Both One Piece and Dragon Ball are among the most best-selling manga and anime of all time. Both of these Weekly Shonen Jump series have enjoyed massive multimedia success, and their connections run deep. One Piece's Eiichiro Oda started work as an assistant to Akira Toriyama toward the end of Dragon Ball's run, and he credits the experience as a huge inspiration for what he would go on to do with One Piece.
It seems inevitable that the two would crossover, but it's remarkable how many times the two separate franchises have crossed over the course of two decades through multiple forms of media. Now, we're taking a closer look at all of the times these two iconic franchises have crossed over in manga, anime and video games.
Cross Epoch
One of the first major One Piece/Dragon Ball crossovers, "Cross Epoch." is a special one-shot manga chapter from 2006 created as a collaboration between Toriyama and Oda. The story takes place in an alternate universe where Mr. Satan uses the Dragon Balls to become a king. Once Shenron grants his wish, he and the eternal dragon himself invite Mr. Satan's friends from all over to have a tea party, which leads to Goku and his friends meeting up with Luffy's crew.
One noteworthy thing about this chapter is that none of the characters exist as they do in canon. For example, Bulma and Nami are space pirates, Krillin and Chopper are train conductors, and Vegeta has a crew of pirates that are constantly at war with Dr. Gero's crew. Naturally, Luffy and Goku are the most like their iconic selves. They are ultimately attacked by a team-up between Buggy the Clown and Emperor Pilaf -- two of both franchises' earliest adversaries.
The series is a simple alternate reality story, presenting Dragon Ball primarily through the lens of the One Piece world. In this sense, it's a great fanfic-esque affair, showing how the characters might all be different in another, completely alternate context.
Dream 9 Toriko & One Piece & Dragon Ball Z Super Collaboration Special!!
In 2013, the 99th episode of Toriko and the 590th episode of One Piece featured a three-way crossover between One Piece, Toriko and Dragon Ball Z. For many hopeful over the prospects of a massive crossover, this episode fulfills all that fans wanted. The episode is another alt-universe non-canon episode. In this crossover, characters from across the three anime compete in a race put on by the International Gourmet Organization.
Naturally, the characters all fight obstacles and each other to reach the center, with characters like Zoro, Chopper and Nami competing against the likes of Vegeta, Piccolo and Android 18. Ultimately, the race ends with a three-way tie between Luffy, Toriko and Goku, resulting in a tie-breaker round with a highly unexpected winner. However, they ultimately need to work together to save everyone from a greater threat.
One Piece and Toriko, another shonen anime based on a Weekly Shonen Jump manga, had previously crossed over in the 492nd and 542nd episodes of One Piece. This ended a series of regular crossover episodes in One Piece that primarily took place within a stretch of 100 episodes inside the series. All the characters retain their powers, though, for obvious reasons, the levels of power are more balanced. Considering Goku could blow up the moon at a young age, his powers are reduced here so he doesn't just rip Luffy apart in one hit.
Jump Crossover Series
Of course, inevitably when talking about One Piece and crossovers, the Jump video game crossover series inevitably enters the conversation. This series consists of 2005's Jump Super Stars, 2006's Jump Ultimate Stars, 2014's J-Stars Victory Vs, and 2018's Jump Force. The four games feature tons of manga characters from various Weekly Shonen Jump titles crossing over, with both One Piece and Dragon Ball featuring prominently throughout the whole affair.
The games are all fighting games of various varieties. While the first two titles are side-scrolling fighting platformer games, the latter two are arena fighters. None of the games are particular critical darlings, but they do offer a great deal of fan service to players of all ages, as well as a chance for Luffy and Goku to both clobber characters like Seto Kaiba or Dio Brando.
While the latter two games received large releases stateside with tons of hype leading up to their release, the former two were Japanese -exclusive titles and have still never been released in America.
Battle Stadium D.O.N.
While many fans are well-aware of the Jump crossover series, such as Jump Force, fewer remember 2006's Battle Stadium D.O.N. a three-way crossover between Dragon Ball Z (D.), One Piece (O.) and Naruto (N.). The game, which draws heavy influence from Super Smash Bros, features characters from the three franchises fighting on moving platform stages inspired by the three prior series.
Much like Smash Bros, the game is a fun fighter with a lot of colorful characters. The roster, however, is relatively small, featuring eight Dragon Ball Z characters, six One Piece characters and six Naruto characters. Compared to the 30+ characters in the Jump series games, it might seem like a downgrade at first, especially considering this is the only One Piece video game that doesn't feature a single villain from the series in it.
However, it was a crossover fighting game that brought the biggest names in anime together for a unique experience -- except in America, where the game was never released.
Lets! TV-Play Dragon Ball Z x One Piece: Batoru Taikan Gomu-Gomu no Kamehameha
While most crossovers between Dragon Ball Z and One Piece are fairly well-known among fans, this particular crossover is a bit more enigmatic, to the point where it doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. However, this particular crossover still exists as a plug and play game.
The Bandai-produced game is a cross between a rails-shooter and a first-person fighter and was one of four plug and play games released in honor of Weekly Shonen Jump's 40th anniversary. The game, like most plug and play games, connected directly to a television's A/V input. Players can play as a host of characters with click-trigger controllers that launch attacks and strike opponents as you charge forward. It is comparable to Dragon Ball Z Kinect in this sense, albeit without motion-tracking Kinect controls.
Alongside the game, Bandai also released a series of figures crossing over One Piece and Dragon Ball Z, further celebrating Shonen Jump's legacy with two of its most iconic shonen heroes.