Pirate adventures, turn-based combat and immersion in One Piece Odyssey | Review

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One Piece Odyssey is a game in the RPG genre, with turn-based style battles that put us in the perspective of the pirates of the One Piece anime universe, to explore a relatively open world, and participate in various adventures.
Features

One Piece Odyssey, developed by ILCA and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment, was released on January 13, 2023, and made available for Microsoft Windows, Playstation 4, Playstation 5, and Xbox Series X/S. 

One Piece Odyssey is a simple game and at the same time has its difficulty, it does not have many mechanics, since it consists of exploring a world that seems to be open, but has elements of linearity and turn-based combat, which in my experience is the most complex point of the game. 

For fans of One Piece who like turn-based games, perhaps it is a great experience, of the opportunity to be in the perspective of pirates, with beautiful animations and graphics for the genre, however, with locked controls when exploring and during my sessions, I believe that the interface during battle is polluted, with disproportionate elements, especially against many enemies.



Story

The story of One Piece Odyssey, from the very first cutscene, is very well told, as it makes a whole context to justify the odyssey that was presented, even during the game, the interactions with the map say something, and the group of pirates interacts with each other. 

At first, we are thrown onto a seemingly deserted island and soon discover that Nami, is lost, which delivers our main focus, to get the group together and find her.

But that's just our initial goal, after all, for the adventure, we're going to need everyone, right? 



The systems behind it

One Piece Odyssey is a single-player experience, with only the story mode existing, with a classic save system, given by some sort of artifacts that are scattered around the map. 

In summary, the game does not have complex systems, being exploration and battle, practically. So, I found that I learned very quickly how everything works and how I would survive. 

I am not a fan of games that have turn-based combat, but in One Piece Odyssey the combat manages to be very dynamic, although the camera positioning does not favor a wide view of the battlefield. 

In addition, there is an item system, with the possibility of use during combat, but with that old mechanic of losing the turn when using, as in my experience with turn-based combat I do not like to risk too much, I always use my items as healing or enhancements for my characters during combat and surprisingly it works very well.



Mechanics

One Piece Odyssey, in short, has pretty simple mechanics, we walk around the world, accomplish objectives, and fight enemies in a turn-based system. 

The battles, the game's strong point in-game mechanics, are done in turns, with the possibility of normal attacks, skills, and items. 

Within combat, skills cost points, which are acquired simply by fighting, so it is a regenerative system, but beware, these points run out if not well managed. In some moments, especially at the beginning of the game, I didn't know how to manage them and sometimes I got in trouble. 



The game has a mechanic that is introduced early on, that Luffy can use his arm as a kind of hook and can move between places that would not be accessed easily, at first it seems a little difficult, but you can get used to it. 

What brings me to the main negative point of the game, is the movement of the characters, you can change the protagonist of the group throughout the journey, but unfortunately, they all freeze, but because of the game system itself. 

Another point to highlight is the save system, which I do not like, but for the dynamics of the game makes a lot of sense, progression is required to reach the save points, although a classic system, which is used for years, in my opinion, could be different and more dynamic.



Gameplay

The gameplay is fluid in combat, when we are just exploring, I found the movement to be very slow, with the feeling of there being invisible walls all the time, which is really frustrating. 

During my experience, I used a mouse and keyboard, and control, and I felt that the control matches more with the game's key mapping, although we can change the controls in the settings.

The game has great optimization, maintaining high frame rates most of the time, sometimes when I enter a different zone than the one I'm in, the game chokes and returns to normal quickly, it's not a nuisance, but it is a rather old system.

I had no difficulty with the adaptation with the control, but the mouse and keyboard did not feel comfortable, the impression I had is that to be released for the PC, everything was adapted, although really very simple, it was not a cool experience. 

The audio of the game is excellent, the soundtrack fits with all situations, the dubbing is impeccable, and overall is very faithful to the anime, being for me, the highlight of the game. 



Localization and assistances

The game has only Portuguese texts, the dubbing is always in Japanese. Overall, the localization is very good and many times the game experience is like being inside the anime. 

The assistances of the game are limited, counting only with basic settings, changing the graphic options, and the possibility of customizing controls to meet improve the experience, if necessary.



Experience

Overall, the game is beautiful, and well set, with excellent audio features and combat that pleases even those who are not fans of turns, however, its movement in the exploration is quite limited, the invisible walls will get in the way and many times the controls look original seem to make no sense, being necessary to change. 

In summary, it is a very good experience, the fidelity of the anime is impressive, and will please people who just had contact with this universe and long-time fans with emphasis really on the game's setting and its dubbing. The features offered are well crafted, being able to innovate in some aspects, such as not losing a turn when using some item. 

One Piece Odyssey will hold you for hours and for sure will bring you a lot of fun, my recommendation is to change the controls if they are bothering you and raise the volume of music and voices, it's worth it! 

Thanks to Bandai Namco Entertainment for the access key to the game. For this review, the game was played on PC and using the Steam platform. 
 
Veredito
84
Excelente

One Piece Odyssey is a role-playing game, with turn-based battles that if in the universe of the One Piece anime. It is not the first game in the series, but it certainly has its highlights and is worth playing.

Scoring

  • Gameplay
    75
  • Graphics
    90
  • Audio
    95
  • History
    90
  • Controls
    70
Scoring Criteria
About the author
#
barbositos
Redator
Graduado em direito, fã de MMORPGs, séries e música.
About the game
One Piece: Odyssey

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