Forgettable Odyssey

Greatest-selling manga One Piece isn’t wanting recreation variations. Along with crusing the Grand Line, the Straw Hat Pirates have navigated by a number of video games starting from preventing to journey. Now it has anchored in a full-fledged role-playing recreation with One Piece Odyssey. The sport spares no effort in making an attempt to draw previous and new followers alike, promising a brand new story written by Eiichiro Oda, One Piece’s legendary creator. Nonetheless, One Piece Odyssey finally ends up enjoying it too secure. The entire thing could be very predictable and uninspiring. Fight ages shortly, and exploration tires of itself, buying and selling freedom for linearity proper off the bat. It’s an expertise that can possible solely fulfill the most important followers of the manga.

The sport begins with a neat cutscene that includes the crew of the Straw Hat’s trademark abilities. Every member flashes their abilities in opposition to sharp, flying icicles, however quickly are shipwrecked on an uncharted island. It’s as much as the crew to unravel its thriller, repair their ship, and discover Captain Luffy’s much-loved straw hat. In between, the colourful personalities of the characters are showcased as they discover the area. One Piece Odyssey makes no effort at correctly introducing every pirate; followers of the collection want no introduction. For these unfamiliar with the Straw Hats, solely indifference is in retailer for them.

Many of the recreation’s eventualities are a sight for sore eyes.

Right away, One Piece Odyssey introduces the participant to the sport’s distinctive characters, Lim and Adio. Each instantly partake within the narrative, serving as key characters in its unfolding. Lim additionally acts as a conduit for non-fan gamers. After a fundamental tutorial and overview of Waford Island, One Piece Odyssey introduces the Memoria mechanic, which has the Straw Hats tackling earlier arcs of the manga. That is the place confusion will set in for newcomers, felling caught enjoying a direct sequel with out having skilled its predecessor. The narrative information is Lim, whose job is to flood the crew with questions in regards to the corresponding Memoria whereas additionally giving context to these unaware of those occasions. Nonetheless, it feels rushed and cropped, as if the sport already anticipated gamers to be acquainted with it.

Within the first Memoria, the sport introduces a function known as Logs. They current a stunningly creative retrospective of the arc. Like Lim, Logs assist contextualize these new to One Piece. Nonetheless, since this function is optionally available, Logs will be simply neglected, including to the mess. Outdated followers may respect the flashback, because it acts as an interactive retrospective. These summaries grow to be tedious to observe with the frequency they arrive up.

Between the Logs and visits to Memoria, the sport is fueled by its turn-based battle system. One Piece Odyssey brings just a few twists to the traditional tackle turn-based battles, permitting an additional dose of technique with its rock-paper-scissors construction and zone-based battlefield dubbed the Scramble Battle Space system. Upon coming into a struggle, there’s the chance that the 4 celebration members shall be separated into zones, no matter whether or not an enemy is current in it or not. Primary assaults and close-range skills are reserved for enemies in the identical zone, whereas long-range skills can hit any opponent.

Events heal the crew and supply buffs for subsequent battles.

Every unit in fight is one among three sorts: Energy, Approach, or Pace. Energy is robust in opposition to Pace; Pace beats Approach; Approach overpowers Energy. If an ally is caught with an enemy whose assault kind is robust in opposition to their very own, the scenario thickens —or at the very least it ought to. Social gathering members will be switched on the fly, both with the reserves or these at the moment in battle. Subsequently, disadvantageous conditions can simply be rectified, which undermines the technique of the battle system. The participant solely must trade the Straw Hat on the weak level with one other one with an edge in opposition to the enemies in that zone, and that’s it; disadvantageous scenario erased. Moreover, battles are extraordinarily straightforward to start out with and there’s no option to enhance problem. A number of abilities that strike the enemy’s weak level give a one-hit KO, discrediting any tactic.

