The biggest One Piece event this year has come and gone. One Piece Day hosted by Bandai Namco, Shueisha, and Toei Animation ran from August 10 to the 11th in 2024 at the Makuhari Messe Exhibition Hall in Chiba, Japan. The event celebrates not only its third year but also the 25th anniversary of One Piece with lots of exciting panels, live events, and live streams for fans all over the world to watch.
This past weekend has several highlights across both days of the event.
DAY ONE (August 10)
Exhibition Area
- The results for the ONE PIECE anime Best Scenes poll are in. From Gear 5’s first appearance to the farewell of Merry.
- the ONE PIECE BOUNTY RUSH, The 2nd Extreme Treasure Festival Tournament -Finals-, took place with Team Ambivalent defeating Team Otomodachi and securing the championship shield. After the final battle, a memorable promotional video celebrating over 150 million downloads was played.
- ONE PIECE GRAND ARENA was announced, a new game scheduled for a winter 2024 release within the popular virtual platform, ROBLOX!
- Inaki Godoy, the actor behind Luffy in Netflix’s live action ONE PIECE adaptation commented on the filming of the anticipated second season in Japanese through a video at the event.
Live Area
- GRe4N BOYZ, Mori Calliope, Maki Otsuki, and Hiroshi Kitadani sing their iconic ONE PIECE related songs in front of approximately 6000 fans. GRe4N BOYZ would perform PHANTOM -Yakusoku- as the opening act. Mori Calliope would perform Future Island along with a cover of Hikari e as tribute. Maki Otsuki would follow up by performing RUN! RUN! RUN!, Dear sunrise, and Memories. Hiroshi Kitadani would close out the event by performing the his 4 opening themes for ONE PIECE: We Go!, OVER THE TOP, UUUUUS!!, and as he performed the iconic We ARE! for the new world, Teru from GLAY made a surprise appearance to sing along.
DAY TWO (August 11)
Exhibition Area
- In depth interview of WIT STUDIO‘s production team involved with THE ONE PIECE anime remake series. Starting from the East Blue Saga and a behind the scenes video also released showing off concept art and character sheets for the series by WIT STUDIO.
- ONE PIECE makes the Guinness World Record of reaching its 300th DVD volume. New record being “Most DVD’s released of a serial anime tv programme” with a certification ceremony being held for the occasion.
- Radio Broadcast of MUGIWARA SPACE with a live recording of the 9 Straw Hat pirates and the 7 Vegapunk voice actors altogether.
Live Area
- ADO and BE:FIRST performed on the stage. Maki Otsuki and Hiroshi Kitadani also joined, and got the crowd hyped up as ADO performed her songs from ONE PIECE FILM RED. Songs including Backlight, Fleeting Lullaby, to NEW GENESIS.
- The Straw Hat pirate voice actors take to the stage to sing BINKOSUNO SAKE for the finale in a surprise appearance. At the end of the performance, Luffy’s Voice Actress Mayumi Tanaka suggested “One of our friends (Franky’s Voice actor) didn’t make it today, so can we all do Franky’s “SUPER!”. All of the Voice actors present and the crowd shouted “SUPER!” with Tanaka shouting “All of you who came today are my friends!”.
That concluded the recap and highlight of all the events during ONE PIECE DAY 2024. Are you excited about any of the announcements or events? Let us know down in the comments below!
