Any news you heard about Sakura Taisen or as its known over here, Sakura Wars, coming out in North America is true. A representative from NIS America confirmed to Siliconera they are localizing at least one game in the series, but aren’t sure when the game will be released.
In the Sakura Wars games players spend one part of the game interacting with characters via the Live Interactive Picture System (aka LIPS) where conversation choices are selected similar to Persona 4 or a dating sim. The combat phase of Sakura Wars should be more familiar since it’s like a strategy RPG. After releasing a string of Sakura Wars games on the PlayStation 2 Sega moved the series briefly to the PSP for a compilation disc. The most recent Sakura Wars game is on the Nintendo DS.
The long running Sakura Wars series has been a project between Sega and Red Entertainment. Since NIS America is taking care of the series here it shows they have a relationship with either Sega, Red Entertainment or, most likely, both companies. Perhaps, we could see NIS America pick up other Sega projects in the future like Hatsune Miku: Project Diva. Nippon Ichi Software worked with the Hatsune Miku license before with Tori no Hoshi: Aerial Planet.
Images courtesy of Sega.
