Higurashi When They Cry writer and illustrator Ryukishi07 hosted a special new project announcement event today, where they announced Tragedy Sandbox, or Sangeki Sandbox, a new title in collaboration with freelance artist Itaru Hinoue who previously belonged to Key as one of its co-founders, but she’s been a freelancer since 2016. [Thanks, Gamer.]
Tragedy Sandbox is still a tentative title and it will have a story written by Ryukishi07 and illustrated by Itaru Hinoue. Its scenario is about 80% complete. The project didn’t start out with Ryukishi07 coming up with a plot and finding a good illustrator to go with it, but rather, the two artists got together to talk about what they wanted to do and that’s how it started.
Ryukishi07 says he wants to see “what would happen if we take Hinoue-san’s transient characters and put them inside a box called ‘Tragedy’ to see what kind of chemical reaction we get out of it.”
Tragedy Sandbox releases in Japan in 2019. Its platform(s) has yet to be announced.