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Could this be the start of a trend? First Japanese cellphone-exclusives The Third Birthday and Final Fantasy Agito XIII receive PSP ports, and now we have a WiiWare port for the cellphone-exclusive Final Fantasy IV The After: Tsuki no Kikan.

This sequel to Final Fantasy IV is planned to be released in monthly installments over Japanese cellphones. Virtually all of the surviving characters from Final Fantasy IV make appearances, with a few of their offspring as playable characters (Cecil's son Theodor and Yang's daughter Ursula). Kain makes a key appearance as one of the game's major antagonists. The game uses a traditional SNES-era Final Fantasy interface, with 2D sprites, the ATB system, and random battles. The stats of players and appearances of monsters vary on lunar phases, which can be changed by spending the night at an inn. In addition, players can execute powerful "band" attacks that require any two players taking action, similar to Twin attacks in Final Fantasy IV DS or Dual Techs in Chrono Trigger.

The ESRB (North America's rating organization for videogames, the equivalent of Europe's PEGI or Japan's CERO) has published ratings for Final Fantasy IV: The After Years as a WiiWare game dated for 2009. This is all the information we have on a non-Japanese release, and hopefully we'll have more information soon.

Source: Kotaku