User blog comment:Leek0421/Fairy Tail vs One Piece/@comment-7418318-20150813161703

I can't really give in depth comparision, since I only read OP up to chapter 230. But in that time OP completely failed to capture my interest. I only ever read it so far because I heard people speaking so well of it, but it's just not my thing.

In the other thread Ultra talked about character development in OP and (at least in the frame of the first 230 chapters) I have to disagree with him on that point.

Sure the characters past have been well explored, but is that truly character development? Just because we know their past in detail doesn't make them any less static. At least in the first 230 chapters the characters didn't grow at all. They were the same in chapter 230 as they were in the chapter they were introduced in.

Nami, despite no longer having a reason to hoard riches is still as greedy as ever. Luffy despite metaphorically burning his fingers quite a few times is still as stupid as ever. Usopp is still the same liar and coward with occasional short brave moment that he was initially... there is no development at all.

Granted there's not too much of that in FT either, but still more than in the bit of OP I read.

But the worst part from my point of view are the mood swings. Everytime I was about to get swept up by one mood, be it dramatic, sad or comical, it made a 180° change and thus threw me off the emotional train.

Tragic and sad moments are mixed together with slapstick, totally ruining the atmosphere. With the sudden changes of moods I just can't get immersed in the story...

One Piece just managed to completely get me emotionally disconnected from the story over and over again and that's the worst thing that can happen to a story in my opinion.

A good story, good fights, character development, backstory... sure that's all important too, but to me it's all secondary to emotion. If a story can't make me feel anything it's pretty much a waste of time. And One Piece uniformly did exactly that: fail to make me feel the emotions of the scenes.