Atlus recently announced additional details for their European release of Shin Megami Tensei IV. The game will be made available on the eShop at €19.99 or £17.99 sometime during September 2014. It was also noted that all of the game’s downloadable content, with the exception of an armor set made available in North America as exclusive preorder content, will be available for download in the game’s European release, too.
Earlier this year we interviewed UDON Entertainment about their experience with translating various Sega artbooks, and based on their announcements during their Comic-Con 2014 panel they are continuing to release additional books for Sega fans. UDON is translating another Shining Artbook: Shining Blade and Ark which is a collection of both Shining games illustrated by Tony Taka. Border Break Artworks, meanwhile, showcases mecha and background designs of the arcade game. An Atlus book has also been picked up. Gungnir Official Art Chronicle is based on the PSP Dept. Heaven game.
So far Border Break Artworks is the only one with a product page on their site. You can look forward to this one sometime in December for $39.99.
Just Push Start announced through Sega that Phantasy Star Nova’s release date is November 27, and will retail at 5,980 yen. Also worth noting is that the game is compatible with the Playstation TV, or as it’s known in Japan – the Vita TV.
I’d like to take this opportunity to go over the recent class and demo information released this week. This week’s issue of Famitsu gave more insight into the classes available for the game; Siliconera writes about the new classes here. There are four classes currently planned that we know of. These classes will have stat growths specific to themselves but each class will also be able to wield different kinds of weapons. Each class will also have a special ability available to them within the demo.
While Siliconera had already revealed that Tears of Tiara 2 would be localized, it’s only now that Atlus has officially confirmed the release of the game for North America and Europe. Co-developed by Aquaplus and Sting, Tears of Tiara 2: Heir of the Overlord is a strategy RPG where most of the story is told in a visual novel style. While the first game was never localized, its characters were featured in the 2D fighting game Aquapazza: Aquaplus Dream Match, which Atlus did localize and release last year. There’s also an anime adaptation that was released in North America by Sentai Filmworks. Continue reading
Over at the official Yakuza games forum, user king_ruckus is asking support for a “Day of the Dragon” initiative. The idea is to send letters to Sega (arriving around the 8th of August) asking them to localize the Yakuza games. Of course, we at Segalization are happy to spread the word! Here’s king_ruckus’s message to Yakuza fans:
It’s 2014 and Ryu Ga Gotoku 5(Yakuza 5) still hasn’t made its way outside of Japan. Help us reach out to SEGA in a meaningful way and show them that we still want this series.
Description:
Our goal is send at least 1,000 unique letters to SEGA’s main office in America on or around the “Day of the Dragon”, 8/8/2014.
Taking part in this campaign is EASY. Just have something ready to mail to the following address the week of 8/8/2014:
SEGA of America, Inc.
350 Rhode Island Street
Suite 400
San Francisco, CA 94103
USAYour letter can be anything you want. Keep it simple or let loose, your choice. The important thing is to send something in to let SEGA know you still want more of this series!
This is an M-Rated, niche title. The Yakuza series really needs YOUR help to continue. Please take a few minutes out of your day and show some meaningful support.
If you’d also like to mail letters to the Japan or London offices, those addresses follow:
Japan:
SEGA Corporate
1-2-12 Haneda
Ohta-ku
Tokyo 144-8531
JapanLondon:
SEGA Europe Ltd.
27 Great West Road
Brentford
Middlesex
TW8 9BW
United KingdomBe sure to like the Facebook page! Help spread the word on Twitter with #BringYakuzaWest and #DayOftheDragon! If you have a YouTube channel, make a video promoting this campaign! We can reach 1,000 fans easy if we work together to make it happen!
You can find their Facebook page here. User SonsOfOcelot has also made a Youtube video to promote the campaign.
You are all invited to Hatsune Miku and Megurine Luka’s next concert! No price of admission – all you need is one Phantasy Star Online 2 account with access to the Japanese version of the game. It’s going to be a short performance, featuring just one song: Living Universe, better known as the opening song for Phantasy Star Portable 2.
