Monday, June 9, 2008

More DS Love from NIS

Late last week, NIS America held a small press event to showcase a few of their upcoming games. Several of their previously announced games were shown including their upcoming PS3 SRPG Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice, and DS remakes Disgaea DS and Rhapsody DS.

Along with these three titles was a "special announcement" that much of the internet (Sword Machine included) speculated was an announcement of Gust and Banpresto's PS2 RPG Ar Tonelico II. Unfortunately for Gust fans, and fortunately for DS RPG fans, the announcement was actually a new DS RPG from Hit Maker (creators of Blade Dancer and Dragoneer's Aria for PSP) titled "A Witch's Tale."

Though details are sparse, the game appears to be heavily Halloween-themed, and has a charming 2D art style about it reminiscent of the Disgaea series (at least, I think so). The game is reportedly an action-RPG that will make use of the DS's stylus to control much of the action, including the ability to draw runes to activate magic spells.

NIS and Hit Maker have yet to release any proper screenshots, but from the trailer it appears that all the locales will be hand drawn 2D. The game is set to hit North America sometime this October. We'll bring you more as we get it.

I've included the trailer from the event below.



Though I'm disappointed that Ar Tonelico II hasn't been announced yet, both A Witch's Tale and Rhapsody DS are looking like buys for me at the moment. What are your thoughts?

3 comments:

Billy said...

I don't know. I like games with witches, but this doesn't look particularly impressive. I'll probably check out Rhapsody DS if I can find it in the $20 range though. There's such a glut of JRPGs on the DS these days, you can afford to be picky. :)

Brandon said...

It's true. I pass up DS RPGs all. the. time.

However, I'm a huge NIS whore, so I'll probably pick up all three DS games, even though I don't even like Disgaea. What is wrong with me?

Billy said...

I've never played Disgaea either. I'll probably pick up Afternoon of Darkness when/if I ever get a PSP. That seems like the version to get.