Here’s something I never saw coming: The [email protected] Cinderella Girls is crossing over with Code Geass for a new collaboration.
The collaboration will take place in The [email protected] Cinderella Girls Starlight Stage mobile rhythm game and was announced via the official Starlight Stage Twitter account on October 16, with more information set to come in-game ‘in the next couple of days.’
The [email protected] Cinderella Girls x Code Geass collaboration will consist of a ‘cover song’ being made available to play in-game (hopefully the legendary Colors by FLOW) as well as special ‘themed room items.’ Presumably, those items are how Chihiro got her rather fetching Black Knight outfit in the above promotional visual.
Indeed, the [email protected] Cinderella Girls mobile game is no stranger to collaborations. Some of the game’s characters appeared in Granblue Fantasy and Shadowverse, and the drums from Taiko no Tatsujin have a whole song featuring them. That’s not even counting all of the countless collaborations that took place outside of the game either, such as this one with Nissin Curry.
Even so, this Code Geass collaboration comes straight out of leftfield. The [email protected] series and Code Geass couldn’t be further apart in terms of tone, subject matter, and general brand identity. This collaboration also doesn’t seem to benefit Code Geass in any way, given that the Re;surrection of Lelouch movie came out in May and its Blu-ray release is still a way off in December.
There’s so much confusion in the air that even the official Code Geass Project Twitter account got confused. When tweeting out the initial announcement for the [email protected] x Code Geass collaboration, it got the name of the Starlight Stage game wrong and had to follow up with an apology.
申し訳ありません。誤りばかりでした。正しくはゲームアプリ「アイドルマスターシンデレラガールズ スターライトステージ」さんとのコラボです。打ち合わせ中にツイートするものではありませんね。 sun_コウジロウ #geassp pic.twitter.com/WvOctHTeSw
— コードギアスプロジェクト (@GEASSPROJECT) October 16, 2019
Still, the response from fans has been largely positive. Replies to the Cinderella Girls Twitter account’s tweet reveal a mood of both pleasant surprise and mild trepidation. Fan artists have also gotten to work rather quickly, as usual, flooding Twitter with art like this illustration of Ranko dressed as a Black Knight. Clearly, there’s some kind of crossover between being an [email protected] fan and a Code Geass fan.
If you’re interested in taking part in the collaboration, keep your eye on the game’s ‘Notice’ section in the coming days for more information. You’ll also need to clear the level 10 mark to be able to access all of the collaboration’s content. The [email protected] Cinderella Girls Starlight Stage mobile game is available to download for both Android and iOS (Japanese only).