The eternal battle of media phenomenons that conquered the young lives of many children and the wallets of many parents. One of them is based around possibly the greatest game series of all time and the other is based on one of the best selling mangas in history. Both are loved by millions by people from all around the world, but which is the better franchise?
Is it Pokemon? The games series that has sold over 200 million games world wide, spawned an extremely popular anime series, one of the most succesful card trading games in the world and has had fourteen movies based on the adventures of Ash and his friends.
Or is it Dragon Ball? The manga series that has sold over 300 million copies world wide, has created one of the most popular and longest lasting animes series of all time, has had thirteen films based around it's universe and has even had a live action movie starring the famous Chow Yun-Fat (I be trollin).
I personally find it extremely hard to choose. Pokemon Red, Yellow and Gold are some of the greatest game ever made and Pokemon in it's prime was an amazing spectactle and experience. I loved collecting the cards, playing the games, battling people, watching the shows every morning and just seeing the world being swept up into the craze. It was an amazing feeling that I've only felt a few times before (Harry Potter, Dragon Ball Z and Spiderman) and it's one that I long to feel again. The problem is that the anime series took a nosedive in quality after the third season, the cards eventually started to become whored out and useless and the games lost the impact and thrill that they once had and this has hurt my feelings toward the franchise going forward.
Dragon Ball on the other hand is special, everyone I knew watched it and some of the greatest memories I have as a kid was pretending to be Vegeta, discussing the series, collecting the cards and playing the games. The craze wasn't as strong, but it was far more consistent and as I got older and started to hide my nerdiness behind a tough guy bravado, I could always count on DBZ for some anime conversation with people who aren't interested in anime, because every 18 year old guy knew their DBZ and loved it. I've re-watched the series multiple times and I love Dragon Ball and still firmly believe it's one of the most epic TV series ever created.
I'm leaning towards Dragon Ball because it has stayed with me for the longest, but I can't forget how great and huge Pokemon was back in the day.
Whatcha think?
Bet with Conegamer and AussieGecko that the PS3 will have more exclusives in 2011 than the Wii or 360... or something.
