different, giving different names to places and people. Besides, the private channel Italia Uno that broadcasted the TV series at national level censored several scenes.
The RPG has a very simple basic system that is explained in just two pages of rules and allows to play the first introductory adventure, "Le Sette Sfere".
To help beginner players, 16 characters are pre-rolled. They stage the main characters of the cartoon and they can also be used as famous Non Player Charcters (NPCs).
Each character has 4 main characteristics: Strength, Agility, Smartness and Charm. Then there is Defence, that measures the chance of avoiding dangerous things: a mix of dexterity, luck and bulk. And then there is Endurance, that is the capability to stand fatigue and pain: a mix of constitution and willpower. Every character has also a Flaw: Goku has a Out-of-control Hunger, Mr. Satan has Vanity, Olong has Fetishism, Lunch has Double Personality... So, as in the RPG "I cavalieri del tempio", sometimes the character does what he want, and not what the player wants!
There is also a set of advanced rules, with the indications about how to generate new characters and where the martial arts are especially detailed. Anyway, players wanting more detail can solve combats using the boardgame "Dragonball Z - Il Torneo".
A long section about the world of Dragonball, its creatures and the famous NPCs from the comics and movies complete the book. The boardgame "Dragonball - Alla ricerca delle sette sfere" provides more encounters and some magic / technological items that can be used by the Game Master to further enrich the adventures. The colourful board of the game is also useful as a reference map of the world.
- Dragonball + Dragonball Z - Il gioco di ruolo