With the global release of Cygames’s Umamusume: Pretty Derby, interest in horse racing and the real-life horses that inspired the characters like Haru Urara has risen in the English-speaking community. The inspiration behind her is still alive today in Japan. Fans can visit and feed the actual horse Haru Urara, though they’ll have to obey guidelines when doing so.

Haru Urara is living out her retirement at the Matha Farm in Chiba. To meet her, you’ll need to make a reservation with the ranch. According to Twitter user tarutaru_mage, openings for these reservations start without warning the month before, and they fill up fast. You need to make a reservation before going to the ranch, so plan accordingly if you wish to make the trip.

Cygames also published guidelines to follow when visiting horse ranches in Japan. You can read the entire document on the game’s official website. In short, you should practice common sense when dealing with large animals like horses, such as not touching them, not making loud noises, and not feeding them.

For those who aren’t in Japan and don’t plan on visiting the country any time soon, but still wish to support the real-life Haru Urara, you can still do so. The Namabokuso Bank service in Japan lets you purchase a 5-kg box of pasturage to horses, with Haru Urara as one of them. It costs 6000 JPY ($40.50) to do so, and you can also set it to do so monthly. As of the time of writing, over 2180 kg of pasturage have been sent to Haru Urara. Many of the most recent comments from supporters are in English, and make mention to Umamusume: Pretty Derby.

Umamusume: Pretty Derby is readily available on the Windows PC and mobile devices. The original anime is on Crunchyroll, while Cinderella Gray streamed on Amazon.

The post How to Visit and Feed Haru Urara, the Real Umamusume Horse appeared first on Siliconera.

Square Enix will introduce a new vocation, Hermit, in Dragon Quest X. It should come out in late August 2025. [Thanks, ryokutya2089!]

The official English name of the new Dragon Quest X vocation has not been announced yet. According to ryokutya2089, it will be a support-focused Master Vocation with its own unique gauge. This gauge will fill up over time, or with special skills. To become a Hermit, you’ll need to have enough levels as a Priest and a Ranger. The Hermit can use the power of spirits to offer multiple boons to the party. It’s unknown at this point if this new vocation supports with purely buffs, or if it can heal as well. Lastly, ryokutya2089 believes that the Hermit’s visuals are a little plain.

Dragon Quest X is the online MMORPG entry of the long-running Dragon Quest series, and it first came out in 2012. An offline remake version is also available under the name Dragon Quest X Offline. In Japan, you can even purchase it for mobile devices so you can play it on the go without bringing your console around.

Dragon Quest X is readily available on the PS4, Nintendo Switch, Windows PC, and mobile devices. More information on the new vocation will appear at a later date.

The post New Master Vocation to Appear in Dragon Quest X appeared first on Siliconera.

An English dub version of Ne Zha 2 will hit theaters in the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand from August 22, 2025. You’ll be able to watch it in IMAX or 3D as well. [Thanks, CMC Pictures!]

Oscar-winning actress Michelle Yeoh will join the cast as Nezha’s mother. So far, she is the only confirmed member of the cast in the CMC Pictures post on Weibo. Yeoh is famous for her roles in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Everything Everywhere All at Once, and Supercop. She stated that she’s proud to work on a landmark film in Chinese cinema. She expresses that Ne Zha 2 is not only a powerful and emotional story, but it can also communicate the charm and beauty of Chinese culture. At the end of her statement, she says that she’s excited to share the story with the world in English.

Ne Zha 2, the direct sequel to the 2019 Ne Zha film, came out in China on January 29, 2025. It grossed over $2.2 billion at the box office, breaking records both domestically and internationally. It is the highest-grossing film of 2025, the highest-grossing non-English language film, and the highest-grossing animated film.

The English dub of Ne Zha 2 will appear in theaters in the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand from August 22, 2025. More information on the cast will come out later.

The post English Dub of Ne Zha 2 to Hit Theaters in August 2025 appeared first on Siliconera.

