"Now rush forth, fast as you can, Imperial Assault Troupe!
and sound forth like thunder, Imperial Assault Troupe!"

So my experience with Sakura Taisen, (aka Sakura Wars) goes all the way back to 1995-6 where I saw it mentioned in Sega Saturn magazines. At the time it was being described as a strategy role playing game and all the screenshots were of units on grid based hexes. Fantastic!, back then Shining Force 1 and 2 were my favorite games and I couldn't wait for more. Sadly time came and went and the game never came to the west, nor did the sequel, or it's sequel, or it's sequel. The first game in the series that came west was the 5th title in the series and even then it never came to Europe so I still couldn't play it.

Finally in 2019 the Sakura Wars soft reboot on PS4 came out herein the uk! Only I found out they were never strategy role playing games....and more like dating sim visual novels that had strategy battles.... which for that release had been removed for some of the most brain dead action possible. Let's just say I wasn't a fan but there was an inkling there of what could have been, There is something about the series keeps calling me back that I want to like it. The art, music and my nostalgia for something I never got to play keep pulling me to the series. Thanks to fans hard work there is an English patch for the original Saturn game I was so interested in I can finally play it, albeit 27 years later than I wanted to.

So how does it actually stand up? Overall I like it. The main premise is almost exactly the same as it's 2019 counterpart. You play the role of Ensign Ichiro Ogami freshly promoted out of the navel academy straight to Captain of the Imperial Assault Troupe, a secret unit based in Ginza Tokyo underneath the Grand Imperial Theatre. The rest of the unit is composed entirely of the female actors who perform when not defending the city in steam powered mechs. The whole game has a very 1930's steampunk aesthetic with a mixture of Japanese and Western influence for the time period creating a wonderful look and feel.

The game is split up into episodes with 'next episode' previews almost like an anime tv show with each episode introducing new foes, characters and scenarios. Within that there are two gameplay types. The visual novel and the strategy battles. The visual novel section has you exploring the theatre talking to characters and choosing dialogue options. I like most of the cast and the game is almost fully voice acted with matching lip synch with the character art which I thought for the time must have been very impressive. Each of the characters stands out both visually and in personality from each other. Sakura is the newest member and a country girl, Sumire is the diva of the group, Kanna the Karate tomboy, Maria the mysterious stoic type etc. Whilst most of them do fall into stereotypes I think they are fleshed out well and have some impactful scenes together. One scene early on actually had me laughing out loud.

When the alert sounds and the battles begin the game goes to an isometric map with the characters in their steam powered mechs known as Koubu to fight off larger than life robots and demons. The battle system is simple in that on each characters turn they can take two of a select amount of actions; move, attack, special attack, defend, heal (only twice a battle) and rest (charges special attack) and that's it. Each character's koubu has slightly different attack ranges based on the weapons they wield. Sakura is only one square as it's a sword but maria has guns so can attack from 5 away for example. To balance this their movement ranges vary equally. There are no visible stats, no customization or weapons. The only thing that may vary from player to player is the mood of the team based on your choices having positive or negative impact on them during the visual novel part.

The visuals for the battles use sprites that look pretty decent overall for a Saturn game and match well with the portraits and animated cutscenes peppered throughout. Each character having a colour associated with their design that their koubu is also coloured is a nice touch. (Sumire always has a purple kimono, uniform so her mech matches etc.) The music is iconic throughout and while I driveled on about the amazing theme tune like a madman in my 2019 review the rest of the soundtrack is pretty stand out on it's own merits.

So as much as I like the structure, setting, art, characters, music and visuals it does have a couple of things that bring it down. The visual novel section can be incredibly annoying due to it's design. Exploring the theatre is often a chore because except a few hints dropped occasionally you have no idea where anyone is and often a limited amount of rooms you can explore before triggering the next major event meaning I missed out on talking to some of the characters I would have liked to. This is compounded in the opposite direction in a later chapter where I have to talk to everyone to progress meaning I slowly knocked on doors or checked each room looking for them. Added to that, not all the character interactions or story beats hit unfortunately with a couple especially around Iris who is only 10 years old were a little cringey and made me uncomfortable or wanting to roll my eyes.

Overall however they are small complaints to an otherwise unique fun little game. I hope the sequel fixes some of these issues as an English patch is being worked on now by dedicated fans. Sadly I don't think a character icon on the theatre map was added to it from screens I've seen, oh well....

+ Great music and art.
+ Likeable varied characters.
+ Combat surprisingly fun despite simple mechanics.

- Exploring the Grand Imperial Theatre for characters is a chore.
- Not every story beat works.