A brand new Mobile Suit Gundam game is coming out for the PlayStation 4 on July 6th, 2017, and you’re probably never going to be able to play it. To date, only a small fraction of Gundam video game titles have made it to American shores, the most recent being the line of Dynasty Warriors: Gundam titles, and a PlayStation Vita game, Mobile Suit Gundam Extreme Vs. Force.
This new PS4 game, Gundam Versus, is set to take an incredibly popular arcade series, and adapt it for home consoles. The Gundam Extreme Vs. arcade games pit four players against each other in two vs. two combat. They provide exciting team based action, mixed with elements of fighting games. The Extreme Vs. series is heavy on fan service too, including a number of playable mobile suits from across the franchise's history, making it all that much more fun to keep coming back to.
Sadly for American fans, this gaming franchise is only something they could read about or at most, watch videos of gameplay footage from. Despite the popularity of this particular Gundam game series, developers Bandai Namco haven’t localized the games for the U.S. market due to a perceived lack of popularity for the Gundam franchise overall. In a 2014 interview with website Siliconera.com, Gundam Extreme Vs. series executive producer Ryuichiro Baba cited the lack of Gundam series being aired in the US, along with the lack of popularity of mobile suit model kits as a reason for not localizing the titles. He freely admits that the action packed nature of these titles would be exciting for western audiences, but the attachment to the franchise itself isn't there.
Still from the official trailer [YouTube]
Gundam Versus appears destined to the same fate as its arcade brethren of never being ported to North America, even though it would be much easier to do than previous releases. The game is being made with the console market directly in mind instead of Japanese arcades, and will even be receiving an English text option for its release in other Asian countries. We can hope that the success and popularity of the most recent Gundam anime series, Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, would provide more incentive to release the game state side, just like Gundam Wing helped bring the Gundam: Battle Assault fighting game to the US back in 2000.
Sources: Play-Asia, Siliconera Interview
