With the brand new release of the highly acclaimed Dragon Ball Z Sparking! ZERO, Great Ape Vegeta proves to be the first hurdle for many. In this Great Ape Vegeta guide we hope to not only teach you the best ways to combat this colossal enemy, but also how to defeat them quickly, and effectively. Much of the fight depends on three key features: evasion/ blocking, sparking combos, and ranged attacks whenever you’re able. This guide hopes to show you not only the best times to attack the great ape, but also when to evade, and how best to tell when the time is right to strike!
Primarily, you can complete this battle using Goku by keeping a firm control over your ki meter, as well as maintaining distance from great ape Vegeta. Remember that you can’t affect this character with rush combination attacks, and their size makes melee combat incredibly difficult. Finally, all of Great Ape Vegeta’s special attacks require some form of direct beam damage, making Z-dashing, and blocking the best protocol for dealing with them. Alternatively, if you’ve gotten the skill mastered, instant transmission used on a beam attack can open you up for a good combination!
You can access the Great Ape Vegeta fight through the Goku story missions, and will be a major hurdle towards completing the story. While there is no alternative ending for the battle, you might want to consider practicing against the normal mode for online matches if you come across other massive characters. In all, it took me about two minutes and nine seconds to consistently beat Great Ape Vegeta using these strategies in Dragon Ball Z Sparking! ZERO.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Dfbu3CJS0uY
Understanding Great Ape Vegeta
Great Ape Vegeta is the early Vegeta transformation while he still has access to his tail. Being a massive character, he can’t be targeted by rush combinations, and has a high level of blocking durability. Due to his large size, Great Ape Vegeta has several strengths including in melee attacks, greater ki blasts, and the ability to take reduced damage from melee attacks. Additionally, he is unable to enter into dragon rush triggered tie conditions, especially during the mission.
While he may be incredibly powerful, Great Ape Vegeta suffers from being incredibly slow, and having small combinations with long wind up periods. Additionally, he charges Ki at a slower rate than Goku during the progression of the battle. Great Ape Vegeta typically blocks attacks instead of using Instant Transmission or Z-dash. When in sparking form, he can unleash heavy chain attacks similar to Racoome or Nappa. If caught in a chain, prioritize your recovery before using Instant Transmission to escape.
Given he is a large opponent, you’ll want to consider the fact that he’s:
- A giant enemy, immune to most throws, and takedowns
- Given additional bonuses for this specific fight
- You will not have access to spirit bomb until the end of the battle
Great Ape Vegeta can be unlocked and added to the roster once they are defeated in the Goku story missions called “Vegeta’s Dirty Tricks”. During this battle, you’ll be forced to play as Goku and have to put down the colossal ape before he drains your hit points to zero. Consistently, you’ll want to maintain distance and try to catch Great Ape Vegeta as they dragon dash towards you. Otherwise, evasion and awareness of the battlefield are key to surviving this difficult encounter.
make sure to avoid Great Ape Vegeta’s powerful grapples, and melee attacks!
Great Ape Vegeta’s Power Attacks
Avoid Great Ape Vegeta’s mouth beam, a continuous blast that’s easy to evade with Instant Transmission or block. Z-dashing away can also leave him open for counterattacks. This attack can deal 1.5 to 2 bars of damage if amplified and knocks opponents back significantly.
His other general attack is a series of high density ki blasts which are meant to hit in a combination of three to four. These are able to pass through structures, and can knock the opponent back in a chain of three times. Consistently, these are better to outright block than they are dodged as they can stagger in their directional travel. Instant transmissions also work in this scenario, but are a lot harder to pull off since Great Ape Vegeta doesn’t have a long cool down period after the last blast before they’re back to fighting.
- Chou Makouhou: A powerful mouth beam that destroys obstacles and deals high damage but can be easily evaded with Instant Transmission.
- Chou Makouhou Barrage: A set of heavy ki blasts that can knock the player back and cause extended knockdown.
