*And Flourish!*
Cross-medium collaborations and inspired works are really cool. Live performance adaptations of video games are coolest on in that respect. And there are more of them than you think. The latest stage play based on a video game is River City Girls.
There is a Japanese theater company called Solid Star is producing a play following the adventures of Misako and Kyoko. Unfortunately, the run of the play is only from December 7th to 11th, and you would have to be in Japan for those performances. It’s not too late to book plane tickets though!
River City Girls is a side-scrolling brawler, where Misako and Kyoko fight their way to rescue their kidnapped boyfriends, Kunio and Riki. It came out in 2019 and a sequel is expected to launch later this year.
It’s unclear if the play is a musical or not. To be honest, the soundtrack and songs written for the game would translate pretty well into musical numbers. Director (of the game, not the play) Bannon Rudis is fully aware of the stage production. He says that he has absolutely nothing to do with it.
Arc System Works is seemingly allowing it to run without any legal issues, unless they already hashed it out. The poster for the show reflects River City Girls’ game art pretty well. Several of the characters from the game can be seen on the production poster.
None of us may get to see this play, but River City Girls is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. River City Girls 2 is expected to come out later this year for the same platforms, plus Xbox Series X|S.
Would you like to see more plays based on video games? Let us know in the comments below.