Shin Megami Tensei X Fire Emblem started with … a photo booth game

LOS ANGELES — One of the craziest team-ups on the Japanese role-playing scene started in one of the most unlikeliest of places.

In an interview with GamesBeat today at the Electronic Entertainment Expo tradeshow, Shinjiro Takata, producer of the Atlus and Nintendo collaboration Genei Ibun Roku (Shin Megami Tensei X Fire Emblem), mentioned that the partnership came from an unlikely beginning: a photo booth game.

“I’m not too sure, since this all happened a long time ago. But the way it all started, Atlus was involved with Nintendo when we were making a purikura [Japanese photo booth] app for the Nintendo DSi and the Nintendo 3DS. Then there was a conversation that started about whether Atlus might be in charge of making a new Fire Emblem game,” Shinjiro said. “It wasn’t anything serious at the time. I think we turned it down at first because we had too much on our plates.”

Shin Megami Tensei X Fire Emblem should hit the States in 2016.