U.S. premieres slated for April 7

Aniplex of America announced at Sakura-Con on Friday that it will offer simulcasts for PERSONA 5 the Animation and Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online on Crunchyroll and Hulu in the United States. Both premieres are scheduled for April 7, the same day the shows debut in Japan.

The company also shared English-subtitled trailers for Cells at Work! , premiering this summer, and Sword Art Online: Alicization , premiering this October.

Masashi Ishihama (From the New World, Kamichu!) is directing Persona 5 the Animation, and the game franchise's producer Katsura Hashino is credited with the original story concept. Satomi Ishikawa (Convenience Store Boy Friends) is adapting Shigenori Soejima's original game character designs for animation. Kazuma Kaneko is credited for having drawn the original demon designs from the game. Shinichi Inotsume (Persona 5 the Animation -The Day Breakers-, Hayate the Combat Butler, Sket Dance) is in charge of the series scripts. Shoji Meguro is returning from the game to compose the anime's music. Lyn is performing the opening theme song "Break in to Break Out" and the ending theme song "Infinity."

Aniplex of America describes the story based on Atlus' role-playing game:

Ren Amamiya is about to enter his second year after transferring to Shujin Academy in Tokyo. Following a particular incident, his Persona awakens, and together with his friends they form the “Phantom Thieves of Hearts” to reform hearts of corrupt adults by stealing the source of their distorted desires. Meanwhile, bizarre and inexplicable crimes have been popping up one after another... Living an ordinary high school life in Tokyo during the day, the group maneuvers the metropolitan city as Phantom Thieves after hours. Let the curtain rise for this grand, picaresque story!

Masayuki Sakoi (Celestial Method, Princess Resurrection, Strawberry Panic!) is directing the television anime of Keiichi Sigsawa's Sword Art Online: Alternative Gun Gale Online novel series at Studio 3Hz (Flip Flappers, Princess Principal). Yousuke Kuroda (My Hero Academia, Gundam Build Fighters, Mobile Suit Gundam 00) is in charge of series composition and the script. Yoshio Kosakai (Chaos;HEAd, Needless) is chief animation director, and he is also designing the characters based on Kouhaku Kuroboshi's original designs. Tomori Kusunoki is performing the ending theme song "To see the future."

The story follows Karen Kohiruimaki, a 183-centimeter-tall (6-foot-tall) college student who's insecure her height, and is bad at dealing with people in the real world. She enters the world of Gun Gale Online with her avatar, Llenn, who is less than 150 centimeters (5 feet) tall and wears all pink. She meets a beautiful, brown-skinned female player who goes by Pitohui. They hit it off, but one day Pitohui pressures her to participate in "Squad Jam," a team Battle Royale variation of the Bullet of Bullets tournament.

Update: Crunchyroll announced territories for both series on Friday. Both anime will be available in North America, Central America, South America, Australia, New Zealand, the U.K., and Ireland.