Sega Announces Sands of Destruction for North America

Never heard of Sands of Destruction? That's okay, no one else has either. The game in question is actually called World Destruction: Michibikareshi Ishi (The Guided Intention), which is a title you may be slightly more familiar with.

Combining the pedigree of Xenogears' design team (Masato Katou, Kunihiko Tanaka, and Yasunori Mitsuda) with up-and-coming RPG developers imageepoch (Luminous Arc, Arc Rise Fantasia), World Destruction was a highly-anticipated RPG in Japan, receiving its own anime, manga, and other various marketing support.

For the forgetful, the game follows a young man named Kyrie Illunis who unwittingly holds the power of ultimate destruction, and the enigmatic (and slightly insane) young woman Morte Ashera who desires the end of the world for her own reasons.

Sands of Destruction will be available on Nintendo DS in North America in Fall 2009, roughly a year from its original Japanese release.

Sega has made no comment on why they changed the name to something so retarded.

P.S. As a note from someone who has played the Japanese version (me), I'd recommend just watching the anime to get the story, and getting the OST for Mitsuda's music. The game is 75% cutscenes, and gives you a super boring turn-based battle system with an extremely high encounter rate when you do get to play. Certainly not worth waiting another year for.