The release date and price of the physical Nintendo Switch 2 version of Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time have appeared on the official Level 5 webpage for the game. As Level 5 announced earlier this year, the physical editions are Japan exclusive, and there’s no information as of yet regarding a Western release.

The Nintendo Switch 2 version of the game will cost 7978 JPY ($54.45). It’ll come out on August 7, 2025 in Japan. Meanwhile, the Nintendo Switch and PS5 versions cost 7678 JPY ($52.40), and are already available. If you have a physical copy of the Nintendo Switch version already, you can pay 300 JPY to upgrade to the Nintendo Switch 2 edition. However, if you play the Switch 2 version on a Switch console, the graphics and such will still be the Switch version’s.

Aside from news of the physical release, Level 5 also announced Photo Mode. It’ll appear later this month. You’ll be able to customize it with poses, emote, and angles. As well, Level 5 will hold a contest to see who can take the best picture. Information on that contest, including what the “awesome prizes” are, will come out later.

Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time is readily available on the PS4, PS5, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, Xbox Series X, and Windows PC.

The post Fantasy Life i Switch 2 Physical Version Dated appeared first on Siliconera.

On July 4, 2025, JastUSA posted that it will release the English and Chinese versions of a School Days Remaster for Windows PC. Overflow, the original studio behind School Days, is still handling the game’s Japanese release.

The announcement on JastUSA’s X (formerly Twitter) account shows an in-development picture of Sekai and Kotonoha, the two main heroines of School Days. The artwork is still a rough draft, but it’s likely to be the cover art of the finished game. According to the text on the teaser image, the game will come out in 2025, and it'll be optimized for any high-end graphics driver so you can enjoy the game as it was no matter your PC.

School Days is an infamous eroge visual novel that came out in 2005. It spawned several adaptations, such as an anime version and a manga serialization. The plot follows Makoto Ito, a high school student who falls in love with his classmate, Kotonoha. Sekai, also a classmate of theirs, helps the two get together, but she becomes jealous after she starts developing feelings for Makoto herself.

Despite its age, School Days still has a following, likely for its depressing and gory story. Aspects of School Days have achieved meme status, even among people who have never watched the show or played the game before. It’s also been a yearly tradition for Abema to stream the show every Christmas for peak romance and festivity.

A School Days Remaster is in development for the Windows PC (Windows 11), and it'll come out some time in 2025.

The post School Days Remaster Announced appeared first on Siliconera.

After years of waiting, Cygames has finally localized Umamusume: Pretty Derby for an English audience and ported it onto Steam. With an updated UI that makes playing in full screen a comfortable experience, it feels like the ideal way to experience the world of umamusume racing.

Umamusume: Pretty Derby takes place in a world where horses don't exist. Instead, we have umamusume, horse girls who take on the names and legacies of real life race horses. Stronger and faster than the average human, these umamusume love racing and running, and the various story modes revolve around these races, which are also based on real life racing seasons. There’s no main story, per se. Rather, there are story arcs that focus on an umamusume or group. For example, the first story revolves around Mejiro McQueen, whereas the second one’s about Rice Shower.

The meat of the game centers on raising your umamusume in Career Mode, and then setting her either on your team for daily races, PVP, and events. Career Mode’s story focuses on you, a Trainer at the highly competitive Tracen Academy, helping your trainee through their three years at school. Each career takes three in-game years (72 turns), with set goals that differ between each umamusume. Some want to reach a certain number of fans within a time limit, while others have goals tied to specific races.

The thing about Umamususume: Pretty Derby is that it's a game that hinges on luck. Even if you’ve gathered the best support cards and sparks for your particular girl, RNG can really mess you up. One unsuccessful training session, even if it had a low failure rate, can set you back three whole turns to restore your umamusume to full health. Not doing so can cost a race, which can then snowball into a failed career. The unpredictability of Career Mode is frustrating, admittedly. However, I don’t really mind it as much as I might have before. The newest scenario on the Japanese server makes it so ridiculously easy to raise everybody that it’s nice to actually put in the work again.

