Ready for More Straw Hat Luffy?

Luffy and his pirate crew are back for a brand new adventure in One Piece Unlimited World Red. While this new story is not going to follow anything seen on the One Piece anime, Eiichiro Oda (the creator of the One Piece series) is over-seeing the storylines, so I am confident that it will fit right in with the series seamlessly. Like before, you will be playing as Luffy and the other members of his crew. You’ll fight against enemies and go through the story in episodes as in the previous games. Supposedly this time, we will be getting a "central town" that you can continually return to. In this town, you can take on additional side-quests if you want, more like a full-fledged RPG rather than a story that you have to play in order. I am quite looking forward that variability.

While I have no clue what the new story is going to entail, I can tell you that you will have two new characters. They were both created by Eiichiro Oda for the game. One is a villain pirate named Red Count. The other is an upbeat raccoon creature called Pato. You can see what he looks like in one of the screenshots on the official website. He’s a smallish creature in a very pink hooded coat. I am guessing he is a good guy, but I can’t promise that for sure. There is more than just the new characters to get you excited though. There is a new mode, Coliseum, which promises the ability to fight enemies at will. Since you can go wherever you wish, as in a more traditional RPG, this Coliseum Mode will give you the ability to go test out any new skills at any time, just to make sure you’re ready for whatever you may encounter.

So far, I have loved the One Piece games (even though I still haven’t made time to catch the anime). I have felt that they were a bit limited in that you had to play things in order, which didn’t really give you much variability. Also, they have just announced that after you have beaten the game once, you will unlock a new "Difficult" mode where the enemies will be harder, but there will be better rewards. I am quite looking forward to seeing the new changes, so it looks like I’ve got to block off more time for a more addictive version of One Piece in One Piece Unlimited World Red quite soon as the release date is coming up in less than a month. Check it out for yourself on July 8th! I do recommend checking it out on that day as there is also very limited, one day only, "Day One Edition" content available.