We're Getting a Guilty Gear Anime! What We Know About Dual Rulers
The well known and absolutely gorgeous to watch, Guilty Gear Strive is getting an anime adaptation called "GUILTY GEAR STRIVE: DUAL RULERS”. While details of the anime are scant, some heavy hitters in the anime world are joining forces to collaborate on the project.
What Do We Know About "Dual Rulers?"
Being the first foray of Guilty Gear into a new medium, Arc System Works are leaning on the directorial expertise of Shigeru Morikawa, director of 2023's "ARGONAVIS the Movie: Axia". Considering that the entire ARGONAVIS series is centered around music and boy bands, Guilty Gear's hard rock vibe seems to be right up the alley for Morikawa. In addition to Morikawa, Seiji Mizushima, of Fullmetal Alchemist and Mobile Suit Gundam 00 fame, will serve as associate producer. Dual Rulers will be written by long-time Guilty Gear writer Norimitsu Kaiho.
Even more information will be shared at this year's Anime Expo in Los Angeles. The publisher has said that they will have a "GUILTY GEAR STRIVE: DUAL RULERS - Special Event" on July 4th at 11:30 am PST for a panel discussion and a revelation of the first trailer for the Anime.
What's GUILTY GEAR STRIVE: DUAL RULERS about?
Details on what the show is are very sparse. We don't know what the story is about nor do we know how much of the cast is involved. All we know for sure is that it's not a movie. Outside of those two very surface level facts, we don't know anything about the content of the series or its plot.
The shared image from Arc Sys heavily features Sol Badguy, the protagonist of the GG series and his protege, Sin Kiske. The two are very close and if Sin is involved then it wouldn't be far-fetched to anticipate his parents, Ky Kiske and Dizzy to be involved as well. Set behind the pair is an enigmatic figure wearing what looks to be military gear and massive goggles with cat ears attached. This character is currently unnamed, but we'll surely get more info on them at Anime Expo.
Anime Fighter Indeed
Guilty Gear is known in some fighting game circles as being on the fringes of "anime fighters". Games that heavily lean into anime tropes and character archetypes as they build their lore. This eventually lead Guilty Gear to have a much different take on their story content than the average fighting game. It's a directorial choice that lends itself to the theory that an anime is a logical progression for the GG series.
In most fighting games, the story takes place through the various single-player campaigns of each character. And through those separate events, you weave together a greater narrative. In others, like the MK series or Street Fighter V, there's an entire story mode where you have a wide, sweeping narrative that's linear and more like a playable film. Guilty Gear does neither.
In GG, the story content is essentially already an anime film. Tucked away from all of the gameplay stuff, the story mode for Guilty Gear for the past few years has been essentially a multi-hour anime film that all takes place in the game's engine. So while we don't know if the anime series will be using the same technology as the game, if Arc Sys is involved we know it'll be gorgeous to look at.
