REVIEW: ‘ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet’ Is A Gomu Gomu Good Time

ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet, the new restaurant management simulator from Kairosoft and Bandai Namco Entertainment, feels like a fever dream. A constant dopamine rush that is equal parts overwhelming and exciting, ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet feels squarely aimed at fans of the franchise. While it does have issues and may be too much for anyone who isn’t familiar with the Straw Hats and the oceans they roam, ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet is a ton of fun, equal parts charming and utterly chaotic. 

ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet starts out simply enough, with the Straw Hats being separated. Sanji and Luffy stumble onto some of Sanji’s old friends from the seafaring restaurant known as the Baratie. They quickly learn that a fake Baratie has been going around and making terrible dishes, scamming people and ruining the reputation of the original restaurant. Sanji decides to fight back, building a second Baratie to go after the fakes, restoring the glory of the name and feeding folks from all over the ONE PIECE universe. 

It’s a fun setup that gives a general narrative construct to the inevitable restaurant chaos. You start in what resembles the East Blue, developing recipes and taking care of the restaurant itself. Sanji and company automatically handle all the cooking and food prep, while the player is responsible for just about everything else. Expanding the restaurant, fulfilling requests, putting down tables and decorations, finding the lost Straw Hats – all of it happens simultaneously in a blur of visual splendor and noise. 

ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet has a fun setup for the impending chaos.

There’s an inherent giddiness to seeing over 400 characters from across the series come together in one place. There are tons of little interactions between them that feel true to who they are. Hachi and Kuroobi gush about Arlong, Nami and Genzo squabble, Luffy and Bon Clay gleefully reunite – all of it feels exactly as it should. For long-time fans of the franchise, it’s awesome seeing these interactions play out. 

This love for the series it pulls from extends past these interactions. You can give gifts to customers, converting them into fans with enough time and effort. Once they’re fans, they can come see you no matter where the new Baratie is on the ocean, even joining as workers under the right conditions.

If you know these characters, it’s almost intuitive knowing what to give them. Of course Tashigi would love a book dedicated to swords. It feels rewarding to nail these moments as a fan, and even if you don’t know the series super well, it does tell you who prefers what gift. 

New One Piece fans face a learning curve, while longtime fans will appreciate the details.

ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet is a constant visual onslaught. While things may start deceptively slow, the gameplay loop explodes quickly with new recipes, visitors, decoration choices, and plenty more. Every new recipe found can be added to a set that can get more expensive the better it gets, with each new decoration raising the comfort level of an area. Catering to your guests’ needs becomes the main focus, as some prefer to sit in pirate-themed areas, while others want their table to be as marine-friendly as possible. 

All of this is constantly playing out in real time, a flurry of orders coming in, customers going in and out, interactions happening – so much so that it can be overwhelming at first. ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet does a good job of doling out new systems as the days go by, and you start to settle into a rhythm. You send Luffy out, potentially with another Straw Hat, to explore and collect resources. You make new recipes, decorate a new area, expand the ship – the at-first choppy waves start to feel like new opportunities and interactions. 

The thing is, the UI is definitely a roadblock. Even after hours and hours with the game, I still find myself hitting the wrong button. It’s not intuitive, with many simple options like moving furniture buried behind multiple menu options. It never truly feels like you know where to go to accomplish something. There are UI elements that show you when something is new, which is super helpful, but you end up relying on it too much rather than it becoming second nature. 

The UI elements aren’t intuitive for players to use, making it tricky to navigate independently.

There are some technical issues on Switch 2, as well. The game can slow down a bit when things start to get really busy. It’s not awful but can be noticeable. Alongside that, there’s a fuzziness to the picture at the edges of the screen. It’s most apparent when you zoom in and out on sections. When everything in the center is so detailed, and the sprite work is so expressive, the fuzziness does stand out. 

ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet works so well as a celebration of all things ONE PIECE. It nails the animations, interactions, and overall feel, almost like reading an unexplored, sillier chapter of the East Blue. How that translates to people who are not fans is a question. A lot of these moments aren’t explained or explored, relying on the players’ baked-in knowledge of the franchise.

In the end, ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet celebrates all things One Piece.

For fans, that’s awesome and can feel totally rewarding. For everyone else, it can end up feeling like a flurry and overload of information and characters. You could totally get by without that experience, as the fundamental restaurant management loop is engaging and a ton of fun, but that magic just isn’t the same.

Overall, ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet is exactly what it needed to be. It’s charming, fun, and as a massive fan of all things ONE PIECE, it feels like a game I’ve always dreamed of playing. Kairosoft is the perfect developer for this style of game, a marriage of technical experience and obvious love for the IP. While there are UI issues and it may not land as hard for non-fans, I have a giant smile plastered on my face every minute playing ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet. 

ONE PIECE: Grand Gourmet is now available to play on Switch, Switch 2, PC, Android, and iOS.