Tomonobu Itagaki recently hinted on a Facebook post that Fatal Frame V: Oracle of the Sodden Raven may be coming to North America this year.
“Hey guys, I strongly believe that Kikuchi Keisuke will release the Fatal Frame V in America, in many countries. He and me have same philosophy from Tecmo days. That’s what I can say for now. I want you guys to read between the lines. Anyway I will play this game.”
Could this statement be a hint towards a possible western localization? Or could he have been simply speaking as a fan please?
Fatal Frame V was a Wii U exclusive released September 2014 in Japan. The game made use of the Wii U camera controls as a way to capture hostile ghosts. Once dubbed one of the “scariest horror games of all time,” Nintendo has since transformed the Fatal Frame V franchise into a strange peripheral title, taking away from the quality of gameplay. Strangely enough, Fatal Frame V was not the first of the series to make use of this camera control function.
A spin-off to the typical Fatal Frame series was Spirit Camera: The Cursed Memoir for the 3DS which was released in 2012. Spirit Camera was the first of the series, well… spinoff, to use the 3DS camera in gameplay. Unfortunately for Spirit Camera, the game was a complete flop, regardless of the fact that the child-like controls seemed most as home on the 3DS.
You can’t help but wonder, after the failure of Spirit Camera, what possessed Tecmo Koei to pursue this again? One can only hope that if this game does get a North American localization, that they will make the camera peripheral optional in gameplay. Analyzing Nintendo’s history with mandatory use of peripherals, this is not very likely.