To diversify, some battles function dramatic scenes. These scenes grant bonuses to enemies, reminiscent of a short lived assault enhance or the warning that they’ll unleash a strong capacity the following flip. The sport then presents a requirement to resolve these dramatic scenes, reminiscent of killing the enemy with a selected character. If the participant succeeds, they acquire an especially beneficiant post-battle expertise bonus. Dramatic scenes can contain utilizing somebody whose weak spot is the enemy’s kind, making a risk-and-reward state of affairs. To counteract these conditions, One Piece Odyssey has an tools system known as badges. Every character has a board, and every badge has a form, like a Tetris piece. It’s as much as the participant to suit these badges, which give bonuses in attributes or resistances. An easy crafting system creates buffing meals for the celebration, debuffing gadgets for the enemies, and improves the badges. Nonetheless, seasoned RPG gamers will shortly acknowledge the perfect construct and break the sport early on.

Fulfilling dramatic scenes is essential to shortly stage up characters.

On the creative entrance, One Piece Odyssey leaves nothing to be desired. The graphics are vibrant, refined, and downright beautiful. The particular results of every talent in battle are a deal with. Whereas the participant can velocity up the fight, they’ll at the very least watch every new set of abilities acquired on the finish of each chapter to understand their results. The surroundings can also be lush, wealthy intimately and intricacy. Maps function components so far as the attention can see at a constant and excessive framerate. The artwork path, coupled with the soundtrack, makes One Piece Odyssey a delightfully visible feast. Every space, whether or not within the Memoria arcs or on Waford Island, encompasses a stellar, joyful, and adventurous soundtrack. Even with fixed interjections at any time when a personality makes use of their tasteless discipline talent, immersion is inevitable.

In the case of exploration, the sport stumbles. Straw Hats are essentially the most landlubbin’ pirates ever, and gamers shouldn’t anticipate a ship voyage. Within the first chapters, the sport misleads, giving the impression that its areas are huge and rewardingly explorable. Nonetheless, One Piece Odyssey quickly turns into a primarily linear expertise. The sport options quite a few optionally available content material, reminiscent of bounty hunts; sidequests; Reminiscence Hyperlinks, which train celebration members abilities activated as pairs or trios; and treasure hunts. Sidequests are easy, typically humorous, however solely partaking for these conversant in the solid. Additionally they lack diligence and have a evident drawback of inconsistency. Lim watches the Straw Hats’ progress intently, commenting on how unusual and alien their actions are in comparison with the pirate stereotype. Ultimately, she varieties an opinion about them all through the primary story. Nonetheless, if gamers return to finish sidequests from earlier chapters, Lim’s conduct will pertain to that chapter, ignoring all her character growth. This creates a distracting inconsistency within the lady’s conduct.

The characters have totally different discipline abilities. Zoro can slice down iron doorways, and Chopper suits in small gaps.

Between the primary story, touring to previous arcs, and finishing optionally available content material, One Piece Odyssey’s pacing is in every single place. The primary half of the chapter record appears to make up 80% of the sport, between meaningless back-and-forth fetching quests and filler cutscenes, whereas the opposite half runs over occasions and unravels mysteries in a single sitting. Essentially the most awe-looking and thrilling Memoria chapter concludes roughly thirty minutes in, losing its great potential, whereas an earlier chapter took its candy time letting the participant wander by a flat desert chasing after their stolen pockets or meals. Odyssey is uninspiring; gamers know precisely what to anticipate at every chapter’s finish, what technique to make use of in each battle, and even the narrative end result.

One Piece Odyssey is a blatantly predictable and run-of-the-mill expertise. Whereas it could appear apparent that an anime recreation is focused to an viewers conversant in it, one could marvel why to waste a possibility to make it extra democratic and appeal to new followers. The tweaks to the traditional turn-based battle construction are welcome however fall brief as a result of recreation’s unchallenging problem and easy-to-break tools system. Die-hard One Piece followers will be capable of respect the sport as an interactive memory of its arcs with minor redesigns. But, these searching for a daring and distinctive recreation could have to look elsewhere.

Disclosure: This assessment relies on a free copy of the sport offered by the writer.

BATTLE SYSTEM

    

INTERACTION

    

ORIGINALITY

    

STORY

    

MUSIC & SOUND

    

VISUALS

    

Stunning and charming world
Battle animations are beautiful
Dramatic scenes are ingenious

An uninspiring and predictable narrative
Uninteresting exploration and aspect content material
Fight is unchallenging and repetitious
Unwelcoming to gamers unfamiliar with One Piece