ONE PIECE: GRAND BATTLE SWAN COLOSSEUM
Original Release: Bandai, 2002, Wonderswan
The grandiose title fails to deliver with a rather limited and mediocre hybrid fighting game
One Piece: Grand Battle Swan Colosseum (Wonderswan, Bandai, 2002)
Where to Buy: Play-Asia
How to Emulate: coming soon!
Review by: C. M0use
One Piece has been one of the world's most popular manga/anime for over 25 years now, but I still have no real personal exposure to it other than seeing people use the bug eye fisherman hat guy as their forum PFP and such. I think part of the issue may be that it's a "shonen" meant for a younger audience that didn't start getting big outside of Japan until I was already in my 20s and way past its demographic wheelhouse, that and these gigantically long series just seem too overwhelming to get into once you've missed years of them if nothing about it really jumps out at you. And, if I can be honest, the bug eye hat kid just reflexively annoys me for some reason, like I just can't stand the sight of him. It may not be fair, but it is what it is.
Anyway, the point of all that preamble is that I know nothing about the series and can't evaluate how this game does it justice or fits into the canon or whatever. I'm just reviewing its merits as a fighting game, which really are middling at absolute best.
The style is in an odd place between a traditional 2D fighter and Smash Bros. It kinda resembles what Guilty Gear was going for with the Isuka sub-series, particularly Dust Strikers, though those games all came out years after this did. It ends up kinda feeling like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Fighter, just with less elaborate levels; there are only a handful (despite an 8 MB cartridge, large for the Wonderswan) and there aren't many little perches, items or ways in which the terrain levels really make a difference in the fight.
Also, I admit I didn't do a real deep dive into this, but it just feels unbalanced after a few casual plays. The guys who actually dressed for the pirate job and brought swords seem to be the by far the best equipped, slashing through opponents with dominating high-priority attacks. The main kid's extendo-limbs are also pretty cheaply spammable, with the AI being overall pretty derpy (it sometimes can't figure out elevation changes for a while and just sits there kicking at air), at least until you get to the last boss. On that subject, the game is padded out by having you fight him three times in a row, and the fights are identical except that he starts dealing out ridiculous damage in the final one.
For big fans, there are a few hidden characters to unlock and a set of something like 50 collectible cards that serve as achievements. I don't feel it really does anything at all to sell newcomers on the series though. It's in Japanese with no translations available at the moment, but what "story" there is seems limited to a few text blurbs between static talking heads in between the matches. As with many licensed games of the 2D era, it seems to assume that anyone buying it is already a big fan and already familiar with the characters and story it's referencing.
Comments
Post a Comment