Level 5 doing football RPG News

Dragon Quest and Rogue Galaxy developer Level 5 has revealed its new football role-playing game for DS.

The news spilled from a press conference held in Tokyo yesterday, translated by IGN, where its upcoming line-up was unveiled.

It's called Inazuma Eleven, and it follows the adventures of you and your high school soccer team as you captain them from the bottom of the table to the top - trouncing your educational rivals along the way, as you might expect.

During the story mode you will get to adventure around your campus and town to scout out and sign new talent for your squad. Level 5 reckons there are around a thousand players to find as you go, with some considerably harder to recruit than others.

When you're happy with your starting eleven it will be time for match day. You'll have complete control of the action throughout, issuing orders to your team on the isometric view on the bottom screen. Drawing arrows will command runs from your players, and tapping on various bits and bobs will place shots and passes.

When you bump into other players on the field, options will pop up asking what you want to do. If you're defending you'll choose to block or slide, whereas attackers will decide whether to jump or evade challenges. Some shot opportunities will also bring up options, like heading or volleying.

The top screen will show close ups of the action when dramatic things happen, like player-specific special moves selectable from the pop up options when you run into others or are through on goal. You'll also be treated to cinematic sequences along the way.

Outside of the story mode you can trade players with friends, and take on their teams in local multiplayer games. It isn't clear whether you will be able to train players and improve statistics, although we assume you can.

No date has been mentioned for Japan yet, although Level 5 said it was well into development on the project - we wouldn't expect to see it here until late 2008.

However, a downloadable demo will be released at the Tokyo Games Show next month, so we'll hopefully be able to get a look at it in a bit more detail then.