46) One-Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows (2020)

Starting as a webcomic in 2009, One-Punch Man is the story of Saitama, a regular guy who trains himself to the point of being able to defeat any enemy with, you guessed it, one punch. As such, he becomes bored and spends his time searching for stronger opponents. He's not a hero with deep convictions, instead he fights against the forces of evil for fun, as a way to feel something. In 2012, the story received a digital manga remake with an anime adaptation in 2015, and has since become on of the best selling manga series of all time.

The story of a hero who is so unbelievably powerful that the question is never if they can defeat the villain, but simply what will happen before they do is rather boring on the surface. The true charm and appeal comes from the self aware nature of the story combined with leaning into and subverting common tropes. Saitama is a clear parody of other powerful heroes, but unlike the numerous edgy variations of Superman that show the corruptibility of absolute power, we get a regular guy who goes shopping, contends with mosquitoes, and is simply bored.

As a comedy and parody, I adore One-Punch Man and cannot recommend the manga and anime more readily. However, with the immense popularity of the property, a video game was all but inevitable. How do you translate something as profoundly stupid as Saitama, who unwillingly becomes a mentor to Genos, a cyborg who would be a standard protagonist in a normal story, but is used primarily as a jobber in this setting? How do you make a video game about a character who, by definition, cannot lose? How do you give a sense of progression and growth when your main character received all of his off screen? Bandai Namco, as the default maker of anime based video games, did their level best to answer these questions.

The game begins with us making our character, a level one nobody that then gets shoehorned into the world of One-Punch Man. After being saved by Saitama, we begin down our path to become a hero. The game borrows quite heavily from, of all things, the Dragon Ball Xenoverse games, allowing us to complete missions to level up, acquire attacks and abilities from characters in the main story, and participate in well executed, though a tad lackluster, arena combat. As we progress, we acquire new customization options, new fighting styles and attacks, and unlock new characters to use in multiplayer.

The game is split between two types of missions, story and events. The majority of our time will be spend doing events, which allow us to level up our character and gain more fame. These range from incredibly silly quests, with equally ridiculous reasoning and dialogue, to incredibly boring slogs. Invariably, they always boil down to us fighting against one or more enemies that are made using the in-game character creation tools. Almost all of these characters look stupid, though that's part of the appeal.

Doing these will eventually allow us to play through the story missions, which mirror a lot of the events of the series. These tend to involve fighting enemies with ludicrous stats where the goal is to take them down to a certain percentage instead of outright beating them. We then have Saitama show up, which we get to play as, and regardless of how hard the enemy is, simply landing a normal punch obliterates them. While this might seem anticlimactic, it comes across hilariously and usually feels cathartic. This ends up like it does in the original story, with the added emphasis of Saitama noticing our character, casually saying hey, then leaving. Honestly, 10/10 on the writing here. I have no notes.

The biggest issues I have come less with the story, as going into a game like this expecting a serious plot would be asinine. Instead, I take issue with how much this game plays like the Xenoverse games. For those who haven't played them, the Xenoverse games allow you to make your very own Dragon Ball OC, complete with hundreds of attacks and costume options from the franchise's long history. Here, we're given a similar gameplay loop, but with an incredibly shallow move pool and customization options that try their best, but fall short. It's made less appealing by the sheer number of random characters you'll have to fight in order to progress.

The fighting system, being an arena fighter, is very much going to be polarizing. I didn't mind it, but most fights would work just as well in a 2D setting. The one addition this game adds that keeps things interesting is in how it handles its team based mechanic. While playing through missions, you'll oftentimes have either an ally or another enemy that is racing to the scene. This is shown with a manga style panel and a countdown. Once they arrive, you either have another character you can switch to on your side, or another enemy you'll have to take down. If you fall or your opponent fall before help arrives, then that ends the mission. It rewards you for being able to defeat enemies fast while also rewarding you for being able to hold out. It's a fun mechanic that exists primarily for the multiplayer mode, but is well incorporated into the single player.

In multiplayer, both sides get to choose a team of three. You can use your OC or any of the characters you've unlocked. The singular exception to this is if either or both sides choose Saitama. Saitama can only be selected as the third member of a team, so you can never start as him. When chosen, you start with access to your other two characters while Saitama appears to be rushing to the scene with a hefty timer. Once he arrives, he's essentially invincible and can one shot any opponent. It's a fun risk vs reward that allows a unique win condition, as if your other two characters fall before he arrives you lose. It's actually a pretty fun way to remain true to the source material while still maintaining some semblance of balance.

One-Punch Man was always going to be a weird property to adapt to a video game, and while I feel the developers did a pretty good job, it's hard to recommend. It's certainly well polished and fun, but it's also shallow and exceedingly repetitive. While I applaud the game's handling of the main story, adapting the humor better than I expected, everything outside of that tends to fall apart. The writing for the random enemies you have to fight is mostly stupid and the humor is lacking overall. It does a good job of handling an overpowered character like Saitama, but the novelty wears off pretty quick. Even if you're a fan of the manga and show, it's still a tough sell. I certainly didn't hate my time with the game, but I didn't really love it either.