must know
What is it? A turn-based JRPG romp through One Piece’s past.
Expect to pay: $59.99/£49.99
Developer: ILCA, Inc.
Publisher: Bandai Namco Entertainment
Judged by: Windows 11, Nvidia 2080 Ti, Intel i9-9900k @ 4.9GHz, 32GB RAM
multiplayer? no
Out: utilities
Link: Official site (opens in new tab)
25 years ago, Half-Life came out on PC, the first PlayStation reigned supreme and a little pirate adventure manga called One Piece began. Now I’m approaching 40, going gray and still enjoying the continued adventures of the rubber-coated villain Luffy and his Straw Hat Pirates. Celebrating a quarter century at sea, the crew embarks on a grand JRPG journey with One Piece Odyssey: a sprawling, charming adventure that creaks under its own reach.
If you have no idea what One Piece is, or have only watched a few episodes of the anime, Odyssey probably isn’t for you. Set in about 750 episodes in the anime, it assumes knowledge of the characters, their abilities, and their history. In addition, most of the game is devoted to (loosely) retelling the events of four major story arcs, these repeated adventures are supported by a story written specifically for the game.
While manga author Eiichiro Oda had minimal input into the story of Odyssey, he did contribute some creature concepts and designs, including some adorable doofy monsters. Odyssey brings Luffy and his crew to Waford, a forgotten island inhabited by a pair of new characters: the big-haired explorer Adio and the mysterious local girl Lim, who magically strips the crew of their powers before they realize they are the good kind of pirates. Fortunately, no one is amnesiac, but the Straw Hat crew has forgotten how to fight. adventures and brush up on their mistreatments.
The black spot
Odyssey is basically a huge filler arc – the kind of questionably canonical side-adventure the anime needs to insert to keep the TV show running weekly. While Odyssey’s new story and characters are good enough for One Piece, where the game’s narrative shines is, paradoxically, in treading old roads.
While these adventures in Memoria are based on previous story arcs (Alabasta, Water Seven, Marineford, and Dressrosa), the Straw Hat Pirates know that this is only a rough approximation of their adventures, and their actions won’t change what actually happened. Despite this, they all decide to do better. Even if it’s just a dream, they set out to save everyone they couldn’t save, win unwinnable battles and create a happier ending. What could have been a glorified clip show takes on an unexpectedly bittersweet and personal touch, giving the heroes a chance to see lost and fallen friends one last time.
It makes for a rich source of character beats compared to the average One Piece filler anime, giving each member of the crew time in the spotlight to sort their feelings apart and come to terms with their losses. The manga often has characters crying tears of tears over lost friends or sad goodbyes, with Odyssey trading more to come to terms with the past. Unfortunately, the funky skellington Brook doesn’t join the party until late in the game, but the rest of the crew is given breathing room. At least if they don’t get sidetracked.
Odyssey is bursting with stuffing, filler in the filler. It’s not just side missions, grinding and searching maps for treasure – the main story often forgets where it’s going. In one particularly egregious case, a chase across the desert to rescue a friend is delayed by outlaws stealing the crew’s food, a monkey stealing Nami’s wallet, a river of quicksand, a caving adventure to get around the quicksand (which fails), and then a big cartoon crab shows up to just take everyone to their destination anyway.
It was hard for me to stay annoyed with Odyssey – or the giant crab for that matter. The distractions often lean towards the silly side of One Piece, and even these weird story digressions lead to spectacular boss fights and fun new monsters. There are also some great encounters in the optional side content, including chasing bounties on rival pirates who have comedic gimmicks of their own, such as a crew that likes to dramatically jump off clifftops but haven’t figured out the “safe landing”. don’t share yet. But almost every part of Odyssey could use some trimming. Quests can be shortened, the grind reduced, and backtracking omitted to leave a leaner, faster game.
The main thing you’ll be doing in One Piece Odyssey is turn-based JRPG combat, and thankfully, padding or not, combat is smarter than I expected. I’d have been happy enough for this game to mimic Dragon Quest, but the developers put a lot of thought into how to replicate the source material’s sprawling, messy cartoon brawls in an accessible turn-based combat engine. Taking on super-powered naval officers, screen-filling monsters, and many outlaw dens, I was always happy to see the Straw Hat Pirates band together against the often overwhelming odds.
