Announced today during PlayStation’s showcase event, Rise of the Ronin is the latest game from the studio that previously brought us Ninja Gaiden and Nioh.
It’s the second game in the same press conference to be set in 19th-century Japan, around the end of the Shogunate and the Meiji Restoration, but while Yakuza’s game is going to be playing very fast and loose with the time period, Rose of the Ronin is claiming to be much more deeply rooted in history. As Team Ninja’s Fumihiko Yasuda writes:
We at Koei Tecmo, have had many titles in the past that were based on history. But with Rise of the Ronin, we set out to take the next big step. By harnessing all the skills and knowledge we’ve gained over the years we really wanted to take things to the next level by attempting to thoroughly portray the most critical revolution in the history of Japan including the darkest and ugliest chapters that many will shy away from.
You’d be forgiven for not picking up on much of that in the trailer below, which is far more concerned with showing Cool Musket Shit. However, he’s also clearly talking about the game’s overall tone and story, not the sexier stuff you need to fill a reveal trailer with.
What you can pick up from the trailer, though, is that Rise of the Ronin is an open-world game, which is going to feature whole urban environments and landscapes you traverse on horseback:
Rise of the Ronin is coming in 2024 as a “PlayStation console exclusive,” the wording of which suggests a PC version could well be on the way as well.