Macron and MBS Are Building a €6 Billion Dragon Ball Z Theme Park Near Paris

It started, improbably, with a conversation between two of the world’s most powerful men bonding over anime. During Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Saudi Arabia in 2025, the French president and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman discovered a mutual passion for Dragon Ball Z — the Japanese manga and anime franchise that has captivated audiences for four decades. Months later, that shared enthusiasm has crystallised into one of the largest theme park investments in European history: a €6 billion ($7 billion) development near Paris, announced Monday during the Saudi crown prince’s two-day state visit to France. “You know my interest for manga,” Macron said, describing the project as something on a scale not seen “since Disneyland Paris.”

“We’re not done surprising the world. Very proud of this achievement.” — Emmanuel Macron

What Is Actually Being Built?

The project will see three separate theme parks constructed near Cergy-Pontoise, roughly 30 kilometres northwest of Paris. One of the parks is confirmed to be manga-themed, directly inspired by Dragon Ball Z, though details on the other two concepts have not yet been disclosed by the Élysée Palace. No opening date has been set — construction is expected to take several years, with the parks opening in stages. French media have suggested the development could take shape on the site of the former Mirapolis amusement park in Val-d’Oise, which shut its gates 35 years ago. The project is expected to create approximately 22,000 jobs and is being positioned by French officials as a major foreign investment win — evidence, they say, that France remains a magnet for international capital.

Saudi Arabia’s Second Dragon Ball Park

This will not be the first Dragon Ball-themed attraction Qiddiya Investment Company — part of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund — has backed. In 2024, the company revealed plans for a Dragon Ball park in Qiddiya City, a vast entertainment hub under development just outside Riyadh. That project is set to span more than 500,000 square metres, featuring seven recreated locations from the franchise including Kame House, Capsule Corporation, and Beerus’s Planet. The Paris development puts Qiddiya at the centre of two continent-spanning Dragon Ball attractions simultaneously, underscoring a broader Saudi push into global gaming and entertainment. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has overseen a wave of investment in the sector: an investor group including Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund completed a $55 billion acquisition of EA, the Saudi gaming arm EGDC holds a 10% stake in Capcom, and Saudi-owned RTS now controls Evo, the world’s largest fighting game tournament series. The Dragon Ball theme park is, in other words, one piece of a much larger picture.

The Geopolitics Behind a Theme Park

Monday’s announcement came amid a flurry of bilateral agreements signed between Paris and Riyadh. Alongside the theme park, Macron and bin Salman agreed deals spanning energy, artificial intelligence, aviation financing, transport, and health. French marine logistics giant CMA CGM signed a $434 million agreement to help develop Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah Islamic Port, while rail group Alstom committed to supplying metro carriages for Riyadh at a value of $580 million. A letter of intent on defence cooperation — covering cybersecurity, AI, and military training — was also signed, reflecting the broader strategic significance of bin Salman’s visit. The crown prince, who owns a chateau near Paris, attended the closing ceremony of the Esports World Cup on Sunday alongside Macron. The competition had originally been scheduled for Riyadh but was relocated to Paris due to safety concerns arising from the conflict in the Middle East — another thread in an unusually anime-adjacent geopolitical weekend.

When and What to Expect

Concrete timelines remain vague. The Élysée Palace has confirmed construction will begin but has stopped short of committing to opening milestones. Given the scale of the Qiddiya Riyadh park — still years from completion — it is reasonable to expect the Paris attractions to arrive sometime in the early 2030s at the earliest. What is clear is that Dragon Ball Z — a franchise born in 1984 in the pages of Weekly Shōnen Jump — is about to become the unlikely centrepiece of European theme park development. Goku never did need much of a reason to power up.