Everyone was kung fu dugong
Combat in One Piece Odyssey is initially familiar: four of my characters take turns trading punches with a bunch of enemies, but the scale is new. Each party member can face off against a separate enemy group of up to four enemies in their own part of the battlefield. While some attacks are limited to targeting nearby enemies, others can be used to hit distant enemies, or go bowling for meatheads by smashing a mook into their nearby friends. I’m particularly fond of attacks that launch enemies in the direction of a distant crew member, leading to fun mid-battle gags. Some of Luffy’s crew appreciate new goals, while others (Usopp) prefer to have less on their plate.
Surprise bonus objectives called Dramatic Scenes are an added twist. Sometimes the game asks you to take out an enemy with a specific character or save a crew member before they get hit by a big attack. Completing these objectives can give a big XP boost, and sometimes the system is also used to add a bit more character to the fights. When Sanji and Zoro stand together, their rivalry can result in some banter and their Tech Points (the MP equivalent of this game) can be fully charged.
Despite all these nice touches, One Piece Odyssey lacks difficulty settings or scalability, meaning the first 5-10 hours are extremely easy. Even without paying attention to stats and largely ignoring synergies between characters, it wasn’t until 15 hours into Odyssey that I saw my first character knocked out, and a quick-healing item brought them back to life seconds later. The difficulty levels out a bit after that point, but that’s a long wait for a challenge.
Smooth sailing
But even if they’re easy, the fights are fun to watch. Beautifully replicated, One Piece captures the visual tone of the anime, but channels a bit of the manga’s style by rendering shadows as increasingly dense lines of shadow, mimicking Oda’s art. It’s a very charming detail that felt so natural that I didn’t notice it at first. It helps the exaggerated designs of wide-eyed cartoon monsters work into 3D and fit naturally with the more subdued geography.
While largely linear, One Piece Odyssey’s dungeons and towns are fun to wander through and rummage through. In the overworld, each character has their own interaction options: Luffy can cross gaps with his stretchy rubber arms, Zoro can slice through metal bars, Franky can build bridges over specific gaps, and Sanji can smell fresh ingredients a mile away. It’s often worth taking the time to chat with the NPCs as well. While not materially worth it, they have plenty of little jokes to add: guards who forgot their guns at home, outlaws who have doubts about their career choices, shopkeepers who’ve been squabbled to the ground by Nami, and cheeky talking animals. Chopper.
As charming as the NPCs are, they don’t get in the way of the animation much, with conversation outside of the big plot scenes looking a bit stiff and clunky. Fortunately, the combat animations are a treat. Most of the characters (not Brook – the undead get no respect) have an unreasonably long list of attacks that represent almost every notable named technique or attack panel from the manga. These animations are fast, clear and bursting with nostalgia. Thankfully, there’s an option to double the speed of all combat animations so they never grind like an overlong, unskippable Final Fantasy call.
Technically, there’s little to complain about here, aside from a lack of ultra-wide monitor support. There’s a fair amount of graphics and control settings, and it plays equally well on gamepad or mouse/keyboard. It even supports high refresh rates, which looks great in combat, though some cutscenes only run at 30fps. If you have a Steam Deck you’ll probably want to limit the game to 30fps for consistency and battery saving, but otherwise you shouldn’t have any issues. (Not really a technical note, but Odyssey only contains Japanese audio. Subtitles or bust, and some occasional chatter are not translated at all.)
One Piece Odyssey is a beautiful new adventure with an unexpectedly bittersweet tone, expanding the world of a venerable manga/anime. It celebrates 25 years of pirate adventures while recreating the vaguely sad atmosphere surrounding the announcing the final saga (opens in new tab). Like the TV anime, it’s a bit slack and some trimming would have made for a consistently thrilling 30-hour game rather than a meandering 50-hour game. But if you’ve been following One Piece all along, chances are you’re here for a leisurely cruise, rather than a race to the finish.