As a One Piece Fan, the whole game felt like a massive love letter to some of the best moments the anime has to offer pre-time skip. The game perfectly replicates the moments that shaped the characters into what they are today and what makes them special. Here is our full One Piece Odyssey Review.
One Piece Odyssey is developed by ILCA and published by Bandai Namco. The game was released on January 14, 2023, for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and PC. In One Piece Odyssey, you follow Luffy and his crew, stranded on an island where they need to go through their memories to get their powers back.
While I didn’t expect to buy the game at 1st, when I saw the battle gameplay was like Persona 5, I just had to buy it straight away. With Persona 5 being one of my favorite games of all time and seeing that initial gameplay of One Piece Odyssey, I knew I was going to be in for a great ride, and I was right because this game had me on the edge of my seat throughout the whole game and had me up multiple times going to sleep at 3 am due to just forgetting the time.
I absolutely loved seeing old locations and characters again, as a One Piece viewer, it really feels like a love letter to their old adventures and the things they have done, the characters they met, and even their old ship the Going Merry. It’s kinda moving to see some iconic moments being recreated again in a new jacket with some changes to have it make sense in game form. I think every One Piece fan can probably say that the moments they picked for the game perfectly reflect some of the best moments the anime has to offer.
While the game is a 10/10, there are a few missed opportunities. One of the major ones for me personally was cutting out the iconic fights of the Baroque Works agents in Alabasta, but the chapter is massive, just like Alabasta, so I do understand why it has been cut. Another one is during one of the bounties where you have to go find Sniper Killer. During this side thing, and most of the bounties is a side story going on, and not doing the Sogeking theme was kinda a bummer because the Sniper Killer was after him.
My biggest problem with the game is how unrealistic it actually was. Zorro had a map. This is something that is just impossible. They even made multiple references to Zorro going the wrong way… (This is a joke) It would have been nice if Zorro didn’t have a map just to make it that much more realistic.
Another minor issue I had with the game was “save points”, I don’t like it, feels like an outdated game design mechanic. It does kinda fit with this type of game, so I didn’t care that much, but I forgot to save 1 time and my game froze during Xbox Series X’s “quick resume” feature and lost about an hour of progress. The game was so good, I honestly didn’t mind replaying that specific part, but I can see it happening at a worse time for people, so I miss an autosave type thing.
visually stunning, it has a perfect balance between what you expect from an anime and 3D effects (playing on series X). The skill animations are awesome and some are a bit bizarre but in a good way, especially the ones of Nico Robin… with her hands reaching places that shouldn’t be crushed, but should be a very effective move against male enemies. So much detail in the sound design, specifically the water is really calming to listen to at areas at the beach and Water 7. It was like a nice water ASMR-type thing to just listen to while the cutscenes were going on.
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