NIS America has finally locked in a Western release date for its dark fairytale RPG. The Grimm Reapress and the Drearytale Monster will launch in the West on May 13, 2027 for Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and PC via Steam, the publisher announced on Thursday, alongside a brand-new release date announcement trailer.
Mono and Mär (Credits: NIS America)
The game originally launched in Japan on April 30 for Switch, Switch 2, and PS5, so Western fans have been waiting just over a year for a localized release date. The new trailer gives players their first extended look at the game’s picture-book world in English.
What Is The Grimm Reapress and the Drearytale Monster?
The fantasy side-scrolling adventure is told in a storybook aesthetic, and its tale is a dark one. The story follows Mono (voiced by Rena Motomura), a girl born into a family that runs an opera house. Mistreated and cast aside, she spends her days doing chores around the opera house and sleeping in the attic, loved only by her beloved older sister (Reina Kondo), who teaches her about opera and dance.
Everything changes when her sister contracts Paper Mortis — a virulent disease that slowly turns those it infects into picture books, and eventually into horrific “paper monsters.” The sickness strikes teenage girls hardest, and the state has given up on a cure. Instead, patients are locked away in facilities called Asylum Libraries, left to waste away.
Mono’s Journey Through the Asylum Library
With her sister confined in one of these libraries, Mono sets out to do the impossible: reverse the disease. Inside the facility, she finds it overrun with paper monsters and warped by strange rifts in reality — manifestations of the picture books the patients have become, expanded into bizarre realms built from their memories and traumas.
There, Mono meets Mär (Makoto Koichi), a legendary paper monster who forms an uneasy alliance with her. Mär wants revenge against the human race for a past grievance, but agrees to protect Mono as she pushes deeper into the library and the picture-book worlds in search of her sister.
A Dream Team of Fairytale RPG Veterans
The game was directed and written by Kento Jobana, known for Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero and Disgaea 7. Character design and illustration come from Sayaka Oda, while Takeshi Matsumoto composed the music — both previously worked on The Cruel King and the Great Hero and The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince. Akiko Shikata, famous for the Ar Tonelico series, performs the game’s theme song.
With its haunting paper-craft visuals and emotional sister story, The Grimm Reapress and the Drearytale Monster looks like one of the most distinctive RPG releases of May 2027. Mark your calendars — the West finally has a date.
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Source: Anime News Network — read the full story there.
