Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 Producer Warns About Potential Character Roster Cuts

Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 producer Masayuki Hirano has acknowledged that porting the full playable character list from Xenoverse 2 into the game’s new tech will be difficult, raising the possibility that the sequel’s roster could be trimmed.

Key takeaways

• Producer Masayuki Hirano said transferring every Xenoverse 2 character into Xenoverse 3 will be a “challenge” because of the new engine.
• The series is known for extremely large character rosters, often counting transformations and era variations as separate options.
• Xenoverse 2 had about 138 fighters when transformations are included, or just over 250 when unique move variants are counted.
• Hirano explained that Xenoverse 1 and 2 shared a core engine, while Xenoverse 3 uses a rebuilt version.
• He did not confirm that the roster will definitely shrink, but warned that expectations for a strict one-to-one character carryover may be unrealistic.

Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3’s New Engine Means Bringing Over Every Character Will Be A “Challenge”

Never Say Never, But You Should Probably Expect Some Cuts

Earlier this week, Noisy Pixel shared an interview featuring Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 producer Masayuki Hirano, with several details about the game’s context and what players should expect from a long-awaited sequel. After nearly a decade of waiting, many fans are hoping for “everyone” to return, and that naturally points to a massive roster.

Hirano responded by explaining that although the first two games in the series used the same underlying engine, the team rebuilt it for Xenoverse 3. That change is part of why the third installment has taken so long to reach players. From there, Hirano emphasized that getting every single character back will be a “challenge,” particularly considering everything else the sequel is trying to accomplish.

That said, Xenoverse has always leaned heavily into the custom character side of the experience. Because of that, a smaller roster than players might expect may not be as disruptive—especially if the missing characters’ core abilities still show up in some form.

It’s also important to note what Hirano didn’t do. He didn’t explicitly state that Xenoverse 3’s character list will be cut down relative to Xenoverse 2. Instead, he focused on how hard it is to recreate the full set on the new engine. As a result, players expecting a strict character-by-character carryover should probably dial back those expectations, since the sequel appears more interested in starting a fresh chapter than simply repeating the old one.

As for who might not make the transition, it’s reasonable to assume that many characters could lose some of their variants. Xenoverse 2 went particularly hard on different forms and move variations, so the area most likely to change is the number of options tied to each fighter. Beyond that, no single character stands out as an obvious omission right now, meaning the final outcome will likely depend on what the finished game decides to include.

WHERE TO PLAY

I recently had a hands-off preview of Xenoverse 3, and it already looks poised to be a major step forward for the series.