If you follow me on Twitter, you can see my love for One Piece, from the anime to the manga, and even the video games. There hasn't been a lot of One Piece video games in the United States, but when I saw One Piece: Pirate Warriors was on the Playstation Store for $20, I had to download. One thing about the file size for this game- It's a big file. 11 GB. Make sure you have one of those 160 GB or 250 GB PS3's, and not those new 12 GB PS3's, which I say are the equivalent to the 4 GB XBOX 360's. But before I get off topic, let me get into my review of One Piece: Pirate Warriors, exclusively for the PS3.
One Piece: Pirate Warriors art cover
One Piece: Pirate Warriors covers most of the first part of the story of One Piece, starting from the East Blue Saga to the Return to Sabadoby Arc. It starts out two years after the time skip, which everyone is reuniting after the time skip. It's called "Episode 0", which is more like a tutorial than an actual stage. Once you complete this stage, it's much easier to play from here on out. It then flashes back to two years ago, which was before the timeskip, as the Strawhat Pirates talk about their stroy of everything they've been through over the years together. So far playing this game, I'm disspaionted that some stages are left out, like Syrup Village and Thriller Bark, but that shouldn't stop you from playing it. The stages are really long, and it takes you about 20-30 minutes just to beat one stage. Harder stages take about 40 minutes. The animation is very fluid, and this is a game that you must play on an HDTV. The animation is very beautiful, and you can tell that time and care went into makig this game, especially since it's One Piece's 15th Anniversary game.
Now for the gameplay. If you like Dynasty Warriors and Sengoku Basara: Samurai Warriors, you are going to love this game because it is almost exact to those types of games, except that you play as pirates instead of samurais. There are many playable characters in this game, from the protaganist Monkey D. Luffy and all of the Strawhat Pirates, to famous characters like Portgas D. Ace and Boa Hancock. You can also customize and level up these pirates by completing each stage, attacking as many enemies as you can, and collecting coins, which are put in place after the stage or in the Custimazation Option in the Home Screen. Other features is that each charcater has Normal Attacks pressing Square, Triangle, and L1, Signature Attacks, which are special to each character that can be changed using the D-Pad and R1, and a Special Attack, using R2. The game is in English, but with the Japanese voices. There is no English dub to this game sadly, because even I prefer the English dub over the Japanese audio.
Gameplay of One Piece: Pirate Warriors
There are also many bosses in this game, including Buggy the Clown, Lucci, and Monkey D. Garp. Boss battles take long to beat if you don't know how to attack, and sometimes very frusturating when you have to perform a specific action when they are constantly attacking you. Real time commands are also present in this game, and even if you mess up, you won't get attacked unlike in other games, for example the Naruto Storm series. Other features in this game include Another Log, which are kind of like challenges aside from the Main Log, and a library featuring voices and history of characters in the game. There are many other features which I do not remember at the time.
Overall, I give One Piece: Pirate Warriors a 9.0/10, my only concerns being that major arcs are left out, and that the game is in Japanese, having the English voices missing. Gameplay is smooth, attacks are easy, and patience in this game is a virtue. It's a lot of fun, and if you're a One Piece fan, this is a must buy. From all the playable characters to all the vast stages and animation, this is one game that you'll be happy to own, and after you finish this one, you'll want to buy it's sequel, which includes more stages and characters, and is a discussion for another day. From me to you, I hope you all like this game, and it's a great way to catch up to about 500 One Piece episodes, including two major arcs. But as I said before, that should not stop you from playing this game.
If you have any questions or want to discuss this game with me on Twitter, my account is @djddueces. Until next review guys!
