As many had already assumed, it seems that the vague “Winter 2009/2010” release date that Nippon Ichi America gave to Sakura Wars: So Long, My Love means that we won’t be seeing it this year. I’ve been waiting for a game in the Sakura Wars series to come over since the days of the Sega Saturn, so while I’m sure I can wait a little while longer, it’s definitely going to be a tough sell for many hardcore gamers with all the other highly anticipated titles that have already been pushed back into 2010, such as Bayonetta and No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle. It’s being released on the PlayStation 2 and the Wii, which aren’t exactly the first choices of hardcore gamers these days, which also makes me worry about its success.

Sakura Wars, for those who’ve missed out on its 13 year history, started as a title for the Sega Saturn and became something of a hit in Japan, getting four more sequels, a few more ports, a few sidegames, some anime renditions and even a popular real-life stage show. Despite this popularity, it never seemed to arrive on Western shores, because (for some strange reason) many publishers believed a video game where you chat up pretty girls to make steam-powered magical robots more powerful in their fight against demons a “niche game.” Fortunately the obvious mainstream appeal of anime girls who work as both stage dancers and giant steampunk mecha pilots in a Strategy RPG video game eventually occurred to a US publisher (or at least someone in the industry got tired of fans like myself whining constantly and decided to shut us up).

The game we’re getting as “Sakura Wars: So Long, My Love” is actually the series’ fifth instalment, Sakura Taisen V (that was already released in Japan back in 2005), strangely the one that takes place in alternate history New York rather than the Paris or Japanese instalments, so expect to see your favourite “American” stereotypes on display. The trailer on the official website is either campy or crappy, depending on who you ask, but we’ve been told there’ll be a dual audio option for those in the audience who can’t appreciate horribly/awesomely overdone pseudo-American speech patterns, y’all hear?