Sega’s TGS 2015 Lineup – New Yakuza Game, and More Surprise Announcements?

Sega’s Tokyo Game Show 2015 plans are becoming clearer as the big weekend approaches. The official Yakuza portal has a curious image at the top of the page, the one we’ve chosen as this article’s featured image. It’s certainly a teaser for a new Yakuza title, set to be revealed at Tokyo Game Show 2015. So much for my prediction….anyway, congratulations Yakuza fans! September 15 is also the day of the Sony Japan’s press conference, so we can probably expect a full reveal of new title there.

Sega had also gone live with an update to their website detailing this year’s TGS offerings from itself, Atlus, and its partners for this year (Warner Bros., Nippon Ichi Software, Mages). The officially announced list featuring Atlus and Sega (and including their status as playable and/or stage presence only) is as follows:

Sega/Sega Networks:

• 7th Dragon III Code: VFD (3DS) – Playable, Stage
• Blade Arcus from Shining EX (PS4, PS3) – Playable (PS4), Stage
• Dengeki Bunko: Fighting Climax Ignition (PS4, PS3, PSV) – Playable (PS4), Stage
• Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA X (PSV, PS4) – Playable (PSV), Stage
• Miracle Girls Festival (PSV) – Playable, Stage
• Phantasy Star Online 2 (PS4, PSV, PC) – Playable (PS4), Stage
• Sega NET Mahjong MJ (PC, Android, iOS) – Stage
• The World End Eclipse (PSV, PC, Android, iOS) – Stage

Atlus:

• Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir (PS4, PS3, PSV) – Playable (PS4)
• Persona 5 (PS4, PS3) – Stage

(Poor Persona 5! If only it were playable this time…)

However, the website was quickly picked apart by Japanese media outlets and fans, who managed to find hints of two unannounced games in the site’s source code. This prompted Sega to re-publish the website featuring nothing but the advertisement page prior to the full lineup reveal, but the information on the new titles is still out there!

One title is called “Thirteen Mecha Soldier Defense Force”, which is apparently a title in development by VanillaWare and Atlus. It might have quite the history; VanillaWare’s 2013 greeting card featured a peculiar piece of artwork that contained a certain string of characters in quotations: “十三機兵防衛圏”. You can see it in between the left and middle “thirds” of the image below.

That same combination of characters was featured in source code unearthed in the version of Sega’s TGS website that detailed their lineup. Reportedly the game is set for Playstation 4 and Playstation Vita. No other details known yet.

Next is a game only known by the name “LEXUS”. It’s set for Playstation 4 and Playstation 3. Let’s note Toshihiro Nagoshi has teased a game that isn’t Yakuza itself not too long ago. The platform choice is consistent with the history of recent Yakuza titles, at the least. LEXUS is probably the codename for a new title (I don’t really expect some sort of unprecedented partnership between the car brand Lexus and Sega as it stands), but there’s no way to tell what that might be for the time being.

Credit to this Gematsu article for its overview of Sega’s TGS 2015 plans.