The next chapter of One Piece, the longest-running manga in history, could be authored by a computer program. Last week, Eiichiro Oda, creator of the One Piece comic, commissioned ChatGPT to pen the next episode. According to Anime Hunch’s translation, this led to a plot about extraterrestrial stowaways and Robin Nico’s search for a hidden tribe.
According to Anime Hunch’s translation, it all started when the official One Piece Twitter account posted a video of Oda asking ChatGPT “the prohibited question,” which was asking AI to write the next episode of One Piece. The video below shows you a clip of the AI developing a story on the fly.
尾田さんがAIに質問してみたら…
話題の #ChatGPT に尾田さんが禁断の質問をした動画が送られてきました！その回答とは…！#ONEPIECE pic.twitter.com/HRU1oSC4GM
— ONE PIECE スタッフ【公式】/ Official (@Eiichiro_Staff) February 22, 2023
The computer program began by creating a fictional foe dubbed “The King of Shadows.” The king abducts Tony Tony Chopper, but Chopper and his gang manage to get him back. After completing the previous one, Oda requested a “more engaging” story from the AI.
In the second, an extraterrestrial stowaway convinces Luffy and the crew to help save his home planet from an evil vessel. A wicked witch who wants to steal a “piece of the star” from the aliens stands in the gang’s way, and they must fight her.
The aliens need that star piece to fix their world, which is a significant setback. After defeating the witch with the help of the Straw Hats, our heroes set about restoring the aliens’ home world.
Inconsistent with the current state of One Piece, the story doesn’t feel quite right. To avoid spoilers, I will say that the Straw Hats are currently on an island named Egghead, which functions as a high-tech futuristic world.
To have Luffy and his pals return to their ship with a group of aliens in the middle of a conflict is a significant plot twist, even though there may be some thematic and meta parallels between the use of AI and the technology of the island.
Naturally, ChatGPT’s AI has some restrictions. To begin, it employs generative AI to pen a tale, but it lacks the artistic capabilities essential to the manga genre. The story it generated, however, makes an odd sort of sense.
The Straw Hats relieve semi-strangers on numerous islands during many story arcs. If someone offers to buy Luffy lunch, it’s a recurring joke that he’ll risk his life to save that person. With all the mayhem in One Piece, the AI chapter makes sense.
The story follows a pirate who can stretch his body like rubber, and as such, it is not meant to be taken seriously. That suggests it has the potential to usher in a hitherto unknown alien race.
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How or if this artificial intelligence experiment will affect the canonical One Piece plot is unknown. As things stand, Oda has a strategy to wrap out One Piece, which is currently in its final saga. However, he said in the video that he was at a loss for next week’s chapter; maybe this would give him some ideas.
All in all, Oda’s experiment reads like a fun approach to using the software to interact with his work, and it has the potential to function as a gimmick to attract attention and foster interaction with his audience.
Whereas some people may view the incorporation of AI into artistic works as a no-brainer, others are not so accepting. Some notable people, like the famed directors Hayao Miyazaki and Guillermo del Toro, have argued that using artificial intelligence in the arts would be “an insult to life itself.”