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After the English-speaking gaming world spent decades saying little more than "lol, Japan" at the concept of visual novels, the genre has finally grown enough in popularity for notable titles to frequently get global releases. But some of the most notable examples of the format came about long before that audience developed, and never really got their worldwide due. That's why I'm hoping the upcoming crossover between Banshee's Last Cry and Street Fighter 6 is going to open some doors.
Banshee's Last Cry originally launched for the Super Famicom – the Japanese equivalent of the Super NES – back in 1994. It's a horror-tinged murder-mystery, and helped popularize what developer Chunsoft called the "sound novel." You'd be hard-pressed to actually define the difference between SNs and VNs today, but the idea was that you'd have text-heavy game stories enhanced by atmospheric music and sound effects.
Chunsoft's game wasn't the first of its kind, but Banshee's Last Cry was popular enough to create a genre boom that influenced many of the visual novels that would come later. It's technically not lost to Japan, as an official English version came to iOS in 2014, but that version has long since been delisted and is no longer playable on modern devices.
With all that context, it's still pretty wild to see Capcom adding a Street Fighter 6 crossover with what it describes as a "genre-defining visual novel" in honor of the game's 30th anniversary. (Never mind the fact that's been nearly 31 years.) The collaboration will be a "free addition" to World Tour mode, offering a new story scenario to play through.
Judging by the brief teaser shown in Capcom's Tokyo Game Show broadcast today, it looks like the new scenario will feature plenty of visual novel-style storytelling, but you'll also go through some fights with characters rendered in the silhouetted style of Banshee's Last Cry.
It's all very odd to see presented in Capcom's English broadcast for an audience who likely doesn't have a clue what Banshee's Last Cry is, but I absolutely love seeing seemingly obscure bits of gaming history given a fresh light of day, and I'm hopeful that this might be the spark necessary for the VN to get a new English-language release on modern platforms.
After all, you can probably thank the appearance of Fire Emblem protagonist Marth in Super Smash Bros. Melee in part for Nintendo's strategy RPG series finally getting localized on GBA. Hopefully whetting the curiosity of fighting game fans will be a repeatable method of getting big Japanese games in the hands of English-speaking players.
The Banshee's Last Cry crossover lands alongside the launch of returning fighter C. Viper on October 15.
These are the best visual novels out there today.
