News: Hissatsu Urakagyou

June 21, 2005, 05:17 AM

by chazumaru, via Genki/LightWeight -
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Genki revealed, through a new and rather empty page, a new adventure action game from LightWeight (Bushido Blade, Kengo) called Hissatsu Urakagyou ("My secret occupation is to murder people", roughly). The game puts you in the role of a doctor during the Edo period that, with the help of an heteroclite supporting cast, turns into an anonymous and bloody server of justice at night, to punish those who perform the crimes he witnesses through his day job. Hissatsu Urakagyou features gameplay sequences for both occupations: as a doctor you'll help victims and investigate on the bad guys, whereas at night your sword will do the talking. The game is scheduled to come out on PS2 by the end of the year and is reminiscent of Genki's Fuun Shinsengumi and Fuun Bakumatsuden, although these were not produced by LightWeight. Genki's success with Fuun Shinsengumi was partly due to the popularity of a japanese TV show that aired around the time of the game's release, which focused on the same subject and era (In a similar fashion, Shinji Okamoto's Genji occurs in a similar period as a popular japanese TV show of last year - itself based on a famous historical tale). Instead, with Hissatsu Urakagyou, one could see an analogy with several classic chanbara series such as the TV drama "Hissatsu!" which, besides the obvious title similarity, also featured an team of justice-enforcers in a corrupted Edo period (and led to a nice action platformer from Bandai Visual on the Sega Saturn).