Where: ARKS Lobby
When: July 23
Free goodies promised for attendees, including two hour rare drop, money, and experience boosts. The concert is meant to commemorate the 5th anniversary of the Project DIVA series, as the first Project DIVA game was released in July of 2009.
Credit to Siliconera , the PSUBlog for the image
note: by the way, according to the PSUBlog, Phantasy Star Online 2 is now fully operational and is working as it was prior to the recent server attack. Apparently compensation of sorts was doled out for those who were unable to play due to the DDoS attack, available to characters made prior to a certain date.
Famitsu announced a new Shining Resonance party member this week: Lesti Sera Alma, an elven Dragoner and elder brother of Kirika. He projects a composed and icy veneer but is also prone to brooding, and being overprotective of his sister. He fights using the above pictured halberd, stylized (and roughly translated) as the Dragon Fang Halberd Fang Root. Perhaps true to his personality, one of his screenshots show him using ice-themed attacks.
Within the world of Shining Resonance, Lesti is the commander of a group of elven troops. He will be voiced by Yuichi Nakamura, who is coincidentally also the voice of Kurt Irving from Valkyria Chronicles III.
Outlets reporting on this recent news say to expect more from Famitsu later this week on Shining Resonance, on such topics as a weather system unique to the game and a costume that Kirika can wear in-game.
Credit to RPGFan
NIS America recently launched their new European store, allowing fans in Europe to buy Limited Editions of their games directly, without having to import them from the US store. Of course, this includes the upcoming Atlus game, Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth: The Wild Cards Premium Edition. However, while this should have been good news, the fans were quick to realize that the prices were a lot higher in the European store than in the US one.
Yesterday NISA opened up pre-orders for the Persona Q EU Premium Edition, but unfortunately the price for the game is also a lot a higher than its US counterpart. I’d personally have to pay $138 (game + shipping) to get the EU Premium Edition of the game, compared to the $80 + free shipping price of the US version. While we’re used to seeing higher prices for our games in the EU compared to the US, the steep 73% price increase is difficult to accept for the European Persona fans. NISA also announced (cheaper) standard shipping options for the majority of countries outside of the UK, although it’s not clear which countries actually get this option. In any case, it did little to stop the complaints. Fans are still asking NISA to lower the price of the games themselves, but at the moment it seems NISA is not planning to do so.
On NISA’s Facebook page some users have noted that there are local retailers in the EU that are now also accepting pre-orders for the Premium Edition for as low as €70. Despite these reports, NISA claims the Premium Edition is only available from the NISA EU Store. We’ll try to get more details on this, as an alternative to the NISA store would be a welcome thing indeed.
We reported earlier on about the fact that the original Persona 4: Arena was the only PS3 game in existence to be region locked. Thankfully, Atlus have confirmed that the sequel that will be region free for the Americas. Along with that news, we got to learn more about the pre-order bonuses for the game. Atlus stated the following on their official website:
Persona®4 Arena Ultimax, the upcoming fighting game from ATLUS will not be region locked for the Americas and will be available this fall for the PlayStation®3 and Xbox 360®; pre-orders and all first-run editions will include a collectible Teddie bop bag and Set #1 of the iconic Persona Tarot cards. (Set #2 will be included with Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth.) This follows the recent announcement that playable DLC character Tohru Adachi will be offered for free the first week after the game’s launch. Full details are available here:
We’re still waiting for news on a European release of the game, but at least importing the US version will actually be an option now.
Sega and tri-Ace’s Phantasy Star Nova will soon have a gameplay demo made available to the public. Titled “Battle Demo”, it will allow users to take on one of the game’s signature Gigantes creatures, and explore planet Machia. It will also feature some character cutscenes. The demo will arrive sometime in August on Japan’s Playstation Store.
…however! There will be other, earlier opportunities to play the game if you’re in Japan, such as the Phantasy Star Online Kanshasai. There are two separately scheduled events: one at the Sapporo Convention Center in Sapporo and another in Port Messe in Nagoya where the above mentioned demo will be available for public playing. The Sapporo event takes place on July 26 and the Nagoya event takes place on August 3 – it seems these will be opportunities to play the demo before its wide release. This year’s Jump Victory Carnival, though an invitation-only event, will also feature the game demo on July 19 and July 26.