Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Meiis the newHigurashimobage coming to iOS and Android this summer in Japan. The game is described as an RPG with gacha.Higurashi Meiwill follow a brand new story whose draft was written in cooperation with Ryukishi07. The scriptwriter is Saichi Kanou, who worked on the scenario of theHigurashiconsole ports. The game’s theme song is titledFrustration, sung by Ayane (彩音), and with lyrics and composition by Chiyomaru Shikura. The game’s battle BGMs will be handled by Motoi Sakuraba.

Higurashi Meiincludes three brand new characters. Just like the new upcomingHigurashianime adaptation,Higurashi Meialso uses Akio Watanabe as its character designer. A key visual featuring K1, Rena, and the three new characters was revealed:

Higurashi Meiis developed byD-Techno and Smileaxe. D-Techno is a Japanese studio who recently made theBofurimobage, but is mainly known for making character alarm apps of popular franchises. They did one forSteins;Gate,Strike the Blood,SSSS Gridman,Prism Illya,etc. Smileaxe is the studio developingMoeshu Box, a tower defense mobage where types of Sake are anthropomorphized into cute girls and cool boys.

As usual with mobage, a pre-registration campaign is ongoing. it’s at over 30,000 pre-registrations for now. You can preregister on thegame’s official site.It’s in Japanese needless to say.

The newHigurashianimewas supposed to start airing in July, but was delayed to October due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

This news is pretty unsurprising and is definitely something that was decided alongside the new anime adaptation.Higurashiis pretty iconic and popular and yet never got its own mobile game as far as I know. Many outside Japan tends to dislike mobile games and sociage, but they’ve been extremely popular for years now in Asia and Japan. I’d say ever since thePuzzle & Dragonsboom in the early 2010s. This is where the money is at instead of console games, and it’s a much bigger market nowadays in Japan than consoles.

I’m particularly curious to see and hear whatHigurashiwith Sakuraba’s synthesizers will be like.

The Steam version of the firstHigurashigame is currently free. An ultimate version ofUminekois coming someday in Japan on PS4 and Switch.The newestWhen They Crygame series,Ciconia,is also ongoing.Lastly, Ryukishi07 and Entergram are also working onKaleidoscope of Phantasm Prison,one of the final PlayStation Vita games.