Unless you’ve played it yourself or seen clips of it, it can be hard to understand the appeal of Umamusume. “Horse girls based on real life race horses race and then perform a concert afterwards” sounds pretty nuts. If you enjoy sports manga, you'll probably enjoy the stories, as they’re very focused on themes of hard work, friendship, and such. The horse races are very exciting to watch, too. Everything—from the sound design, cinematography, and sheer adrenaline of watching your girl dart past her rivals to get to the finish line first—really pulls you in.

Like with Granblue Fantasy, the in-house localization team did fantastic with Umamusume: Pretty Derby. It’s a good mix of localization and translation that makes for a comfortable reading experience. I’m also a huge fan of how the Steam version splits up the screen compared to the DMM version. It's actually full screen, and it's easy to reference information like the log or my support deck.

The one thing I'm on the fence about is the accelerated schedule. On one hand, it'll be nice to get umamusume that the Japanese server has had for years instead of having to wait for their debut. On the other, we don't have as much time to save between banners compared to when the Asian servers launched these characters or support cards.

The positive about this, though, is that the concept of "limited characters" doesn't really exist in Umamusume: Pretty Derby. I pulled the New Year Kitasan Black during summer, for example. Even if a banner comes and goes, you still have a chance (albeit a lower one) to get who you want. So there's no FOMO or anything like that. You can jump in at any time and not lament about missing a limited character you wanted.

Umamusume: Pretty Derby has been blowing up on social media lately, so people who didn’t know about it before might have seen what the gameplay is like through screenshots or videos. The heavy RNG and long career mode might be a turn-off for some, but I still urge people to try it out, especially while we’re still receiving daily log-in bonuses for the global launch. It’s definitely a game you have to experience to understand what all the hype is about.

Umamusume: Pretty Derby is readily available on the Windows PC and mobile devices.

The post Review: Umamusume: Pretty Derby on Steam Makes the Game Even Better appeared first on Siliconera.

Bandai Namco announced Jump+ Jumble Rush, which will be a mobile game that’ll go live in Fall 2025. This game will feature multiple characters from Jump+ manga series, such as Spy x Family, Dandadan, and Chainsaw Man. [Thanks, 4Gamer!]

Jump+ Jumble Rush is a commemorative game to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Shonen Jump+. From the screenshots and trailer video, we can get a look at how the game plays. It’s a tower defense game in a field that looks like manga panels. Manga panels also appear whenever you use a character’s signature attack. You can choose ten characters for your dream party, combining characters from popular series like the aforementioned three series, and much more.

Here is a trailer of the game:

According to Bandai Namco, this is a game that’s very intuitive and easy to get the hang of. So if you’re a manga fan but not much of a gamer, you can still pick it up without any difficulty.

Shonen Jump+ first came out in September 2014, and is a free mobile app and website. While you can read digital versions of Jump titles, it also has a lot of original titles, such as Kaiju No. 8. Series that debuted this year include Maison and the Man-Eating Apartment, Eunuch of Empire, and Blue Proustian Moment.

Jump+ Jumble Rush will come out in Japan on mobile devices some time in Fall 2025. More information on the release date, as well as any pre-registration bonuses, will come out later.

The post Jump+ Jumble Rush Is Tower Defense With Manga Characters appeared first on Siliconera.

McDonald’s Japan will have a Hello Kitty Happy Meal set this summer, along with a limited edition of Suika Game to enjoy. You’ll only be able to download the game by buying a Hello Kitty Happy Meal and scanning the QR code it comes with, and the game will only be downloadable from July 11 to August 8, 2025. [Thanks, Denfaminico!]

