Bandai Namco promised everyone would get a chance to pick up the One Piece Tony Tony Chopper Tamagotchi Nano in May 2024, following a Japanese launch, and now the virtual pet is everywhere. (It’s also known as a Choppertchi in Japan, which is a much cuter name.) However, after spending a full week with him, I can’t help feeling it doesn’t feel as much like a pet as other characters in the line.
As this is a Tamagotchi Nano model, that means the virtual pet process for taking care of Chopper from One Piece is a bit more streamlined. You can’t actually check the health and happiness stats. Basically, you feed him until he won’t eat the standard food anymore. There are only two games. One involves pressing the “B” button when Chopper’s hooves are in the center of the target. The other involves using the “A” and “B” buttons to move the character’s head left and right to collect cotton candy, but avoid hot peppers. “C” can be pressed to trigger a brief animation.
Depending on your level of care for the virtual pet, Chopper evolves to a form based on his Grand Line or New World design. You start with either the pre-time skip or post-time skip character randomly, and things like your promptness when feeding him, the games you play, what you feed him, and if you are mindful enough to turn the lights off (in-game) at night affect his growth. Likewise, eventually you also can get forms of Chopper dressed as other One Piece characters for this Tamagotchi Nano after the secondary ones. So I ended up with a Walk Point Grand Line Chopper, and he then turned into a Gol D. Roger one.
The thing about it is, because of the nature of this Tamagotchi Nano, I never felt like Chopper was a traditional virtual pet. Part of that is the lack of demand. Because I can’t check his status, I didn’t feel like I needed to look at it every half hour or so. I’d check in when I’d take a break during my work day to grab something to drink or lunch. When work was over, I would look at how he’s doing if he made a sound or I was switching between games and other activities.
The fact that there are other One Piece character cameos helped too. Sometimes I’d look over and see Luffy eating or Frankie showing up on screen. Since the screen is so recessed into the device, it might make it difficult to see what was going on under certain conditions, but at other times it seemed like Chopper was peeking out behind something, searching for attention. When I’d press A, little hearts would appear. It’s all very casual.
It almost felt like a casual friendship. Instead of taking care of a virtual pet whenever I’d glance over at the One Piece Tamagotchi Nano, I’d be checking in on what Chopper was up to while I was engaged in other things. Maybe I’d see if he wanted something to eat or a quick game that would take me all of 30 seconds to finish. There were no demands, and I always knew that even if I wasn’t super prompt or attentive, Chopper would be okay and eventually change to a new costume or form.
The One Piece Chopper Tamagotchi Nano is available worldwide.
