Square Enix is looking to get back to their classic console-style RPG roots in the coming years, which they confirmed at their E3 press conference last year, with the announcement of a brand new subsidiary studio, Tokyo RPG Factory. The new subsidiary developer’s flagship game, then called ‘Project Setsuna‘, has since been given the final title of ‘I Am Setsuna‘, and released in Japan this past February. Now, those in North America and PAL territories can circle a date on the calendar as well, as Square Enix has announced today that I Am Setsuna is releasing outside of Japan on July 19th of this year.
A spiritual successor to the highly celebrated Super NES RPG, Chrono Trigger, I Am Setsuna received overall positive feedback in its initial Japanese release, despite a few seemingly dated elements and an obtuse battle system, with its art style, storyline, characters, retro chic RPG feel, and soundtrack all being praised by Japanese reviewers. Like Chrono Trigger, the game is a turn-based RPG with menu-based battles that unfold where they occur as players explore landscapes and dungeons, with enemy proximity and character-based techiques becoming more or less effective, depending on where monsters wander. The game’s premise involves a girl named Setsuna, who lives on a snow-covered island besieged by demons that demand human sacrifices, who must journey with several protectors to the sacrifice site to save her land. In this respect, the storyline also seems to bear some similarity to Square Enix’s PlayStation 2 RPG classic, Final Fantasy X.
There is a caveat to the Western release of I Am Setsuna, as previously confirmed by Square Enix, namely that, out of the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita builds of the game that released in Japan, only the PlayStation 4 version is being released in the West. In Western territories, an exclusive PC version of I Am Setsuna distributed via Steam will replace the PlayStation Vita version that is being left in Japan.
Keep journeying to Eggplante for all major news and updates on I Am Setsuna, and other big projects from Square Enix’s Tokyo RPG Factory.