Ni No Kuni: The Another World trailer

Not exactly film news, this, but…

The Japanese are no strangers to hiring movie talents for spicing up their videogames, but Studio Level 5 (of DragonQuest fame) have taken this to, haha, the next level.
For their new RPG “Ni No Kuni: The Another World” (no typo), the animated cut-scenes will be done by Studio Ghibli. That’s quite a catch as you will agree.

And it doesn’t stop there either, for Joe Hisaishi will compose the game’s soundtrack. In case you’re wondering “Joe Who?”, well, shame on you!
He is perhaps most famous for composing the soundtracks of all of Hayao Miyazaki’s movies for the past 25 years, but he also collaborated on several movies with Takeshi Kitano like “Brother”, “Dolls”, “Kikujiro”, “Hana-Bi” and “Sonatine”. And that’s only scratching the surface!

Last week the Tokyo Game Show started, so Studio Level 5 released a trailer for “Ni No Kuni”.

It is a Role-Playing Game (Studio Level 5’s forte) about a 13-year old boy who blames himself for his mother’s death. But one day he gets a chance to enter a parallel universe inhabited by alternate versions of people he knows in the “real” world, and working from this strange place he just might be able to save her…
Gripping stuff, and the animation sure does show its pedigree. My only worry is that the intended platform (which is the Nintendo DS) does not quite have the resolution or size to do all of this splendid artwork justice.

Our good friend Peter van der Lugt over at GhibliWorld.com has the trailer on his site, so please head over there for some Ghibli Goodness.