Atlus

Segabits at E3: Interview with Ryan Vandendyck and Jason Ruper

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While on the E3 showfloor, Nuckles87 talked to Eden Industries, Ryan Vandendyck who is the director of development on “Citizens of Earth”. An old-school style of RPG in the vein of Earthbound, but with some new twists. With him was project coordinator, Jason Ruper of Atlus. During the interview they discussed several aspects of the game, how it went from a Kickstarter campaign to a published game and the wacky antics of the Vice President of the world. Enjoy!

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SEGAbits at E3 Preview: Citizens of Earth (PlayStation 4, PSVita, Wii U, 3DS, & PC)

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Some games just have this irresistible charm about them. The moment you see it, you just know you want to play it and see if it lives up to just how awesome it looks. At E3, Atlus’s Citizens of Earth was one of those games. As a man who is interested in politics and is always open to some political satire, and the concept on display here is way too hilarious to ignore.

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SEGA in the Charts: MediaCreate charts for June 02 – 08 June 2014

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This is the first time “SEGA in the Charts” will be covering an Atlus game and what a time to start! As it is, this is SEGA’s first number one since Hatsune Miku released back in March and the first title published in Japan under SEGA’s ownership of the Atlus brand. It’s also the first time the Persona series has appeared on a non-Playstation console, so it will be interesting to see how things develop after the first week of sales. I think both Atlus and SEGA can be extremely happy with how it has turned out for them. Hit the break to see the full lowdown!

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SEGAbits at E3 Preview: Abyss Odyssey (Xbox 360, PS3 and PC)

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This is going to be an interesting year for us here at SEGAbits, as we try to get accustomed to covering Atlus games. I’ve been trying to familiarize myself with the company, but I haven’t truly begun to introduce myself to their catalog until today, when I played several of their games on the showfloor. I’m going to do my best to provide coverage of this company, but I am somewhat out of my depth here. First on my docket? Abyss Odyssey!

I had a fun time with this game. It’s essentially a Smash Bros game with rogue-like elements. So pretty much a side scrolling brawler that can be really, really hard and brutal. Allies can hit and damage each other in this game, the labyrinth quickly becomes much more difficult the deeper you go, and dying will result in you going back to your previous checkpoint, sans all of your equipment and items. Death in this game carries a serious consequence! For a rogue-like this game is actually pretty generous, as you get to keep all of your collected experience, skills and gold.

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SEGAbits at E3 2014 coverage begins – previews and interviews from the show floor coming soon

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Another Electronic Entertainment Expo is upon us, and once again SEGAbits is attending on location at the Los Angeles Convention center to bring you previews of the latest SEGA games and interviews with the people behind them! No secondhand reporting here. This year, SEGA has a small but highly unique assortment of games on display which we’ll be playing and talking about as the week goes on. At the SEGA booth are Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric (Wii U), Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal (3DS), Alien: Isolation (PS4, Xbox One, PS3, Xbox 360, PC), and Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA F 2nd (PS3, Vita, PSN). We’ll also be covering Bayonetta 2 (Wii U), which will likely be on display at the Nintendo booth.

SEGA’s recent acquisition Atlus will also be receiving coverage from us, with Atlus showing off Persona 4 Arena Ultimax (PS3/360), Persona Q (3DS), Persona 4: Dancing All Night (PS Vita), Abyss Odyssey (PC, PS3, 360), Citizens of Earth (3DS, Wii U, PC, PS Vita, PS4) and an unannounced Title (PC, PS Vita, PS4). In addition to all of that, we’ll be attending a VIP event held by SEGA’s mobile division where we’ll be playing and talking to the developers of the upcoming Sonic the Hedgehog, Crazy Taxi, and Super Monkey Ball mobile games.

You can view all of our E3 coverage here throughout the week, and you can find live updates on our Twitter and Facebook accounts. We also have a live from E3 podcast in the works, which we plan to release during the show. The countdown is over, welcome to E3 2014!

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Persona 4 Arena and its DLC removed from PSN in Europe

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It seems like Persona 4 Arena and Europe just don’t go well together. Atlus usually doesn’t publish it’s own games in Europe, so their games are often released far later there than in other countries. But Persona 4 Arena in particular had a problem with this, as it was also one of the few region locked games on PS3. So Europeans couldn’t import it and had to wait for it to be released in May 2013, nine months after Americans could get their hands on it.

Publisher Zen United brought it over back then, but now the downloadable version along with all of the DLC has been taken off PSN. While no response was given for this, a Facebook post from late last month tells us that Atlus is now handling the game in Europe. Which suggests that Zen United no longer has the publishing rights to the game. This is just speculation though, of course. This article will be updated when an official response will be given.

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Persona 4: the Golden Animation announced

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While Persona 4 has already had an animated series, it wasn’t exactly of high quality. Particularly the quality of the animation. So for those who weren’t pleased with it, Atlus has announced that there will be a new anime based on the Vita version: Persona 4 Golden. It’s being produced by A-1 Pictures, who are perhaps best known for Sword Art Online.

