Project Sakura Wars Producer: We’re Hard at Work on the Western Release

Sega held on January 29 the 11th Sakura Taisen Imperial Communication Department’s Broadcast stream. You can find the full stream here. As usual, it featured MC Mami Yamashita, Yohei Azakami, and Producer Tetsu Katano. At the beginning of the stream, Producer Tetsu Katano mentioned the development team is closely analyzing the feedback and impressions they got since Project Sakura Wars‘ Japanese launch on December 12, 2019. They’ve been discussing it continuously this January. Katano also mentioned the team is hard at work on the Western release of Project Sakura Wars. The game’s Asian version has already been released. Taking this into account, we might get a release date announcement soon.

Yohei Azakami, who voices Seijuro, also mentioned he saw a lot of positive feedback on the game. He was most notably worried old fans would compare Seijuro to Ogami and Taiga, but it didn’t turn out that way and many fell under Seijuro’s charm. Both Azakami and Yamashita also mentioned they love picking Seijuro’s dumb dialogues choices when playing the game.

On this month’s SegaNama, Sega’s Toshihiro Nagoshi also spoke about how Yakuza: Like a Dragon and Project Sakura Wars performed sales-wise. He’s aware many players wish the game was fully voiced, and mentioned Sega will definitely consider making more fully-voiced games in the future. I think it’s a shame Shin Sakura Taisen isn’t fully voiced as well, but most of the scenes are voiced and it’s not a big deal ultimately. As a related note, another complaint I’ve seen often coming back is how the battle system has no lock targetting function. Personally speaking, I think it’s fine this way. Timing and aiming your attacks properly is fun in its own way. Some of the attacks actually have some targeting assist too.

Shin Sakura Taisen has an anime coming in April 2020. The stream focused on it and revealed many new details. Most notably how it’s a sequel to the game, cast and staff comments, and the Moscow Combat Revue designed by Mika Pikazo. We covered all that here. A Stage Play will also happen in March. A manga adaptation is also underway, and a novel adaptation already released. And it’s not over yet. Back in September 2019, Game Director Tetsuya Otsubo also mentioned “Not only Sega, but Sega Sammy Group as a whole is preparing various things, so look forward to it.” when asked about other upcoming projects. Maybe a mobile game or an arcade game could be announced soon.

Shin Sakura Taisen is already available in Japan. The western version is temporarily named Project Sakura Wars and is scheduled to release on PlayStation 4 in Spring 2020. In case you’ve forgotten, it will feature Japanese voice acting with subtitles in English, German, French, and Spanish, which is really awesome. But if you don’t want to wait for the localization, I am translating the game as I’m playing through it via a let’s play. You can find the episodes we did so far on our YouTube channel. The first episode is also included below, along with our full coverage of the game.

The next Sakura Taisen stream will be held on February 26 and will include more info on the anime adaptation.

First story details, first trailer

Unfinished French trailer incident

Comments on the Sakura Taisen series from original creator Oji Hiroi

Famitsu staff interview Part 1 Part 2

Main cast comments

Toshihiro Nagoshi comments, story, mecha details

Sumire, Kaoru,Komachi Gameplay introduction videos

Michie Tomizawa/Sumire comments

Shangai characters designed by Lucky Star’s Yukiko Horiguchi, new gameplay

Toshihiro Nagoshi comments on switch to action RPG battles

London characters designed by Sword Art Online‘s Abec, new gameplay