This year’s Hello Kitty toys from McDonald’s are all practical in some way, with three of them featuring a tanned version of Hello Kitty. The first set of toys will be available from July 11 to 17, 2025. Then, the second set will come out from July 18 to 24, 2025. Afterwards, from July 25, 2025, you’ll be able to get all of them in stores. The toys you can get are:

• Bag clips
• Cup
• Miniature tray
• Onigiri mould
• Spoon and fork
• Surfboard-shaped ice maker

Here's a trailer going over everything:

As mentioned earlier, the Hello Kitty Suika Game will only be available to download after you scan the QR code on the Happy Meal box. You’ll have from July 11, 2025 to August 10, 2025 to download it. It plays like the usual Suika Game, in which you combine fruits to make bigger ones. However, depending on when you download it, you'll get a different summer and Hello Kitty theme. The fruits also have a Hello Kitty bow on them, or they resemble quintessential Japanese summer icons. For example, there are water yo-yos and plastic bags of goldfish.

The Hello Kitty McDonald’s campaign will start on July 11, 2025. The normal Suika Game is available for download on the Nintendo Switch and mobile devices.

The post Hello Kitty Suika Game Appears Alongside McDonald’s Happy Meal in Japan appeared first on Siliconera.

The Animal Crossing: New Horizons snow globe gachapon that lets you fill the toy with water to make your own will be re-run in Japan starting in the first week of July 2025. It’ll cost 400 JPY ($2.80) per attempt. [Thanks, Inside Games!]

These water globe toys first appeared in Japan three years ago in 2022. Back then, it cost 300 JPY (around $2.60 at the time) per attempt, so you’ll be pulling for these toys at an inflated price. Each snow globe globe depicts a different seasonal scene from the Animal Crossing: New Horizons island once filled with water, complete with some popular villagers. There’s also one of the Island Representative standing at the Airport, as well as one using the promotional art depicting island life. This makes for a total of six variations.

As a note, you’ll have to put the water globe together yourself, and it doesn’t come in a capsule, making it a more sustainable type of gachapon. After filling the globe part with water, you’re supposed to set it on the stand. Then, you can display it.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons came out in 2020 as the fifth installment in the Animal Crossing series. The village the player lives in and gets to develop is on a deserted island, and they can go “scout” more villagers by flying to other islands from the Airport. It is one of the best-selling games on the Nintendo Switch, especially since it came out during the COVID-19 quarantine and was used as a replacement for social interactions.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is readily available on the Nintendo Switch and Switch 2.

The post Animal Crossing: New Horizons Snow Globes Return appeared first on Siliconera.

The Sanrio and Yu-Gi-Oh collaboration has moved on to the next series in the franchise with a Yu-Gi-Oh GX collection of merchandise. Advance sales for Sanrio and Yu-Gi-Oh GX goods are available until July 6, 2025, and they will officially come out in physical locations on August 8, 2025.

The collection features six human characters drawn in a cute chibi style and more pastel colors, and nine Sanrio mascots dressed up like signature monsters from GX. Sanrio did something similar for the first Yu-Gi-Oh crossover campaign. The human characters you can get are: Judai (Jaden), Manjoume (Chazz), Johan (Jesse), Asuka (Alexis), Ed, and Ryo (Zane). As for the monster and mascot combinations, we have:

• Badtzmaru x Cyber End Dragon
• Cinnamoroll x Mokey Mokey
• Hangyodon x Neo-Spacian Aqua Dolphin
• Hello Kitty x Elemental Hero Flame Wingman
• Keroppi x Winged Kuriboh
• Kuromi x Yubel
• My Melody x Crystal Beast Ruby Carbuncle
• Pochacco x Elemental Hero Neos
• Pompompurin x Ojama Yellow

Goods include the usual line-up. You can purchase pin badges, stickers, acrylic keychains, memo pads, and a mug. Currently, the merchandise is only available via the online Sanrio Store or KC Store. You can also still get stuff from the first collaboration.

2025 marks the 20th anniversary of Yu-Gi-Oh GX. The remastered version of the anime started airing in April 2025, and the milestone has renewed interest in the series. Earlier in 2025, a pop-up shop opened, selling goods like T-shirts and more.

