If there’s an award for unusual motorcycle marketing campaigns, we think Yamaha must have it in the bag this year with the launch of this anime-style web series promoting its MT-07 and MT-09 naked streetbikes.

Masters of Torque will run for four episodes (each around 10 minutes long), telling the story of three young motorcycle riders in a futuristic Tokyo. The show is produced in Japanese, unsurprisingly, but features English subtitles.

According to Yamaha’s press materials, the series is designed to break away from conventional Japanese motorcycle marketing, which tends to focus on US/European locations, by instead celebrating Japan’s own style, culture and geography.

For more information, you can visit the show’s web page here: http://global.yamaha-motor.com/showroom/mt/

And here’s the first episode, titled “Idle Roughness”…