Left 4 Dead is being released as an arcade game in Japan. None of the eight existing characters, however, are making the trip (despite featuring in the local releases of the console titles). Instead, publishers Taito have swapped in an all-new cast.


We saw (and heard) them in action in some grainy footage from last week, but this official character art lets us really get a good look at them. And soak up the strangeness.


We've got, from left-to-right, a Japanese university student, a Japanese schoolgirl, an American bartender (who used to be in the Navy) and a half-Japanese, half-American tour guide.

The game itself is still set in the US; guess it was easier to swap out the character models than re-do the level textures. In case you missed it last time, the game actually sounds pretty cool, since it's an arcade game, only with a PC-like control setup courtesy of a mouse and a Wii nunchuk.

アーケード版オリジナルキャラクター公開！[Nesica, via Arcade Heroes]