Atlus
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Atlus Co., Ltd. (or simply Atlus) is a Japanese video game developer and publisher based in Tokyo. The company originated in 1986 as a simple developer, and converted to both a developer and a publisher in 1989. Two years later, in 1991, a North American branch, Atlus USA, was founded, serving as the company's publishing branch in the West. In 2010, the company was bought by Index Corporation, which re-branded themselves as Atlus. Three years later, Index Corporation was acquired by Sega, which re-branded it as Sega Dream Corporation, which is still operating today.
In 2017, the company also opened its first European branch, based in Sega's London, UK headquarters. Starting from 2016, Atlus has a partnership with Deep Silver, which published most of their games in Europe, starting with Persona 5.
Atlus' most well-known series are Megami Tensei (and its spinoffs, including the Persona series), Etrian Odyssey and Trauma Center. Their North American branch is also responsible for publishing a number of well-known titles, including (but not limited to) Demon's Souls and the Guilty Gear series.
Bad Qualities
- Ever since it was acquired by Sega, Atlus started getting more greedy, milking the Persona series (arguably their best-known series) and locking content behind paywalls, such as Challenge Quests and some bonus bosses in Shin Megami Tensei IV, or extra maps and demons in Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker.
- The launch of Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight and Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight was very controversial due to the two games' misleading marketing: the games were announced at the same time and developed in tandem, yet ended up being split into two identical games (only with different songs and different characters), each sold at full price. To add salt to the wound, Atlus announced a remaster of Persona 4: Dancing All Night on the PlayStation 4, a download code of which was provided by buying the Special Edition of the other two games. While this was true, gamers found out very soon that the only way to obtain the download code was to buy the Special Edition, and even then, it didn't have the DLCs, forcing the player to buy them again (even if he/she had them on the original release of the game).
- The Special Edition itself was heavily criticized, as the artbook that was supposed to be bundled with wasn't a physical book, but a CD; furthermore, it didn't give the player access to the DLCs of the other two games, forcing them to buy the four Season Passes for the game of their choice, for a combined total of $185.
- The DLC Personas and costumes in Persona 5 were extremely overpriced, with the full package costing up to $60, whereas the actual game costed $20. An Ultimate Edition of the game including all DLCs was released at the price of $125, which was reduced to $85 (which is still four times the base game) shortly after launch.
- To add insult to injury, Atlus announced that the updated re-release Persona 5 Royal, on top of introducing more DLC content, wouldn't be bundled with the DLCs for the base game, forcing players to spend their money to unlock the same content twice.
- They recently considered the decision of restoring Dante in the remake of Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne as DLC, which was criticized by many fans.
- The launch of Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight and Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight was very controversial due to the two games' misleading marketing: the games were announced at the same time and developed in tandem, yet ended up being split into two identical games (only with different songs and different characters), each sold at full price. To add salt to the wound, Atlus announced a remaster of Persona 4: Dancing All Night on the PlayStation 4, a download code of which was provided by buying the Special Edition of the other two games. While this was true, gamers found out very soon that the only way to obtain the download code was to buy the Special Edition, and even then, it didn't have the DLCs, forcing the player to buy them again (even if he/she had them on the original release of the game).
- Their milking of the Persona series caused them to ignore their other series, such as Deus, Makken, Trauma Center, Luminous Arc and Shin Megami Tensei (their own flagship franchise!), which is insulting to fans of those series.
- Yikes, they even stopped their publishing/localization jobs of other games! All of the upcoming localizations were sold mainly to Nippon Ichi Software/NIS America.
- They haven't released a new Shin Megami Tensei title since 2017's Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey Redux. However, that's a remake of an old instalment in the series; the last actual game in the series released was Shin Megami Tensei IV, released in 2013 (but that was until they announced Shin Megami Tensei V for the Nintendo Switch, which will release in 2021).
- For some reason, they refuse to release earlier entries of their most beloved series in the West, despite their sequels being available. The most egregious examples are Shin Megami Tensei II, Shin Megami Tensei: if..., Devil Summoner, Kyuuyaku Megami Tensei, the Majin Tensei series, Shin Megami Tensei NINE, Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne Maniax Edition, and the PC port of Megami Ibunroku Persona (known in the West as Revelations: Persona).
