Developer: Tecmo Koei, Omega Force
Publisher: Namco Bandai
Platform: PS3, PS Vita
One Piece: Pirate Warriors 2 – Review
After the success of the first game, Tecmo Koei and Omega Force released One Piece: Pirate Warriors 2. Due to the success of the first game, the sequel was released just a year later. Is it possible to deliver a worthy sequel after such a short time? As a great One Piece fan, the game did not disappoint.
Story
The story is an “original” story that takes place after Luffy and his crew enter the New World. The prologue starts with the story of Sky Island to introduce the origin of the “Dials”, which might be useful for those who are not familiar with One Piece. After that the Strawhat Pirates find themselves on Punk Hazard where they find a room with strange dials. These dials emit some kind of smoke that takes control over you. Luckily Luffy and Nami manage to escape the smoke, while taking a strange dial with them. This dial is different from the ones that emitted the smoke. All of this being said, the adventure for getting the Strawhat Pirates back begins.
You’ll make a lot of unexpected allies during your playthrough. Seeing this is an original story that was created for the game, anything can happen. Prepare yourself for Luffy’s epic adventure to the New World.
Graphics
For a game that seems to be a Dynasty Warriors clone, graphical quality isn’t really a must. Luckily even games like this are getting better graphics with each release, bringing them up to par with the average PS3 games. Some cutscenes look like they are pulled right out of a One Piece 3D movie, while others are a lot less detailed.
Games like Dynasty Warrios tend to have trouble when you screen is flooded with enemies. This causes situations like having seemingly empty surroundings when all of a sudden enemies pop out of thin air. One Piece: Pirate Warriors 2 still has that problem, but a lot less than others games of the genre. Most of the time you can see the enemy approaching from a distance, which makes looking for the enemy a lot more fun. It also makes the game feel much more stable.
The environments look pretty detailed, and are very well designed. Sadly sometimes the levels with their ‘specific’ environments can be very repetitive. Luckily, you don’t play a game like this to stare at the surroundings with awe.
Sound
The music of the game however, I have nothing bad to say about. As a regular follower of the anime, I think the music fits the game perfectly. While playing the game you’ll never get the idea of thinking: ‘Oh no, not this song again’. It is possible that the music is a bit repetitive, but I never noticed it while bashing enemies.
Gameplay
Like in the Dynasty Warrior games, each level has a map, with different bases scattered on them. You will have to conquer these bases so you get more control of the map. To conquer a base, you’ll have to defeat a lot of enemies until the leader of the base appears. When you defeat this evil mastermind, the base is under your command. Unlike the typical Dynasty Warriors formulae, One Piece: Pirate Warriors 2 also includes missions you will have to complete while conquering the map. These missions can vary from protecting an ally while he’s going to a certain point on the map, keeping a place under control while an ally is there to search for something or defeating bosses to clear the level.
Each character, and there are around 30 in this game, has its own recognizable moves from the anime. Unfortunately in these games, there is always one combo with each character that you can spam throughout the whole game. This makes the game sometimes too easy and very repetitive. Luckily the bosses are somewhat tougher to beat. Bosses can perform a Style action. This means they use their Haki, a special power only a few possess. The stronger your Haki, the more powerful you are. While your enemy is in this state, he can avoid your attacks more quickly and deal you more damage. To even the score, you can also perform your style action, if your meter is full and go into this Haki state and kick his ass. While in this state you can also perform a crew strike by pressing circle. When activated you’ll perform an attack, and one of your crew mates, which is chosen at the beginning of every level, will finish the attack. Then for a short amount of time you will be able to play as this crewmate, to deal more damage.
When completing a level, you can see your accomplishments: The xp you’ve earned, the coins you’ve collected, the secret coins you’ve found and the amount of money you’ve earned. The coins you collect will go to your skill notebook, with its own set of bingo rules to it. There are nine coin slots on every skill note, and when you form a line of 3 coins, you will unlock a new skill. These skills can be set at the start of the level, however only a limited amount can be chosen. This amount increases as your character levels up. While you’re leveling up you will also unlock new combo moves for your character.
A new addition to this game is that you can send out a request rescue, and everybody who is playing the game will receive it. The one who accepts first will be able to play the level with you. This is handy for when for some reason you should be unable to complete the level on your own. Of course if you have a friend over, he can also help you by grabbing a second controller and play the level in split screen with you. So no worries if for some reason you do not have an internet connection for your game system, you can still get the help you need.
For the lazy people amongst us gamers, there is also the option to level up your characters with the Beli you gathered throughout the game. So if you do not want to level up all your characters by playing the game with them, just spend the money you earn on the leveling system. Of course there is a catch, you can only level up a character to the level of the character with the highest level. This means if you have one character on level 16, and all your other characters are level 1, you can only level up your characters to level 16 with the money system.
There are multiple game modes. You have the pirate’s log, in which you can play the main episode where you can complete the story. You can also play the Crew Episode, where you face many different characters in battle. Here you can also increase your allies if you do not have gathered them all already.
Then there is the Free log where you can freely choose a level to play.
In the online mode you can increase your rank and wanted rank and aim to be the one true Pirate King.
Last but not least there are the challenges, here you can take on special episodes. The minimum required level to start these episodes is level 25.
Conclusion
As much fun as this game is to One Piece fans, the gamers who do not know the Anime (or manga) can get bored quickly; seeing the game is a Dynasty Warriors clone set in the world of One Piece. The characters of One Piece fit the genre really well, as they have multiple attack combo’s which fit right into the game, meaning they can take out multiple enemies at once. As there are enough fans in the world, this game will certainly become another success from Namco Bandai. Also, who wouldn’t want to see their favorite anime characters come to live?
One Piece: Pirate Warriors 2 - Review,
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