Short update: It's a 16:9 release, not worth it.

KAZÉ Anime (or now Crunchyroll) has announced that they will be releasing the first episodes in Germany on Blu-ray Disc. The title of the announcement states that the release will be in HD. It would be the world's first disc release of these episodes in HD. There is no further information about the release at this time.

So it could be the infamous Special Edition or another 16:9 release. Or it could be like the image in the announcement (image name One Piece BD_1920x1920.png). Then it would be in 4:3, it would be sharp, but the lines would look strange. Let's hope for the best.

Source: https://kaze-online.de/news/artikel/piratenkoenig-in-hd

In Germany, a wall projection was used to advertise episode 1000. It said that episode 1000 would also soon be released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc (

). Probably means new episodes with German dub.

It's official: One Piece returns on January 22, 2021 with the Whole Cake Island arc! (https://www.prosiebenmaxx.de/anime/news/one-piece-auf-nach-whole-cake-island-100023)

The distributor for One Piece home video releases in Japan, Avex Group, lists the ONE PIECE Eternal Log “EAST BLUE” with following specs: 16:9 digitally remastered edition, 720x480i.

@RoboBlue:

What forum is that?

In the forum Animes.so. Unfortunately it isn't that easy to get into the relevant thread. Because for some time now you need an account for at least 48 hours and you have to write 20 posts there before you can see the download area.

@DaPikminCoder:

I wonder if it's possible to dub the arcs already edited. I mean, you'd have to go back and do the exact same edits. Maybe they'd just have to do the arc all over from scratch? I feel like it's something they'd only try to do once all the pre-timeskip arcs have been paced.

It's definitely possible. For example in a German forum, 1-2 episodes of One Pace with German dubbing are released every week since July 2019. But from my point of view as an external observer it is unrealistic that the official One Pace team would do this in addition to their actual project.

Two weeks ago, the German voice actor of Luffy posted something on Instagram which strongly suggests that new episodes will be dubbed.