Today, IGN can confirm that Monster Monpiece – the card-battling JRPG that came out in Japan last year -- is coming west. Monster Monpiece is a PlayStation Vita-exclusive, and will launch in North America and Europe in the Spring of 2014.

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You can watch the game’s very first trailer below.Monster Monpiece is developed by Compile Heart – the Japanese studio responsible for the Hyperdimension Neptunia series and the Record of Agarest War games – and initially came to Japan in January of 2013. Idea Factory International is the publisher responsible for porting and localizing the game for western consumption.At the core of Monster Monpiece is a card-battling system. These battles take place on a grid that’s seven slots wide and three slots high, with both you and your opponent being carved out a 3x3 part of the grid to place cards. Your cards are the embodiment of “Monster Girls” that you meet throughout your journey, and come in four core types: Melee, Ranged, Healers, and Buffers. Utilizing these types in tandem with each other is, naturally, a major key to victory.Thankfully, Monster Monpiece isn’t only a straight-forward card-battling game. There’s a story – with plenty of cutscenes – and a world map to explore. Card battles themselves play out with 3D chibi-style characters, adding a different dynamic to the game once you’ve settled on your deck and enter a fight. And you can go to the in-game academy to shop for more cards (and other goods), play over the PlayStation Network with or against your friends, and more.It is worth noting that Monster Monpiece does have some sexualized content, mostly in the form of the “rubbing” system seen in the trailer. This requires players to rub the girls on the Vita’s screen to help level-up cards. While Idea Factory International did opt to keep this system intact for its western release, it did remove certain Monster Girl cards.Idea Factory wrote that it “would like to inform fans and prospective users of Monster Monpiece that [they] have made the decision to cut several Monster Girl images from the North American and European versions of Monster Monpiece. This decision was made solely due to the intense sexual nature of Monster Girl card images. We’d like to emphasize that the gameplay, game system, and storyline are still fully intact.”We’ll have a preview and – ultimately – a full review for Monster Monpiece as we get closer to the game’s nebulous Spring, 2014 release date. In the meantime, check out Monster Monpiece’s image gallery for a smorgasbord of art, screenshots, and more.

Colin Moriarty is IGN’s Senior Editor. You can follow him on Twitter.