Yu-Gi-Oh GX is available to watch on Crunchyroll. The Sanrio and Yu-Gi-Oh GX merchandise is available for online advance sales until July 6, 2025. Then, they’ll appear in physical locations from August 8, 2025.

The post New Sanrio Yu-Gi-Oh Merchandise Focuses on GX appeared first on Siliconera.

From July 1 to 31, 2025, Baskin Robbins in Japan will have a Super Mario campaign. During this time, you can purchase limited edition flavors of ice cream and drinks that draw inspiration from famous Super Mario characters.

You can watch the trailer for the Super Ice Cream Summer campaign here:

The limited edition flavor is the Super Mario Fruits Summer Sorbet, which has the same color scheme as the eponymous plumber. As for the taste, it’s an apple and grape sorbet with “bubble candy,” which has a bubble-like coating and light crunchy texture. Cups featuring Mario and his friends are available. There will be two different types of sundaes, too. You can get a single in a Question Block or a double in a Yoshi-themed cup. Luigi and Boo also have their own themed item. You can get a Crush Soda that uses apple and muscat grape flavors, and includes nata de coco.

Aside from exclusive flavors, you can also get Mario box sets. There’s one that features Toad and lets you bring home eight cups of ice cream. This box also includes a cooling towel that has Toad’s pattern, as well as his friends. It comes with a carrying case that has a carabiner, so it’s useful for when you’re going outside in the summer. Finally, there are two kinds of ice cream cakes you can get. One heavily features Yoshi, while the other one has the whole main cast of characters.

This is the third time that Baskin Robbins held a Super Mario campaign. The first collaboration was in 2023 and the second was in 2024. It’s practically a summer tradition at this point.

The Baskin Robbins Super Mario collaboration will run in Japan from July 1 to 31, 2025.

The post Super Mario Campaign to Return to Baskin Robbins appeared first on Siliconera.

Bandai Spirits announced an upcoming Ichiban Kuji for NieR Automata Ver1.1a. It will come out in stores from October 17, 2025.

Each attempt will cost 900 JPY, which converts to approximately $6.20. The NieR Automata Ver1.1a Ichiban Kuji lottery will be available via the official physical and online Ichiban Kuji store. In total, there will be eleven different prizes, including a Last One Prize and a Double Chance Campaign. So far, Bandai Spirits only posted the images of the Last One Prize and the first three rewards. They are:

• A Prize: A2 figure
• B Prize: 2B figure
• C Prize: 9S figure
• Last One Prize: A2 art scale figure

The Last One version of the A2 figure is a bust. Meanwhile, the A Prize figure depicts her after she cuts her hair short. As for the B and C Prizes of 2B and 9S, they’re both sitting down while holding out their black box. If you have both of them and place them next to each other, you can recreate a memorable and emotional scene from the game. The A, B, and C prizes all depict key moments from the game and anime series, so there's the possibility that the other prizes will follow that same pattern.

NieR Automata is readily available on the PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and Windows PC. The anime adaptation, NieR Automata Ver1.1a, is available on streaming platforms like Crunchyroll. Finally, the NieR Automata Ver1.1a Ichiban Kuji lottery will become available in Japan from October 17, 2025.

The post NieR Automata Ichiban Kuji Recreates 2B and 9S Scene appeared first on Siliconera.

Near the end of the Final Fantasy XIV Letter From the Producer LIVE Part LXXXVII live stream on June 20, 2025, Square Enix seemed to imply that it’s working on a Switch 2 port of Final Fantasy XVI. There is no concrete evidence for this, though, and it’s still a rumor. [Thanks, Resetera!]

Near the end of the stream, Naoki Yoshida (producer) and Kazutoyo Maehiro (creative director) announced the Xbox Series X and Microsoft Store versions of Final Fantasy XVI. Both ports are now available. They suggest that people who haven’t played the game yet take this chance to try it out. After listing off all the platforms Final Fantasy XVI is out on, Yoshida mentions that “Nintendo-san” is the only one they have left to release the game on. The rest of the staff laugh, and they say they’ll “do their best.”

