Square Enix has announced that Drakengard 3 (a.k.a. Drag-On Dragoon 3,) will be released for the PS3 in Japan on October 31st. In addition to the standard release of the game, a special edition will also be available that comes with a lot of (expensive) bonuses.
The Drakengard 3: 10th Anniversary Commemoration Box comes with “Drakengard: The World Inside,” a book that contains commentary from the game’s staff, as well as an original story by series creator Sawako Natori that explains the connections between the 3 Drakengard games and their spin-off, Nier. The World Inside also comes with a poster featuring the protagonists of all of the games set within Drakengard’s multiverse, drawn by the immensely talented Kimihiko Fujisaka (who also did the character designs for Mistwalker’s The Last Story, released last year on the Wii.)
The Commemoration Box also comes with a soundtrack, a blu-ray that features all of the cutscenes from the previous games in the series, as well as an art book, a DLC code for some special in-game content, and a “Novel Prelude” book.
Of course, all these neat bonuses come at a price: the limited edition of Drakengard 3 will cost 19,800 yen (about 200 dollars.)
While the series is apparently pretty popular in Japan, Drakengard has never managed to attract much of an audience here in the States, so there’s a good chance that this game might not get localized. It’s a shame, too: I wasn’t a fan of the first two Drakengards (the combat was just too repetitive,) but I absolutely loved Nier and I was looking forward to seeing what that team would cook up next.