Ar Tonelico Qoga: Knell of Ar Ciel – Out March 15th

[androvsky]

More info and a better scan from Siliconera, via Moonphase (missed my page, eh?)

Gust’s next big game is Ar Tonelico III and it’s a PlayStation 3 exclusive. The game stars Aoto, a strapping lad who is accompanied by two reyvateils, Saki, a lab born Reyvateil on the run, and Phinnel, a pure blood Reyvateil. These characters live on a third tower known as Sol Cluster. (Thanks for the tip Bradley!!)

Song magic is still a key feature of Ar Tonelico III, but the battle system has been revised. Players can make custom songs with the R.A.H. system and change the background music in real time. Diving into the minds of your party members, an Ar Tonelico hallmark, returns and just like the other games, the feature is used to procure more songs. It also looks like Gust shifted the game’s presentation from 2D to 3D.

Namco Bandai will release Ar Tonelico III on January 28, 2010

From some of the bigger scans I've seen, it's quite definite that the battles are 3D now (most likely the same engine as Atelier Rorona), event scenes look like they're 2D portraits (in HD, yummy), but I'm still not sure how the environments/dungeons are handled.

update:

Preview from an Ar Tonelico fan event. Mostly from the intro (guessing), but also has short clips of the main character wandering around environments, and even some short battle clips! Wonderous stuff, really, the intro animation reminds me of Gankutsuou.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IPHcY4qV-M

via rykomatsu from neogaf:

Some tidbits from various event attenders:

-Battle system reminicent of ToA/ToV, free movement on 3D field
-Dive system allows you to obtain Hymma, Hymma are used to synthesize hymnos during battles
-RAH system is rather dynamic...battle music changes quite a bit depending on Hymma combination, battle situation, etc
-Undressing is rather important...

So much new stuff and hype leading up to the Japanese release!

Video of a battle that's probably NSFW!
Another battle video, also NSFW, featuring Saki this time!
Countdown clock, with new goodies (voice clips, videos) every day until the game is released!
A new trailer with even more awesome stuff (including the infamous Saki dance)! Also NSFW! Why are you trying to watch an Ar Tonelico 3 trailer at work anyway?

Back of the box specifications leaked from Japan include 1080p support (dunno if scaled) and 7.1 surround.