One Piece: World Seeker Review (PS4)

One Piece is one of the most popular manga and anime series in existence, spanning over 90 volumes and 800 anime episodes. Of course the character of Monkey D. Luffy has become recognizable even outside of his franchise, appearing in other media such as cross-over games, magazines and more.

A JRPG set in the One Piece universe

The latest entry in the One Piece universe seems to be Ganbarion's One Piece: World Seeker, a JRPG that features an original story and a massive world to explore. The game marketed itself as being an "open-world" JRPG, and it stays true to that claim, since you can pretty much do whatever you want in it, and there doesn't seem to be any restrictions as to what areas you can visit.

 An original story

One Piece: World Seeker is mostly targeted at fans of the franchise, since you'll find plenty of familiar characters, starting from Monkey D. Luffy and the rest of the Straw Hat Pirates and even featuring characters that are original to the story, such as Jeanne and her brother, the antagonistic warden of Sky Prison.

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The game takes place on a prison island known in the past or the jewel mining  activities that took place which is what draws the Staw Hat pirates to it in the first place. However, the island is also home to three prisons. These prisons are the main reason the island is riddled with guards, which make up the majority of the enemies you will face throughout the course of your adventure. One complete run through the game's story will take about 8 to 9 hours to complete, but that's only if you ignore all side quests and play it on Easy difficulty where 2-3 hits are enough to knock a guard out. However, One Piece: World Seeker features 4 different difficulty settings, so that even hardcore gamers can get a thrill out of combat.

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Move and fight as Luffy

You control Monkey D. Luffy from a third person's perspective, and as Luffy, you gain control of all of the powers he is known for ever since he ate the Gum-Gum fruit. These include stretching limbs which allow him to sling from building to building like an anime Peter Parker (yes, moving around with Luffy made me relive my Spider-Man experience).

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More so, The game's combat features stealth elements and Luffy can use the Observation Haki to see enemies from behind walls, as well as figure out if he's been exposed or not. Techniques from the anime like  Gum Gum Bazooka are also featured in the game, and even trump card moves such as Second, Third and Fourth Gear are obtainable later on.  The problem is that more often than not you'll find yourself using signature fighting skills that were used in the manga or anime's most crucial moments just to fight off lousy henchmen, as there are almost no boss encounters during the game. But hey, if you're a fan of overkill and love to pummel a single soldier into oblivion with a barrage of machine-gun punches, then knock yourself out!

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Exploration and finding secrets

One Piece: World Seeker holds a massive game world that hides plenty of secrets to be found,  ranging from hidden objects, NPCs, and treasure. Besides, the environment looks quite beautiful and there will be moments when you'll be using Luffy's Gum Gum Rocket technique just to reach high points from where you can take some sweet looking screenshots.

One drawback about your environment is the lack of NPCs, or at least friendly ones. Besides a handful of original characters that are the backbone of the story, everyone else is only there for the sake of giving, helping with or being the person you submit a quest to. This makes One Piece: World Seeker seem rather deserted, especially when you'd expect to find tens or even hundreds of people going about with their lives in the middle of the towns you get to explore. One of the greatest lore-related ironies originated from the manga that managed to find its way into the game is that Luffy, one of the world's most well-known pirates of the game, is weakened by water. However, unlike the source material where he'd just be rendered powerless, water proves to be fatal to Luffy, so try to avoid falling in it, especially since the whole game takes place on an island....which by definition is surrounded by water....LOTS of water!

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Clunky menu

The only part of the game that is truly annoying is precisely the element that reminds you that this is a game, and that is the UI. Maybe I'm not used to the controls of a console as much as I am with a mouse and keyboard, but I have to admit that if it weren't for an online guide, I would have never figured out how in God's good name I could access the Skill Menu. I had the same issue with the inventory and some other features, and I guarantee that 90% of the times you'll be entering the "Options" menu, you'll be doing it to re-read the tutorials, because for some unknown reason, they seem easily forgettable.

The Good

The Bad

Conclusion