God Capcom, why are you taking part in this? You should be ashamed.
LinkFor the lazy, but scans are in the link (Click to reveal) Being a gigantic fan of the Japanese RPG and knowing the appetites of said fans, I am half tempted to just toss these new Famitsu scans out onto the site and then head for high ground to avoid the ensuing flood of drool, but I'll be nice.
Cross Edge is a new RPG due out in Japan for the PlayStation 3 this September that is a collaboration between some of the top names in the genre. Nippon Ichi, Gust, Namco Bandai, Idea Factory, and even Capcom have lent their properties to this superstar game, which features characters from Darkstalkers, Disgaea, Ar Tonelico, and many more. Hell, a game with Etna and Morrigan together alone is worth eleventy million dollars. The game features turn-based battles, a plot that involves rescuing souls, and...if you look to the bottom right corner of the scan...the ability to dress your characters up in a wide variety of outfits, from PE clothes to devil costumes.
Chances of this coming out in the states? Pretty damn unlikely. Chances of me importing this? Over nine thousand. Thanks to SupaPhly for the scans!
Remember a couple of years ago when they announced Namco x Capcom? It was a SRPG featuring prominent characters from both Namco and Capcom's vast collection of franchises, putting two original characters (Human Pikachu and Auron) at the center of the madness. It had huge sprites, Tron Bonne, and infused an action-based system with grid based SRPG goodness. And it still managed to be terrible. Unfortunately, it seems to have spawned clones, because people eat this shit up: Chaos Wars, a SRPG developed by Idea Factory, which features characters from the d-list of RPGs: Shadow Hearts, Growlanser, and about a dozen games unheard of outside of Japan, with a couple of SD original characters at the center of the madness. For the record, there is a reason a lot of these games stay in Japan.
Now, a group of d-list developers (and Capcom) have decided they want to do it again:
Capcom, Idea Factory, Gust and Nippon Ichi are creating an RPG with a couple of their "iconic" characters. "Iconic" is in quotations because Gust and Idea Factory don't have iconic characters because their characters are... their characters are anime in its rawest form: Generic, boring, interchangeable. This is mostly true for Nippon Ichi, but I'll give them points for looking somewhat distinctive. But then they lose points because N1 characters are what's wrong with anime in it's current trend: They sexualize characters that look about 7 years old. Christ, look at Etna (she is the red haired girl wearing a black leather bra).
Capcom is putting Darkstalkers characters in it. I think fans of Darkstalkers would much rather just have a new Darkstalkers game though. I'm kind of hoping that's the point of this, to help generate some interest in Darkstalkers so when they announce a new one people will remember it. That has to be it, because it certainly doesn't fit in with the rest of the games (besides it being sprite-based).
See. the thing is, Namco x Capcom used popular characters from popular franchises (well, I'm told the characters from the Namco games are very big in Japan). That's why people bought it. I have a hard time believing anyone's going to say "HOLY CRAP I GET TO HAVE CHARACTERS FROM ATELIER MARIE, DISGAEA, SPECTRAL SOULS AND AR TONELICO TOGETHER IN THE SAME GAME??? SIGN ME UP!!!"
(This is where I remember that people in Japan willingly pay hundreds of dollars for PVC figurines of these characters and a little piece of me dies.)
I know a lot of you guys like anime and RPGs, but you should not support this sort of thing.
SHORT VERSION:
Characters from Capcom's Darkstalkers are going to appear in what looks like the worst, most generic RPG in the history of the world. The game will sell well in Japan because ANIME!GIRLS!MOE! (it will sell well in America because of this, too). Capcom should be ashamed of themselves for doing this.