Project Stella will combine cute anime girls and giant mechas in a new title from Kadokawa Games.

From the same folks that brought us the Front Mission and Armored Core series comes a new title. So far, all we know about the title is the codename: Project Stella. That will almost certainly not be what the final product is called, but that’s what we’ll use to refer to the game for now.

Details of Project Stella remain scant, but we’ve managed to piece together a few things from months of reports. To start, the game is based on a canceled mobile title called Starly Girls. In Starly Girls, you play as the captain of a spaceship and command a group of Hoshimisu (or Starly Girls) as they perform missions in special mobile weapon G Gears–basically giant mechas that scoot around in space. Think Gundam but piloted by strangely well-dressed women.

Starly Girls was canceled back in July of 2018. At the time, Kadokawa announced that they would instead focus on a console game using similar IP. Originally planned to release at the end of 2019, Kadokawa announced Project Stella would be delayed into 2020 earlier this year.

Now we have new details from an interview between Game Director and Kadokawa President Yoshimi Yasuda and Twinfinite. Yasuda revealed that Project Stella would still be in the same universe as Starly Girls, would technically be set “way before” in the same timeline. Another game, codenamed Project Europa, would be set far after Project Stella chronologically speaking.

Project Stella will be a “simulation RPG” featuring character development and strategy. Previously it was believed that the game would be a classic JRPG title, but it seems the overall genre has changed course several times during development. Whether or not Project Stella arrives as an Armored Core-style mecha game with RPG elements or a more classic strategy RPG remains to be seen.

One thing is for sure: Project Stella will definitely combine “cute girls + mechas.”

A video released on Christmas Day provides us with the first footage of Project Stella in action. What we see is mecha taking off from either a spaceship or station, with the note that the next video news release from Kadokawa will have more info.

Project Stella is planned to release on the Xbox One and PS4 sometime in 2020. A Western release is planned, but so far has no specific date.

Source: Twinfinite, Gematsu, Anime News Network