Sakura Wars - Pantheon of the Blood God

Axe of the Blood God: An RPG Podcast

Kat Bailey

Leisure, Video Games, Technology

4.5 • 709 Ratings

🗓️ 1 December 2025

⏱️ 168 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Happy American Thanksgiving! We're taking the week off but as a very special treat we're pulling one of our favourite Pantheon episodes out from behind the paywall. To celebrate the upcoming 30th anniversary it's our deep-dive into Sakura Wars for the Sega Saturn! If you can find 3 entire hours to sneak away from your family this Thanksgiving, it's a rollercoaster ride of emotions and packed with history and context for one of Sega's most important franchises. All the original show notes, including the further reading, are included below so please enjoy this blooming episode of Pantheon of the Blood God! -------------For our $10-and-up patrons, it's the longest Pantheon episode yet. Sakura Wars never came out in the West but its massive success in Japan in the late 90s and early 2000s gives it an often-unseen influence on RPGs. Can this forgotten SEGA franchise surpass the language barrier and make its way into the Pantheon? We talk about: For the last time, it's not a visual novel The history of western theatre in Japan Subversions of gender essentialism The single set of footprints in the sand is when Sakura Wars was carrying the Saturn and also fighting Satan. Further Reading:The Origin of Visual Novels - Bowl of Lentilshttps://youtu.be/7wOtv-J7tOI?si=tRyGSp0Hzd1Yyc4r25 Years With an Invisible Elephant in the Room - Tom Jameshttps://freelansations.medium.com/25-years-with-an-invisible-elephant-in-the-room-6e5402c93960Skies of Arcadia 2019 Developer Interviewhttps://youtu.be/BPngEZ80xnU?si=jMX2dffTcaR0BaS1Sakura Wars Retrospective Playlist - Matt Bhttps://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFMXcpj1mOa7AYfYPMZ80LzAwE3zl-ftVSakura Wars - Kimimi (not mentioned in the episode but good coverage of the series)https://kimimithegameeatingshemonster.com/sakura-wars-corner/Timestamps: 6:56 - Our History with Sakura Wars 18:00 - Development and History 2:08:00 - SPOILERS BEGIN 2:11:00 - SPOILERS END 2:38:48 - Verdict Music Used in This Episode: Move Out! - [Sakura Wars] Geki! Teikoku Kagekidan - [Sakura Wars] Blooming Maidens - [Sakura Wars] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Think about cheese. Make your thoughts cheesier. Now add 100% chicken breast fillet, Chipoplae sauce and Ameta cheese melt. And it's giving the new cheesy chicken stack at McDonald's. Did we mention it's cheesy? Cheese. Availments at the 4th of Jan, 2026 from 11 a.m. Plus and participation may vary. Subjects availability. Hey, it's your old pal, Victor, and you may be wondering, what is this? A Pantheon episode,
0:25.5	but I'm not rich. I don't deserve these very special episodes of Pantheon of the Blood God.
0:31.6	Well, we're taking American Thanksgiving off. And because 20206 is going to be the 30th anniversary of Sakara Wars,
0:40.6	and because this episode means a lot to me, this series means a lot to me, I wanted to put this
0:45.2	baby on the free feed. So I want to thank again the community who played through this game
0:51.3	with me over on the Discord, Matt B for being a special guest.
0:55.5	And I'm just really happy to put this one out there for everyone.
0:59.2	So we'll see you real soon for a regular episode.
1:02.5	But until then, here's me with the original preamble
1:05.8	from the original release of this episode.
1:08.1	Love you, bye.
1:10.6	Hey, it's your old pal Victor from the Edit Bay. Just some housekeeping before we start this episode. Love you. Bye. Hey, it's your old pal, Victor, from the Edit Bay. Just some housekeeping before we start
1:14.4	this episode. When our guest starts speaking, he has a little bit of a buzz in his microphone.
1:18.8	Don't worry, that goes away almost immediately. So don't worry about that.
1:23.2	Later on in the episode, we have some spoilers about the ending. If you'd like to skip that,
1:27.4	I will mention the time code that you can skip ahead to.
1:30.2	That's also in the show notes.
1:31.9	And any of the further reading that I mentioned, the essays and things like that,
1:36.4	I also have links for in the show notes, because there's a lot of really good writing and stuff about these topics.
1:44.0	So without further ado, it's Showtime. I'm gonnae. I'm gonnae
2:02.6	I'm gonna.
2:04.6	I'm gonna.
	...

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