The One Piece franchise continues to grow, with Netflx’s live-action series filming Season 2 and a remake of the anime coming out eventually. Naturally, the series has plenty of video games, with more to come once Bandai Namco stops milking Pirate Warriors 4 for all its worth.
While seeing the series have plenty of fun and receive unique video games is cool, I can’t help but ask: why isn’t there an English dub?
Don’t get me wrong, the Japanese cast of One Piece is excellent, giving great performances to lines they’ve repeated hundreds, if not thousands, of times. Bandai Namco is aware of this, as the company has released numerous games in this series without an English dub. It’s an understandable move, as not having an English dub saves money.
However, when the action ramps up in games like Pirate Warriors 4, finding the dialogue boxes and understanding what’s going on in the story can be challenging. In manic situations where enemies are all over the screen, having these characters speak in English would help us know what’s happening as we mash buttons.
This isn’t as big an issue when the games are much slower-paced like the One Piece Odyssey RPG. Odyssey has turn-based battles and cutscenes dedicated to important story moments, so an English dub isn’t as important in theory. However, fans of the English cast would still want to see them perform these lines, which is important enough for us.
Even if anime games don’t need English dubs, the fact that most titles have them is great for accessibility. Various games from Dragon Ball and Naruto provide plenty of subs to choose from, giving fans more choices than most. Aside from English, these games tend to have Spanish and French dubs, adding more international flavor to them.
click to enlargeIf Bandai Namco doesn’t plan on making a new One Piece game soon, which seems unlikely, they could always add a dub for Pirate Warriors 4 or Odyssey. That’s extra work, sure, but fans of the English cast would appreciate it and maybe even replay these games to see how the actors perform.
For the sake of this argument, it’s worth noting that the underrated My Hero One’s Justice 2 added an English dub a few weeks after release. This was met with positive acclaim from fans and even convinced some of them to pick the game up. Considering how anime fans love the My Hero Academia English dub, this was a wise decision.
Although Bandai Namco has seemingly conditioned their fans not to expect one, One Piece games could really use an English dub. With accessibility and variety in mind, I think that the next video game adventure for Luffy and his Straw Hat pirates would benefit from its addition.