Bleach is not only back with the Thousand-Year Blood War anime, but the series is soon returning to the realm of video games too with a new fighter on the way.
During the Jump Fiesta 2025 event, Bandai Namco just announced Shinji Hirako as the latest playable character for Bleach Rebirth of Souls in a trailer that’s a bit different than most of the others.
After the recent reveals of Sosuke Aizen and Genryusai Shigekuni Yamamoto, it appeared as though the launch roster of Rebirth of Souls may be complete, but that isn’t the case after all it seems.
The leader of the Vizards is also being included in the upcoming Bleach fighter as a playable character, and he’s of course here to try and settle the score with Aizen.
Instead of a large focus on his gameplay, much of the new trailer is geared towards Shinji’s appearance in the Story Mode fighting alongside Hiyori (though whether or not she’ll make the cut too remains to be seen), battling Grimmjow, showing off his hollow mask and stepping up to his former subordinate.
This could open the door to more Vizards joining the cast in the future though we have some doubts on that end beyond maybe Hiyori, Love and Rose.
We’re also keenly interested to see how Sakanade’s mind-flipping powers could be incorporated into a game like this, and things could get crazy if they try and keep him faithful to the anime / manga.
Some of that is at least being alluded to in the visuals on display here.
Shinji’s inclusion brings the playable roster up to at least 22 characters though there will likely be more reveals coming and of course the post-launch fighters being added later through DLC.
Bleach Rebirth of Souls is currently slated to release on March 21, 2025 for the PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S and PC.
You can check out the full trailer for Shinji below.