Dragon Ball FighterZ is a little over four years old now, but it’s got a new update on the way. At EVO 2022, Bandai Namco revealed it’s bringing rollback netcode to DBZF. The fighter will see next-gen versions on PS5 and Xbox Series with the update and upgrade paths for players that already own the game.
After last night’s lull in excitement at EVO 2022, thanks to scheduling woes, the Dragon Ball FighterZ announcements and finals breathed a little life into the crowd. DBFZ producer Tomoko Hiroki took the stage to deliver the news, and the moment it happens is kind of endearing. EVO’s shounen-enthused crowd is pretty damn excited; despite the news the game is content complete otherwise.
And with good reason, too. For fighting game players, the updated multiplayer code means an end to its delay-based infrastructure. There’s (hopefully) no more wonky input delay. Instead, your DBFZ character should always be moving, opting for a few teleportation hiccups to fix the match. There’s a fantastic breakdown over on Core-A Gaming for the folks interested in understanding those more technical bits.
The Dragon Ball FighterZ upgrades will head to the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC versions of the game. For folks still on older consoles, it sounds like you’ll miss out. However, Bandai Namco says there should be upgrade paths through programs like smart delivery. Exactly when we’ll see the online changes happen is a bit nebulous for now.
Outside of the Dragon Ball FighterZ surprises, EVO weekend brought a few other big beats. Atlus also announced rollback netcode for Persona 4 Ultimax. As someone who can’t beat the AI in any fighting game, I’m still excited. Mitsuru’s P4 Ultimax ‘fit is easily the best Persona look and worth my time getting stomped.
Guilty Gear Strive saw a few Season 2 announcements, too. Developer Arc System Works shared its tentative schedule for the rest of 2022, dipping into 2023 with new characters and cross-platform support. And, of course, not to be outdone, Sony couldn’t resist making things weird and asking about NFTs. PlayStation snatched up EVO last year, and I might have forgotten that had the platform giant opted not to bug us with glorified receipts.
