Jump 09: Nothing new on Wii Tales game at Jump

Bandai Namco didn't specifically state that the new Wii "mothership" entry in the Tales series would be shown at this year's Jump Festa. But everyone knew it would show up.

And it did, but just for a few minutes. Towards the end of a lengthy Tales of Hearts stage, which featured as its centerpiece a live voice skit performed by Kohaku voice actress Marina Inoue and Hisue voice actor Masaya Matsukaze, Tales of series brand manager Hideo Baba said that the stage event was turning into a "new product announcement" event. He then went on to introduce the Wii game.

New revelations from his introduction... well, there was just one. Baba said that the game has been in development for two years.

He then shared a trailer for the game, but it was just the same trailer that was included on the Tales of Hearts pre-order disk.

And that's it! Considering the amount of hype generated by the Tales of Vesperia unveiling at last year's Jump (Bandai Namco didn't share the platform), this showing for the Wii title was a bit disappointing.

(UPDATE: It turns out that there might have been a bit of extra information revealed at the stage event. See this report for more).

In other Tales of series non-news, following the Tales of mothership title "unveiling" and a presentation on the new Blue Dragon game (more on this in a bit!), Baba called Inoue and Matsukaze back out onto the stage to discuss more Tales of Hearts. Baba said that he's hoping to make an anime version of Hearts. Inoue joked that they should make the anime like the game -- shown on two screens.

Inoue is really cute. And she actually has the figure of a Tales character. I mean that in a good way.