The OTHER Atlus Problem
*Please note that this is a companion piece to a video I made about Atlus. Thank you.*
It’s no surprise to anyone that Persona 6 is taking a while. Like, a very long time.
Atlus has been steadily busy with Persona and Shin Megami Tensei for the last decade. Every now and then they do a little something different like publishing Vanillaware games in Japan, or porting a small handful of their classic titles (which is the topic of my aforementioned video).
But when Persona 6 does release, I have a dilemma:
“Do I buy it day one?”
Normally this wouldn’t be a question for me. If I’m really excited for a game, I have no qualms about buying it on release day and binging the hell out of it. But Atlus has made that complicated for me. I may get some pushback on this, but due to their length, I wouldn’t call the Persona games “replay friendly”. It took me 120 hours to finish vanilla Persona 5 back in 2017. Three years later, Persona 5 Royal came out. I’ve never played Royal, but from what I hear, it’s absolutely the definitive version of the game. It has extra story content, new music, quality of life features and much more.
So what should a company do if they choose to release an updated version an older game?
Well, if you’re Sony, you charge $9.99 for an upgrade.
If you’re Bandai Namco, you upgrade for free. (This was my experience with DBZ: Kakarot. I’m not sure if they charge for their other games.)
If you’re Atlus, you screw over your fans and demand they pay full price again.
And of course the new features I listed above didn’t cost Atlus a small sum to make. I understand they need to recoup that cost. But full price? How is there not at least an upgrade path for $30? Even $40!
Sadly, us Atlus fans are used to this treatment. Back before Persona 3 Reload came out, there were rumors that the game wouldn’t have the story content from the epilogue known as The Answer. Atlus has been doing these deluxe versions for almost twenty years now. The original Persona 3 released in 2006 on PS2 without this epilogue. In 2007 they released Persona 3 FES which included the epilogue. I’d give Atlus a pass back in those days because there was no way to connect your PS2 to a digital shop and download the epilogue for a cheaper price. It’s also fair to argue that Atlus was much smaller back then. JRPGs were much more niche and seemed borderline obsolete in the mid 2000s. They also hadn’t been purchased by SEGA yet. So get your bag! I get it.
But now? I’m sorry, but if you’re going to remake a game from 18 years ago- it should be the definitive version. And a definitive version should have all of the content from previous iterations in the base game. But of course, Atlus confirmed there will be a DLC for Persona 3 Reload with the epilogue at a later date.
If I buy Persona 6 on release day I will feel like an idiot. Because we all know that even before the vanilla game releases, they’re already cooking up the content for Persona 6 Aftermath or whatever the hell it’ll be called. And then they’ll spend another decade making Persona 6 Tennis and Persona 6 Bowling.
It’s frustrating being an Atlus fan. Maybe I just sound like a whining spoiled fan to you. If so, fair enough. I’m not entitled to anything. But I think it’s fair to say that the name Persona resonates with gamers today on a similar level to Final Fantasy. Maybe even more! Which would be an insane thing to imagine twenty years ago. Persona isn’t small. Atlus isn’t niche. These games rake in millions. The fans are loyal.
Why treat them like shit?
