Review for One Piece: World Seeker. Game for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 14/03/2019 The version for PC came out on 15/03/2019 The version for Xbox One came out on 15/03/2019
Open world e One Piece, a combination that on paper would make any lover of Oda's work or more generally of shonen anime / manga jump on the chair. Yet, once again we find ourselves in the review stage to set aside our teenage dreams and to abandon in hopes of a title that will allow us to sail the Big Blue shouting "Come on, all boarding!" together with Giorgio Vanni and Cristina D'Avena.
In the panorama of video games based on anime / manga, One Piece World Seeker it is certainly one of the most ambitious products of recent years. Ganbarion he certainly wanted to try to recreate the emotions that One Piece has made his own for more than twenty years, especially that constant feeling of discovery and mystery that surrounds each new Luffy's journey. Unfortunately, however, One Piece World Seeker betrays its aims, proposing a lean open world, without bite, unable to stimulate the player to explore every square centimeter of the Prison Island in search of even the most ephemeral quotation. The plot, unpublished compared to what was proposed by the master Oda in his work, would like to propose an intriguing narrative arc characterized by the maturity of some details, such as the tragic and devastating past of Jeanne or the separation of Luffy (for the umpteenth time) from his crew, but in practice it all comes down to a set of flat, soulless dialogues, which do not come close to what is proposed in the manga. Between the meaningless appearance of Luffy's historical enemies, silly side missions and a bizarre Karma system (whereby considering some secondary characters based on your in-game actions, ONLY increases the number of dialogue lines) the only element that stands out is the main villain Isaac: the scientist of the Celestial Prison is respectful of the distinctive traits of the main antagonists of One Piece and his meticulous and successful realization makes us wonder why the same care was not used for the other sides of fiction.
Yet another disappointment on the combat system side: despite being in front of a Luffy animation park really well done and faithful to the paper / television counterpart, the moveset, the two fighting styles (agility and armor) and the lack of a depth of combo entrusted to more keys (only the finishers have a mapping on multiple and different buttons) reduce the gameplay to a little effective button mashing. Not even the introduction of the skill tree to unlock the skills with the classic PA and a small RPG component linked to the equipment (why ?!), raise the fortunes, indeed, if possible they increase the load of negativity, resulting not very intuitive, useless and inconclusive for the purpose of advancement given the disconcerting ease, even at higher difficulty levels.
The strength of One Piece World Seeker is instead the technical sector. The world created by Ganbarion is absolutely a feast for the eyes: colorful, sparkling, clean and respectful of what we have always seen in Oda's work. Both the Prison Island and the Celestial Prison offer a recognizable style, capable of striking the player. At the same time, however, the contrast with what the gameplay offers in negative terms is able to confuse the user, leaving him helpless in the face of the possibilities that the title could have exploited and which unfortunately wastes instead.
The contrast between the cartoonish style of the character models and the similar realism of the setting, moreover, create an intriguing combination that enhances the fidelity of the characters, whether they are main characters or “minion” of the navy, in the eyes of the player. And precisely among the ranks of the opponents there is also the excellent variety of types of enemies, which are inspired, varied and well contextualized with the environment that surrounds them and with the original work.
Instead, it is the choice to use only Luffy as a playable character that is truly out of place; the straw hat pirate, in fact, beyond the two aforementioned fighting styles (and the Gear Fourth as a temporary enhancement) is extremely limited, especially due to the diluted unlocking of the skills over time. The choice to make the supporting actors appear only in the short and sporadic cutscenes seemed inconceivable for the game design, especially in light of a franchise that has made the team (Mugiwara, remember Mugiwara!) a real backbone of its essence.
Certain that the open world formula can really be the most suitable option for One Piece, it is clear that One Piece World Seeker could be a first experiment of what the future awaits us for the titles related to the work of Oda. But there remains a bitter taste in the mouth for what the title was not and what will remain: a half-wasted opportunity, another "I wish but I can't" that adds to the long list of titles based on anime / manga.
Being invested with expectations higher than realistic was perhaps the biggest problem of One Piece World Seeker, a title that could have sanctioned a new beginning for this genre of video games. The shining world conceived by Ganbarion and the premises glimpsed with the characterization of Isaac give us hope for a new possibility in the future in which, with the accumulated experience, to raise the open world-One Piece binomial. In the meantime, however, day and evening, the flag, with a threatening skull always flutters; wind in the sails, for the route that will lead to the treasure, a treasure called One Piece.
► One Piece: World Seeker is an Action-Adventure game developed by Ganbarion and published by Bandai Namco for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 14/03/2019 The version for PC came out on 15/03/2019 The version for Xbox One came out on 15/03/2019
