I know that a lot of you guys have been highly anticipating Blue Protocol. I have been ever since I saw the announcement made earlier in July.

“A Bandai Namco made Anime MMORPG like Tales of Arise? Holy crap, that’s too good to be true. A AAA developer making an MMO in this day and age? Pinch me ’cause I think I might be dreaming.”

The game went into Alpha testing a few days ago and ever since, there’s been a surplus of information surfacing around the internet from people who got in and managed to play it.

This article is about something equally, if not even more important than the features – although I would like to preface this by stating that Blue Protocol seems to be a full-MMORPG with large groups of players on-screen and out and about at a given time, no instanced hub-based dungeon grinding.

This video pertains to the release of the game outside of Japan. See, it was recently revealed that Bandai Namco have no plans for releasing the game outside of Japan, so North America or Europe, as of right now.

Presently. In this very moment. Right now, they’re hard at work developing the game and getting it into a format that they can successfully release for a Japanese audience – as is the case with most Japanese games.

And that stands to reason. Why would a game, that is scheduled for a Japanese release ahead of every other country, even be concerned with a Western release in any capacity?

It’s doubtful that they would. Right now they should be focusing on getting the game ready for Beta testing followed by an actual launch before even beginning to think of ideas as grand as a worldwide release.

We’re a long ways off from receiving a fully functional, playable product in Japan, let alone the rest of the world. The game just released their very first Alpha.

Now don’t dismay – this isn’t all somber news. No.

They went on to further state that even though at this very moment they don’t have plans for a Western release, that doesn’t mean they won’t release the game in English in the future.

Their exact words were that “this is subject to change” – meaning that they are more than open to potentially releasing Blue Protocol internationally in the future. Is that a confirmation? A definitive announcement, a promise?

No, far from it. But people who are complaining, creating drama making accusations that the game won’t ever release on our shores are speculating – taking their quote or the announcement made by gaming companies far too literally.

Yes, proclaiming the game will be available in the West with absolute certainty pure is speculation as well.

I’m not claiming it will be, I’m merely stating that we should all be very open to the fact that Bandai Namco are aware of how excited we all are and that they’re making every effort to make certain that we know this.

But they have their priorities straight right now. They’re focusing on getting the game off the ground and getting it into a playable state.

They’re not concerned with anything other than that which is why they have yet to reveal a release date – they have no idea.

In my Project BBQ video I made a wild guess that the games will be available in their respective countries come 2020, with a possible release date in the West sometime in 2021 or beyond, and if Blue Protocol doesn’t release in Japan until next year then we’re looking at at the very earliest, a 2021 release.

Again, I could be completely wrong with this though as there’s nothing we can do but speculate.

They could have absolutely no intention of ever releasing the game outside of Japan, or they could already be in talks for an English release alongside or shortly after the official Japanese release.

So it is with that little revelation that I want to leave you all with a question: Do you think Bandai Namco are waiting, gauging Western interest in the game before making an announcement?

Do you think they already have plans for a potential Western release, or are you of the impression that we’ll never see the game launch outside of Japan?

Do note that Phantasy Star Online 2, which has been a Japanese exclusive for nigh on a decade has recently had a Western release confirmed, so that may have been the first of several steps in introducing their MMOs to a Western market.