This re-doing of the animation will mostly cover the same story, though the Golden version did add a new character called Marie who will be in the new anime. If this is a good thing or not depends on who you ask, as the fanbase seems to be kinda split on if she’s a good character or not. The real important question is though: will this anime be able to do a better job covering the Kings Game? It will start airing in Japan this July.

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Atlus set for another Persona announcement on May 2nd

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Right after the SEGA buyout was confirmed, Atlus went ahead and confirmed that they where working on four Persona titles. Seems that isn’t enough, since we will be getting another announcement come May 2nd.

Atlus will be having a live Persona-related stream on NicoNico on May 2nd, 11:30pm JST. What is this stream about? They will have guests, preview material for the upcoming Persona 3: Midsummer Knight’s Dream movie, and this teased announcement.

The last event was when Atlus announced those upcoming Persona games. What do they have in store this time? Another movie? More games? I guess we will find out soon.

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Yuzo Koshiro will compose music for Persona Q

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Yuzo Koshiro has worked on music for a lot of games, but SEGA fans will always know him for his amazing work on the Streets of Rage series. In my opinion, this is what made Yuzo Koshiro a legend. Want more music from him? Don’t worry, it has been revealed that he will be composing tracks for the upcoming Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth.

Also announced to be working on the game is Yuji Himukai who is being brought aboard to design some monsters along with Shin Nagasawa. All three (including Yuzo Koshiro) worked on Etrian Odyssey (and Persona Q is basically Etrian Odyssey with Personas…).

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Persona 4 Arena Ultimax to get story based DLC and RPG style arena mode

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According to Japanese store, Rakuten, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax will have story-based DLC and also feature a role-playing type game elements. The story based DLC will be exclusive to those that purchase the game in Japan on August 28th. What’s in the DLC? That, as of right now, remains a mystery.

A new mode titled ‘Golden Arena Mode’ will include character progress system with elements that fans of RPG-type games will be familiar with. Players in the Golden Arena Mode will be able to fight and level up to earn extra experience points and learn new abilities throughout the stages. How many skills can you unlock? According to the site, over 150 different skills.

Hit the jump to see three new trailers that have been released for this game.

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Launch trailer of Tesla Effect: A Tex Murphy Adventure shows FMV goodness

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Atlus released a launch trailer for Tesla Effect: A Tex Murphy Adventure a couple of days ago. originally known as Project Fedora on Kickstarter, this Atlus-published FMV/first person adventure from Big Finish Games will be released on April 22nd for PC and Mac. It’s the first game in the Tex Murphy series since 1998 and the first FMV game to be presented in 2k resolution. Of course, as with all launch trailers, this one may have some spoilers.

The game can be pre-ordered on Steam or DRM-free on GOG.com for $17.99, after it’s release the price will be $19.99.

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Atlus publishing a failed Kickstarter game called Citizens of Earth

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While there are many Kickstarter success stories like Broken Age or Shovel Knight, not all potentially good games make it through. Citizens of Earth by Eden Industries is one of these games, as it failed to meet it’s $100.000 funding goal. It seems like the people at Atlus think that this game has potential though, as they announced today that they’ll be publishing the game for PC, PS4, Vita, Wii U and 3DS.

The game itself is a comedic RPG inspired by Earthbound, in which you play as the vice president of the world and recruit ordinary people into your party. You can find a lot more details about it along with gameplay and a demo on the original Kickstarter page. Citizens of Earth will be released on the already mentioned platforms later this year in the US and Europe.

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Atlus debuts new logo and website to match

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One of the things many Atlus fans feared during the SEGA-Sammy buyout, was that SEGA would kill off the Atlus name and rebrand their titles under the SEGA logo. Seems that is not what will be happening, now Atlus is its own company, separate from Index Corps. To celebrate, we have a new logo (above). Forgot what the old logo looked like? Here it is.

Here is the new Atlus website and here is the new Index Holdings (who also got a new logo).

So, new logo or old? Tell us in the comments!

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Persona Q influenced by Etrian Odyssey’s dungeon mapping and combat

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When Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth was announced, it seemed like it would take aspects of the Atlus’ Nintendo DS long running dungeon crawler Etrian Odyssey and according to this week’s Famitsu, I was partly right. They have now said that the game will feature a map-making feature similar to the one featured in Etrian Odyssey games. This map feature will allow users to draw the layout of the dungeon on the 3DS touch screen and help you find your way around.

That isn’t all though, the game will also contain ‘F.O.E.’ monsters and give you a choice if it you are better off running or allow you to ‘try’ and take down the monster. If you do decide to take do F.O.E. monsters, you might just get a special reward.

So Persona Q is Etrian Odyssey with a Persona storyline and characters from Persona 3 & 4. Persona Q is set to come out in America this fall.

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