Sakura Wars

The OVA sold approximately 60,000 units in Japan and was the first Sakura Wars series adaptation outside of video games.

The OVA project was announced as the first joint product of the planned merger between Sega (owner of the Sakura Wars brand) and Bandai (parent company of Bandai Visual). Although the merger was ultimately cancelled, OVA production proceeded as planned.

In May 1998 at the Project A-Kon 9 convention, ADV Films announced it had acquired the license for the OVA series in North America, making it the first officially available Sakura Wars universe material in that region.

The OVA plot encompasses the first three acts presenting a previously unknown story of the formation of the Flower Division of the Imperial Capital before the main protagonist Ichirō Ōgami joined it, while the fourth act is a side episode set in the timeline of the main game.

In Japan, before the broadcast of the television anime version of Sakura Wars, the OVA was re-aired as part of a promotional block – in March 2000 in the Anime Shower block on MBS, and in early April 2000 in the Spring Anime Festival block on TBS, along with a rerun of Ultraman Tiga.

With the broadcast of the 'New Sakura Wars: The Animation' series in 2020, the original OVA was made available for free for a week on the YouTube channel for TMS's 55th anniversary, first in the form of all four episodes at once, then as just the first act.

The OVA was released in North America by ADV Films in 1999 on two VHS cassettes titled Sakura Wars and Sakura Wars 2, each containing two episodes, available in both subtitled and dubbed versions.