There’s not a game company more quirky, more unique, more gamer-punishing, than Atlus. The Japanese company is undeniably niche, but they’re also willing to experiment with games like Catherine, a puzzle game about emotional immaturity, and publish games like Demon’s Souls and the Persona series. But whether they’ll be able to keep that up is an open question, especially if they’re sold to Sega.
Not to bag on the House of Sonic, but let’s not forget Sega’s biggest release so far this year has been the miserable Aliens: Colonial Marines. Sega has, much to the chagrin of gamers everywhere, been noted more for its ports than anything else lately, although it has put out games like The Cave and Company of Heroes 2.
But why is Atlus even on the market in the first place? The short answer is that they were bought by a company called Index a while back and it turns out Index was, how do we put this delicately, run by a bunch of miserable lying crooks:
Index…has had its corporate offices raided as well as the residency of the company chairman on Wednesday after an initial investigation by the Japanese Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission concluded that company staff had committed fraudulent business transactions between it and various companies to maintain the illusion of stability for the conglomerate itself.
Worse, they did this by lying about their sales of video games and mobile games. So Atlus’ reputation may be on the line despite doing nothing wrong.
Atlus has managed to keep to its release schedule and Index seems to have done a lot to try and protect the company, which is its crown jewel, from any sort of business-related fallout. But the reality is, Index is going down the tubes. Fortunately, there’s no lack of suitors for Atlus, so we’ll still be getting our asses handed to us and loving it for a little while longer, at least.