- The PlayStation Portable version of Persona 2: Eternal Punishment was only released in Japan, and the fan translation has yet to be finished.
- One of their biggest projects in recent years, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE, which was supposed to be a crossover between Shin Megami Tensei and Nintendo's Fire Emblem franchise, was heavily criticized, as mismanagement led to drastic alterations of the game, which ended up having very little of either franchise. Since its release, it's held as one of the first and most glaring examples of Atlus' downfall, due to the aforementioned mismanagement, censorship and use of DLC (which was mostly stuff that had little effect on the game, leading fans to question the decision of including it as DLC in the first place)
- Their English localizations take way too long and often come out months after the Japanese release. This is unacceptable, considering that other Japanese games like Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana had worldwide releases, and even before that, Atlus used to be a leader in the sector. The upcoming Shin Megami Tensei III remaster has been released in late October 2020 in Japan, yet there is still no precise date for a western release beyond a simple "Spring 2021"
- In late 2019, an internet troll managed to pose as Atlus' official account on Twitter and falsely announced Shin Megami Tensei V, turning the fans' fear and doubt into pure rage due to Atlus implicitly giving people a free pass to lie to fans and give them false hopes. However, it was confirmed in a video uploaded by Around The Clock on Youtube that Atlus were teasing a 2020 release of the game with more news to come this year.
- They are no stranger to being stuck on outdated consoles for a long time. For example, when the Xbox 360 was released on 2005 (and the PlayStation 3 on 2006), their first game on these consoles (Catherine in this case) was released on 2011 (though this may be excused, as the PlayStation 3's sales were stagnating in the period between its launch in 2006 and 2010).
- Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth, Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey Redux and Etrian Odyssey Nexus have no English dub. Although this can be explained due to the Nintendo 3DS quickly being obsolete with the release of the Nintendo Switch.
- Very lackluster support for the PC. Outside of Catherine Classic (which is the original version of the game and thus lacks the content added in the Full Body remake) and Persona 4 Golden, there is almost no Atlus game released for the PC (though there are rumors that the upcoming remaster of Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne may have a PC release).
- Even before their rebranding, they published terrible games such as 101-in-1 Explosive Megamix, Friday the 13th, Virtual Hydlide and Rest In Peace Department: The Game.
- They've started pandering to SJWs, as they've hired users of the infamous "forum" ResetERA as heads of their localization team, which caused fans to be wary of their future games' English localizations due to SJW ideology being shoehorned in. In fact, Persona 5 and Catherine: Full Body's localizations were managed by them, leading to some lines being removed or drastically altered, to the point when they no longer match the context they are in (for example, in one scene in Persona 5, the protagonist addresses Yusuke in a line directed towards Ryuji).
- One scene in Persona 5 where Ryuji is teased by two gay men in Shinjuku was removed from the North American version of Persona 5 Royal, a decision which caused a lot of flak and caused many fans to feel weary. To add salt to the wound, the scene has no relevance at all on the game (meaning that there was no reason to remove it to begin with), being there primarily for comedy purposes, and it wasn't removed from the Japanese and European versions of the game, making this decision feel utterly pointless.
- In Catherine: Full Body, Erica's voice acting was inexplicably changed, as she sounds angry in a line where she tries to explain the concept of femininity to Vincent, as opposed to the original version of the game, where she retained her usual tone.
Good Qualities
- Despite their milking, they still do make good games; recent examples are the Persona games (Minus the aforementioned dancing games), the Devil Survivor games and Radiant Historia.
- They were among the first companies to provide accurate English localizations for their JRPGs that used Japanese honorifics. They still used western name order however.
- While the PSP port of Persona 2: Eternal Punishment remains a Japanese exclusive, they released the original PlayStation version of the game on PlayStation Network to make up for this (though this still means that Western Audiences can't play the new content exclusive to the PSP version).
- They put Shin Megami Tensei on Nintendo Switch Online, thus introducing the first game of the franchise to Western audiences.
- On July 20, 2020, they released a trailer for Shin Megami Tensei V, as well as a trailer of a remaster of Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne (one of the most beloved entries in the series), proving that they hadn't forgotten their flagship franchise.
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