Sega held today the 8th "Sakura Taisen Imperial Communication Department’s Broadcast" stream, where many new pieces of information were revealed. The biggest reveal on the stream was the introduction gameplay video of two new characters:

First, we have Itsuko Saijo, voiced by Mayu Yoshioka. She's a 15 years old girl and a huge fan of the Flower Division and the Imperial Theater. She spends all her free time at the theater, interacting with the staff and the other customers. She also has a huge collection of goods, with both goods based on the old and the new members of the Flower Division. She most notably collect bromides, and considers Seijuro her rival when it comes to bromide collecting. She's also jealous of him as he always gets to spend time with Sakura Amamiya.

Next, we have Hiromi Hongou, voiced by Haruka Terui. Hiromi is 22 years old and the daughter of the owner of Mikazuki, a Wagashi shop. Hiromi works there as a shop clerk. She has a gentle personality and is always seen smiling, so a lot of customers go to Mikazuki just to see her. Her hobby is creating new types of Wagashi, but it seems people who eat her creations tend to have mysterious things happening to them. Some people are terrified of what she makes too. Hiromi also loves Japanese culture and believes Wagashi is its best representative.

Both Itsuki and Hiromi were designed by Noizi Ito. She's the character designer of Shakugan no Shana and Haruhi Suzumiya's light novels. Seeing the other character designers we got so far are all people related to incredibly popular anime of the late 2000s and early 2010s, I actually predicted Noizi Ito would be one of the designers on Shin Sakura Taisen. I'm pretty hyped she is.

Here are Noizi Ito's comments:

Noizi Ito: Thinking back of when I used to play the previous Sakura Taisen games, I never imagined I'd be working on the series one day. It's a great honor. The two girls I designed are characters who frequently interact with the main characters, so I'm really looking forward to how it'll turn out.

Mayu Yoshioka also shared some comments on Twitter:

Mayu Yoshioka: It got officially announced! I'm voicing Itsuki Saijo in Shin Sakura Taisen!

Itsuki chan loves the Flower Division. Her conversations with Kamiyama san are something you definitly need to see.

Look forward to the game's release!

We'll be covering the rest of the stream in separate articles coming soon. Kohei Tanaka chatted about his work on the Sakura Taisen series for nearly an hour so there's a lot of interesting bits to report. Producer Katano also shared some new story elements, so look forward to it. Meanwhile, you can check our summaries of the previous streams:

PS4 exclusive Project Sakura Wars launches on December 12 in Japan and in Spring 2020 in the west. The next stream will be held on November 20.