Dragon Ball Z: Shin Butōden

Dragon Ball Z: Shin Butoden is a 2D fighting game released exclusively in Japan on November 17, 1995, for the Sega Saturn. As the fourth and final entry in the Butoden series, it builds on the technical foundation of its Super Famicom predecessors while taking advantage of the Saturn's increased processing power. The game features twenty-seven playable characters, reusing character sprites from Dragon Ball Z: Ultimate Battle 22, and shares that game's introductory cinematic footage as well.

Battle Mode encompasses three formats: Story Mode, Versus Mode, and Group Battle Mode. Story Mode covers the Androids Saga through the Cell Games Saga and concludes with a credit-roll ending upon completion. Versus Mode offers one-on-one fights against the CPU, against a second player, or in a CPU-versus-CPU exhibition format. Group Battle Mode lets players assemble a team of five characters who fight sequentially, with winners carrying a portion of their remaining health into subsequent bouts.

Tournament Mode supports up to eight players competing in a World Martial Arts Tournament bracket, with CPU-controlled fighters filling any unoccupied slots. The results screen at the end displays portraits of the top three finishers alongside black-and-white photographs of the various matchups. Mr. Satan Mode is a unique side mode in which the player bets on fights as Mr. Satan, using items such as banana peels, guns, mines, and dynamite thrown into the ring to influence outcomes, while managing a Zeni budget starting at 1,000 and aiming to reach 10,000.

Shin Butoden's Story Mode draws from the Androids and Cell Sagas, covering the arrival of the Androids, the battles with Imperfect and Perfect Cell, and the climactic Cell Games. The game assembles a roster that borrows characters from across the entire Butoden series history, incorporating fighters from Super Butoden, Super Butoden 2, Buyu Retsuden, Super Butoden 3, and Ultimate Battle 22. Five secret characters are shared with Ultimate Battle 22: Super Saiyan 3 Goku, Super Gogeta, Kid Goku, Master Roshi, and Mr. Satan.

The roster of twenty-seven fighters represents a comprehensive survey of the Dragon Ball Z cast available through 1995, giving the game one of the widest character selections in the series up to that point. The inclusion of Mr. Satan as a secret playable character, following his non-playable appearances in earlier Butoden titles, rewarded dedicated players with access to a comedic fan favorite. The overlap with Ultimate Battle 22's roster and visual assets speaks to the close relationship between the two Saturn-era fighting games.

Shin Butoden closes out the Butoden series that began on the Super Famicom with Super Butoden in 1993. Its release on the Sega Saturn marked a platform transition for the franchise, moving from Nintendo's 16-bit hardware to Sega's 32-bit console at a time when the Dragon Ball Z games were beginning to grow in visual ambition. The game's title translates loosely to "True Armed Struggle Legend," positioning it as the definitive culmination of the series.

The Mr. Satan Mode is frequently cited as a creative highlight of the game, offering a gambling-and-interference format that breaks entirely from the standard fighting game structure. This mode reflects the sense of humor present in the Dragon Ball Z source material and gives the game a memorable feature that distinguishes it from both its predecessors and its contemporaries. Shin Butoden remains a notable entry in the Saturn's fighting game library and in the broader history of Dragon Ball video games.