It splits the party in the first act and dares you not to panic. Nobita washes up alone with a young pirate for company while Doraemon, Shizuka, Gian and Suneo get dragged into somebody else's war at sea, and suddenly the safety net of the four-dimensional pocket is on the wrong boat. That's the whole trick of this one: the gadgets are stranded away from the kid who needs them most, so Nobita has to be brave on his own clock instead of Doraemon's. The 1998 treasure-hunt setup looks like a lark, all maps and open water, and then the ship goes down and the tone hardens. Kids who grew up on the TV show remember exactly where they were sitting when Nobita stopped waiting to be rescued.

Doraemon and his magical gadgets make even a hard treasure hunt seem possible, so Nobita and the rest of the gang set out by ship in search of treasure on an island. The voyage goes wrong before they arrive: their ship comes close to being wrecked, and the group is split up. Nobita ends up stranded on an island alongside a young pirate, while Doraemon and the others somehow get caught up in a war between pirates. From there, a fantasy adventure at sea unfolds for the separated friends in this 1998 Doraemon feature film.