This isn’t the first time that rumors about a potential Final Fantasy Switch port flew around the Internet. In 2017, Hajime Tabata (who previously worked for Square Enix) cleared up confusion about a Final Fantasy XV Switch port. In a Famitsu interview, he stated that international media had jumped the gun and thought he was hinting at a possible Switch release. People had extrapolated his comments about how he'd performed technical tests on the Switch and how much he liked the console. Until Square Enix makes an official announcement, one should keep in mind that this could just be a joke.

Final Fantasy XVI is readily available on the PS5, Xbox Series X, and Windows PC.

The post Naoki Yoshida Mentioned FFXVI and Switch 2 in FFXIV Live Letter appeared first on Siliconera.

Bushiroad announced a Tales of series set of decks and booster packs for Weiss Schwarz and Weiss Schwarz Blau. They’ll come out in late 2025 and early 2026.

During the Bushiroad TCG announcement stream on June 18, 2025, it showed off slides that noted which Tales games would have characters appear in Weiss Schwarz and Blau as cards. The announcement took place at around the 2:06:08 timestamp. The starter deck and booster packs for Weiss Schwarz Blau will come out first, on December 19, 2025. Included games are:

• Arise
• Berseria
• Destiny
• Destiny 2
• Hearts R
• Innocence R
• Xillia
• Xillia 2
• Zestiria

Stan, the protagonist of Tales of Destiny, is the poster character for this slide. As for the Weiss Schwarz cards, the trial deck and booster packs will come out on January 16, 2026. Included games are:

• Abyss
• Eternia
• Graces f
• Legendia
• Phantasia
• Rebirth
• Symphonia
• Symphonia: Knight of Ratatosk
• Tempest
• Vesperia

The 2026 release will include illustrations of each game’s protagonist in an original outfit. So Tales fans who don’t play Weiss Schwarz Blau might still be interested in buying the cards for those.

Weiss Schwarz and Weiss Schwarz Blau are crossover TCG from Bushiroad. Other collaborations include ones with Goddess of Victory: Nikke and hololive. While the Nikke cards had international releases in English, Korea, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese, Bushiroad will need to confirm when and if the Tales cards will come out in other languages and regions.

The Tales Weiss Schwarz and Weiss Schwarz Blau cards will come out in late 2025 and early 2026, with more details on the cards to come out later.

The post Weiss Schwarz Tales of Card Game Decks Revealed appeared first on Siliconera.

Sanrio is collaborating with the Japanese watch brand Angel Heart to release a heavenly Cinnamoroll watch. Instead of coming in a box like a normal watch, it’ll come in a vanity pouch that looks like Cinnamoroll’s head, which you can reuse for small items like make-up or keys.

The watch is mostly silver, though the face is the pale blue that’s usually associated with Cinnamoroll. The edges where the numbers are resemble clouds, and they’re on a separate layer from the blue. This gives the face a three-dimensional effect, while also resembling the sky where Cinnamoroll came from. Angel Heart’s logo is above the hands of the watch, and there’s a Cinnamoroll hanging out near the six. There is also an engraved Cinnamoroll on the back.

As for the Cinnamoroll pouch, it’s around 190 mm wide and 110 mm tall. As mentioned earlier, you can use the bag when you’re going out for a short amount of time. It can fit travel-sized containers of hand cream, perfume, make-up, sunscreen, and so on. Both the zippers and handle use pearl beads, which gives it a fancier look.

The Cinnamoroll watch from Angel Heart will come out on July 18, 2025. However, pre-orders are open now. As a note, both Sanrio’s and Angel Heart’s online stores don’t accept international orders.

The post Cinnamoroll Watch Will Come With Bag appeared first on Siliconera.