- Super Galick Gun: A devastating beam attack from early Vegeta, highly effective in this battle.
Finally, Great Ape Vegeta has a unique ultimate that works like a massive version of the galick gun. During the story mode, you should seek to interrupt Great Ape Vegeta any time they attempt to enter sparking to obtain this attack. It deals massive damage, and is often something they will only use if the battle prolongs too far. Because of this, keeping your distance is key to making sure that you don’t become a victim of this terrible attack.
Great Ape Vegeta using his mouth beam attack, best to block!
Other Moves To Consider
Great Ape Vegeta favors heavy knockback attacks that juggle players. Keep your ki bar filled to use Instant Transmission and evade these combos. You’ll recognize his intentions when he either dragon rushes or winds up for a heavy attack while you’re charging ki.
Some of the player skills available to Great Ape Vegeta allows the character to reduce incoming damage, as well as to increase their ki charging abilities. Great Ape Vegeta’s main weakness is how slow his ki charging is, making this the most exploitable aspect of fighting this battle. These skills can directly make it more difficult, however these are also opportunities to attack. Since both require a posed action, the great ape can’t block while performing them!
Auto Blocking: Great Ape Vegeta will be able to auto-block incoming special attacks such as the Kame-Hame-Ha so long as they are able to visibly see it, and aren’t in combat.
Anti-Clash: Great Ape Vegeta is completely immune to rush clashes caused by two opponents Z-dashing into each other.
Finally, Great Ape Vegeta is very likely to block any form of ranged attack while they are charging ki, or attempting to move. Because of this, you need to wait for them to either try to rush towards you, or to miss one of their own special attacks. Their mouth cannon in particular is easily avoidable, and allows you to basically Z-dash or instant transmission directly behind the great ape for a quick and deadly attack.
Dragon Dashing with full ki management allows you to follow, and evade easier!
How To Beat Great Ape Vegeta
During the battle with Great Ape Vegeta, you’re going to come across a lot of heavy attacks, and general bullying against the player. However, like any good bully, there are plenty of ways to deal with them! Primarily, you’ll want to stick to your core mechanics of the fighting game, your defensive ability, your ranged attack timing, and knowing how to manage your ki. All in all, they are three good tools to consider for the entirety of Dragon Ball Z: Sparking Zero, or anything else in the franchise.
More than anything though, the fight against Great Ape Vegeta teaches the player the core mechanics so they can understand them for the future. Large characters like these require a lot more skill and effort to defeat since you can’t rush spam them. Additionally, it’s one of the first examples in the story where you’ll really want to focus on the sparking mode more than anything else! Because of this, Great Ape Vegeta is more than a tough boss battle, it’s a strong chance to grow as a player.
This is best done when he’s trying to charge towards you, or just finishes an attack!
Essential Skills: Defense & Evasion
A key aspect to this battle is going to undoubtedly be your block timing, and evasive maneuvers. Since this installment of the franchise focuses more on movement and maneuverability than ever before, you’ll want to consider these key features of gameplay:
- Dragon Dashing: being able to expand ki to either quickly move a short distance, or to travel a longer distance!
- Z-Dashing: this is basically a double dragon dash, and super effective for short range repositioning.
- Instant Transmission: This is basically like a teleport, it eats Ki and often puts you in an advantageous position!
Otherwise, you’ll be focusing on your blocking potential, mainly through the core idea of blocking ki blasts and melee attacks, and using perception against incoming distance attacks. Blocking will be ideal for any rapid ki attacks, or melee onslaughts, while the use of perception will automatically dodge incoming attacks so long as you have ki available.
defense is key against Great Ape Vegeta, and his devastating attacks!
