Pledging its intention to extend its support for the Japanese game development community, Epic Games will next month hold an Unreal Engine-oriented meeting at its recently-established Tokyo office.

According to a Famitsu report, the event will commemorate the studio's opening and will highlight Epic's plans for Unreal in Japan, including bolstered Japanese-language support.

Epic Games founder and technical director Tim Sweeney will deliver opening remarks at the event, and Epic design director Clifford Bleszinski will be present in prerecorded video form. Grasshopper Manufacture CEO Goichi Suda (Killer7, No More Heroes), whose upcoming multiplatform game is based on Unreal Engine 3, will present a speech.

Epic Games Japan was announced last year during the Tokyo Game Show as primarily a sales and support office to deal with Japanese Unreal Engine licensees. At the time, Epic president Michael Capps said the division may expand to fill other roles in the future.

Relatively few Japanese studios have based their games on Unreal technology so far. Square Enix licensed Unreal Engine 3 for its RPG The Last Remnant, but notoriously faced difficulties working with the external technology -- an experience which may have reinforced Epic's decision to increase its local support.