Ni no Kuni: Level 5 and Studio Ghibil’s DS Game

You might recognise famed animation house Studio Ghibli from such gorgeously animated Japanese flicks as My Neighbour Totoro, Spirited Away, and the recently released Ponyo.

Now, the film studio is handing off its team of talented artists to developer Level 5, best known for the Professor Layton series and the latest Dragon Quest games, to illustrate a brand new game.

Titled Ni no Kuni, and coming to PlayStation 3 and DS, the RPG features a young boy who discovers a magic doll, who gives him a magic book, which lets him enter a magic world. Magic.

Both games are being developed separately, and will feature different artwork, graphics, and storylines, they’ll just happen in the same world. That means you can catch the full lusciously animated graphics on your HD telly, before settling down with the DS version to continue the tale.

The DS version will hit Japan this winter. There’s no confirmation yet that the game will be translated into English.

See the trailer at Kotaku.