We’re a week away from Japan Amusement Expo 2014 and the four big ones have already released most of their line ups for the show and while there’s not anything notably new one can just hope that at least one of them has a hidden ace up their sleeve.
First up is Sega
Sega will be showing off a couple of new games. New, in the sense that they’re not released yet. In another way not so new, since most of them are already on location tests and already known to the public.
As always most of them won’t be available anywhere near Europe, except for perhaps Dead or Alive – making its arcade comeback – and Guilty Gear Xrd. I’d love to try both the new Initial D and the super trippy mai mai GreeN music game (check the video clip further down!).
Events
- SEGA Sound Unit, Beat Mario and Ozaki Junko will be performing songs from the upcoming mai mai GreeN PLUS.
- The finals of the 1st ARCANA CUP official CODE OF JOKER tournament. This even will also be streamed live.
- Appearances by Guilty Gear Xrd ~SIGN~ director; Daisuke Ishiwatari and the Initial D Arcade Stage producer; Kenji Arai.
- and many others. See the related links at the bottom of the page for a link to the full event schedule.
Line up
Hero bank arcade (ヒーローバンク アーケード)
An arcade version of the Nintendo 3DS RPG with the same name. You play as Kaito Gosho, a young boy with serious money problems, forced to participate in a virtual fight tournament in order to repay his debts. The money you win can also be used to perform actions during the battles. Hero bank arcade is scheduled for release this summer.
Initial D ARCADE STAGE 8 Infinity (頭文字D ARCADE STAGE 8 インフィニティ)
The next installment of the Initial D franchise has the appropriate name Infinity. According to the press release it goes back to Shuichi Shigeno’s original world of the Initial D manga. You’re faced with a single player career mode where you race upgrade your ride. D coins can be used to purchase special parts. To save you progress you’ll need an ALL.Net IC card. Initial D ARCADE STAGE 8 Infinity is scheduled for operation sometime this year.
DEAD OR ALIVE 5 ULTIMATE ARCADE
It’s been 13 years since we last saw 
Dead or Alive in the arcades. DoA 5 Ultimate Arcade was released on 24/12/13 and features a new character named Marie Rose (voiced by Mai Aizawa). She’s a French maid and her fighting style is somewhat oddly systema, a Russian martial art focused on controlling the six body levers (elbows, neck, knees, waist, ankles, and shoulders) through pressure point application, striking, and weapon applications.
Marie Rose will be made available to the console versions of the game in an upcoming patch. DoA 5 Ultimate Arcade runs on Sega’s RingEdge 2 system with support for the ALL.Net P-ras MULTI Ver.2 system.
GUILTY GEAR Xrd ~SIGN~
Guilty Gear is back in full cel shaded 2D glory using Unreal Engine 3. According to rumors it will be released later this month for the arcades and sometime this year both for PlayStation 3 & 4.
Development is once again done by Arc System Works and the series creator, Daisuke Ishiwatari, is back in the director’s chair.
New in this version is the character Bedman.
Final location testing is currently ongoing and like it’s predecessor GGXrd will be released on Sega’s RingEdge 2 arcade board with support for the ALL.Net P-ras MULTI Ver.2 system.
Dengeki Bunko FIGHTING CLIMAX (電撃文庫 FIGHTING CLIMAX)
Dengeki Bunko Fighting Climax is a 2D fighting game collaboration between Sega and Dengeki Bunko scheduled for release in March this year.
The game features characters from different light novel series under the Dengeki Bunko imprint. Each playable character has its own assist character that can be called into the fight to help in various ways.
All characters are voiced by their respective actors from the anime adaptations. Akria Yuki of Virtua Fighter is confirmed as one of the bosses.
Puyo Puyo! QUEST ARCADE (ぷよぷよ!!クエスト アーケード)
Puyo Puyo! Quest Arcade is an RPG spin off of the populat Puyo Puyo! franchise. The game was released in November last year and seems to be getting a good deal of plays.
mai mai GreeN PLUS
mai mai GreeN is a fast paced crazy music game where you have to hit and swipe on a touch screen to the beat of the music. The updated version (mai mai GreeN PLUS) scheduled sometime this spring will be available for play on the expo. Level: ASIAN!
THE WORLD of THREE KINGDOMS
The World of Three Kingdoms is an epic scale real time battle game set in the Chinese Sangokushi era. You command your troops using buttons and touch screen.
You can battle out against the CPU or other players and as all other Sangokushi style battle games the cabinets are beautiful though in the case of TWOTK they’re combined four and four in a half circle with an integrated live monitor instead of rows of free standing cabs.
Trailers
Sega will be showing new trailers for Border Break scrambled (ボーダーブレイク スクランブル) Ver. 4.0 and Shining Force Cross Ecclesia (シャイニング・フォースクロス エクレシア) Version B.
Medal games
- 100 & medal GINGAAAN!! (100 & メダル GINGAAAN!!)
- StarHorse 3 Season III CHASE THE WIND
- Onimusha Soul Card Rush (鬼武者Soul カードラッシュ)
- Fist of the North Star BATTLE MEDAL (北斗の拳 BATTLE MEDAL)
Kids games
- 遊育右脳教室 うのチャレ (educational game)
- Take it! Anpanman Popcorn (それいけ！アンパンマン ポップコ－ンこうじょう3)
- Kids naughty village (キッズわんぱく村)
- Single satiety Aquarium (シングルまんぷくすいぞくかん)
New Astro City 