Essential Skills: Ranged Attacks & Sparking Combos
Your offensive options against Great Ape Vegeta are extremely limited, especially due to the fact they’re a large combatant. You won’t be able to use rush attacks, grapples, or have much luck with normal chain combinations. However, through ranged attacks like ki blasts and kame-hame-ha, you can easily wittle down their health. The main problem with this strategy is that ranged attacks are often blocked by the opponent if they see them coming. Because of this, you have two major options for dealing these blows out:
- Wait for Great Ape Vegeta to Dragon Rush towards you, during this time he doesn’t have time to enter a block before you quickly pop these out.
- Evade Great Ape Vegeta’s ranged attacks before unleashing your own while they’re caught immobilized.
If those options aren’t readily working. Consider entering sparking mode in order to utilize the sparking combination buff you get in melee combat. During this time, opponents struggle to block or dodge, giving you a chance to throw them around the arena. Once they’re knocked back, unleash your ranged attacks at full power while they recover. Sparking is especially useful, allowing you to chain multiple ranged attacks before it depletes.
Make sure to Ki Charge while Great Ape Vegeta’s not able to do anything!
Ki Control & Skill Buffs
During this fight, a large part of evading and pulling off your attacks is just managing how much Ki you have. Any time that Great Ape Vegeta is charging Ki, you should consider doing the same. The reason being is that you will be able to charge much faster than he is. Additionally, in the time it takes him to reach full Ki, you can enter sparking mode by charging up continuously. Ki management will help you be able to keep dodging, and blasting the beast down until you’ve eventually won the battle.
Maintaining a high ki level allows you to use skills like Wild Senses to enhance your evasion. Since ultimate attacks aren’t available in this battle, Solar Flare can temporarily paralyze the enemy, setting you up for a quick Kame-Hame-Ha. Effective ki management is crucial for success.Or else you may just get caught in another one of those crushing combination chains!
Other Options
If you still have a lot of trouble fighting Great Ape Vegeta, you should try lowering the difficulty from the base level to easy mode. You can quickly turn it back after the battle concludes, since it doesn’t have an alternate ending available. That being said, this battle really is a good training platform for dealing with other massive characters such as Slug. You can also purely beat the battle by spamming as many kame-hame-ha’s as you can, however Great Ape Vegeta can eat a majority of them with no problem.
Entering Sparking mode is a great way to get powerful melee combinations in!
Common mistakes to avoid
When you’re going through the boss fight with Great Ape Vegeta in Dragon Ball Z Sparking! ZERO, make sure you don’t make these common mistakes:
- Trying to rush into a melee combat encounter with giant Great Ape Vegeta at the beginning of the battle.
- Allowing Great Ape Vegeta to power up to his own sparking stage.
- Attempting to grapple Great Ape Vegeta in combat.
All of these are going to prove fruitless as they give you nothing but grief. Rushing into melee combat against Great Ape Vegeta can leave you vulnerable to his high defense and damage output. You risk exhausting your ki, making you susceptible to his special moves and combo chains. If he charges his sparking meter, he can deal massive damage quickly, so caution is essential. Finally, Attempting to grapple giant characters will result in the normal sized character being thrown back.
Final Thoughts
Great Ape Vegeta may be a significant challenge for new players, but defeating him offers a rewarding sense of accomplishment. This battle tests your understanding of game mechanics without relying on powerful super moves, emphasizing the core theme of Dragon Ball Z: overcoming obstacles. Have fun, and stay sparking!
If you need help with other bosses or battles, feel free to comment below, and we’ll assist you!
MadMoff
Big Monkey
Tommy
This is awesome! I’m so excited to get back into the Dragon Ball Z games! I haven’t played since I was a kid, playing the Budokai games!
Michael VanDine
I was super excited myself to hear that the budokai tenkaichi series was getting a new game in the form of Sparking! ZERO. I hope they add some of the original Dragon Ball characters in the future, but I’d definitely recommend it as it stands now!
Thank you for reading my guide, and leaving a comment, if there’s any other content you’d like to see about Sparking! ZERO or any other game, be sure to let me know, and have a great day.