Primary Auction for Atlus Confirmed, Index Announces that “Several Candidates” Have Been Selected

Index Corporation (Atlus’ Mother Company) just officially announced with a press release that the primary auction for the acquisition of the company’s assets (including Atlus), and that until now was only rumored, has indeed been conducted, ending with the selection of several candidates.

[animegamingnerd]

can we please get some names so we can either be in fear or be extremely happy on who might buy atlus?

[Abriael]

Very unlikely that any name will be officially confirmed before the end of the proceedings. It's just not done, as it can influence the stock market.

All that will possibly surface are rumors, like the one about Sega.

[cleft5]

Really hope Atlus isn't sold to Sega. Sega just doesn't seem to get the point of localizing good games for the West. The fact that they have gems like Yakuza 5 and Valkyria Chronicles 3 and they still haven't localized those games is a tragedy. Not mention the incredibly stupid decision not to officially do anything with Phantasy Star Online in the West.

[Donnieboi]

The plot thickens. Crossing fingers for Kadokawa Holding or any other Holding group (like Index) sugar-daddy type of company who will just support Atlus financially and not restrict their art or close down their independent publishing firm. Not some restrictive 3rd/1st party. Keep Atlus free!

[MoveTheGlow]

As down as I felt about Sega, given how they treat their own titles toward a Western audience, what was their last acquisition? Creative Assembly. How did Creative Assembly change when Sega got them? Well, their games got a bit more promotion on Steam, that's for sure. They develop their stuff in nearly the same way. The only big thing they've done is close a floundering Melbourne studio, and assumedly they consolidated that group into the bigger UK studio anyway.

I'm guessing if Sega grabs them, Atlus will continue on as usual, possibly giving up a bit of their role as a publisher of external games, but continuing Shin Megami Tensei and Etrian Odyssey for sure.

Honestly, Sega should just throw Atlus the development talent they have left and allow Atlus to get the grunt work out of the way for bigger games like Persona 5. I'm sure a lot of coders would be thrilled to not work under the management that brought us Sonic '06.

[3-4-5]

If Sega buys, there will be more Atlus games on PC.

[showtimefolks]

Here is hoping for Sony

But I doubt it, I was really hoping Sony buy darksiders IP and let Sony Santa Monica work on it but that didn't happen either

Sony and Atlus have been great partners so here is hoping that continues

Please MS or Nintendo stay away from Atlus

UBI
Sega(Sammy sega that Owns sega is worth almost 4 billions)
Take two

My gut feeling is to gonna be a unknown party

Also Bethesda could work too

[zeal0us]

How could Bethesda work but Nintendo can't?

[Dagobert]

Lol seriously why Bethesda?

[vakarian75]

Nintendo would be better for Atlus than any of those companies you just named.

[Ezz2013]

Bethesda ?!

are you into buggy games ?!

[MoveTheGlow]

Nintendo hasn't *been* away from Atlus, how could they *stay* away? They've allowed Atlus to create great content on a lower-tech platform, and the results so far (EO, SMT, Strange Journey) are staggeringly good for the hardcore RPG crowd. It's a big reason why a lot of gamers have a 3DS in the first place.

Atlus' main creative branch has become Nintendo's new Treasure over the past couple of years - a scrappy, low-tech ragtag bunch with a ton of ideas and a singular vision, and gamers should freaking love that. They're the real punk-rock studio - sorry, Suda. They, along with Intelligent Systems, give Nintendo way more gamer cred than they should have right now, honestly!

This is why I'm hoping they stay third-party. They have a great team for creating low-fidelity, high-content, artistic games with pretty risky narratives, and I'd like them to stay that way and not be forced into throwing so much money into high-res grunt work. We don't need another FFXIII-era Squenix. They need options.

[showtimefolks]

i meant Bethesda as a Publisher, you guys are thinking about the development side

Bethesda as a publisher could work

also heck no to nintendo we don't want PG rated Atlus

[zeal0us]

For the past few weeks people/reports have been tossing names on who might buy Atlus assets.

[TomShoe]

Hopefully Sony. More Disgaea please. JRPGs on the Xbox just seems wrong. It's an American console.

[MoveTheGlow]

I'm pretty sure NIS will find another publisher if it's not Atlus. Disgaea is a lower-cost thing with a good enough fanbase, I don't think Atlus' sale will make it go away or jump exclusivity. Heck, NIS could self-publish and just fund localization work through their America branch.

[iamnsuperman]

The big question is who

[THC CELL]

Sony sony sony

[gamer7804]

i would definitely hope that neither of the big 3 obtain atlus, this would limit them on what platforms they could deliver on obviously.

[Dagobert]

True but Sony seems like the one out of the big three that wouldn't censor it as much and would localize it and fund the games compared to the other two. Then you have Sega which was one of the companies wanting to buy Atlus, and honestly Sega themselves aren't doing that great financially and seeing how they don't localize some games or take too long to do it, I wouldn't want them either.

I mean no one knows the other companies that are bidding on Atlus but lets assume it's Square Enix... Would you honestly want them? Namco seems like a choice as well, but look at their localization record. Or hell what about Capcom, they can't get their own franchise to do well like Capcom because they don't listen to the fans, it's like they only focus on Streetfighter.

So the only good choice I can think of that does well with localization and whatnot would be Sony.

[god_o_war]

Haven't all their games been on different platforms? I can't seem to remember any of theirs being multi platform? So wouldn't it be better if they were exclusive to one of the big three, where you could get all their stuff from one place instead of two or three?

[CLOUD1983]

SONY get them! GoGoGo!!! :P

[gamer42]

Kodakawa(most likely), Gung ho, Marvelous AQL are my preferred choices, because unlike some people, I would like to them to stay third party, so they can keep to their routine and reach out to as many people with their games as they possibly can.

[Abriael]

Same here, those would be the ideal candidates.

[jon1234]

my room mate makes $9000... JOKING!

haha JK! but i really hope sega doesnt buy atlus... they cant even freaking localize phantasy star online, i dont even want to play the stupid game anymore to be honest...

[MASTER_RAIDEN]

lmao tough crowd. you got me though.

"awh man another one of these spam--- ohhhhh"

[zeal0us]

You better hope people don't just read the first sentence and hit report lol.

[fsfsxii]

Man, you made my day. after i just fucked up my playthrough in FF7

[Tong]

Lol i was about to say Stfu xD @jon1234

[Sigh]

hope some third party like Sega gets it. Love that Atlus can be seen on all platforms.

[Abriael]

Third party would be awesome, but please not sega, they can't even localize their own games.

[AznGaara]

Man I really wanted them to localize Valkyria Chronicles 3.

[Inception]

Sega did amazing job with Bayonetta, Valkyria Chronicles 1, and Yakuza 3-Dead Souls. But their financial isn't healthy right now. Especially when they faced some lawsuit for Alien: CM thx to Gearbox :(
So, i think they are not ready to buy Atlus, let alone to localize their own games...

[gamer42]

Than why the hell did they bid $200 million?
http://n4g.com/news/1324447...

[gamer7804]

until they screwed up the ps3 port, and then subsequently wouldn't help fund the sequel which now ends up soley on nintendo platforms.

[Inception]

@gamer42

Really?! Holy hell, that's new to me. But i'm not online for a couple of days and that's make me out of the loop >.<

Thx for the info btw :)

@gamer7804

I'm playing Bayonetta on my PS3 and i don't see what is wrong with it.

[Summons75]

@ inception.

If your playing bayonetta on the PS3 and nothing is wrong, you have the patch that fixed the game. It did get sent to a different dev for a quick port which was poor but PG made a patch which made the game equal to the Xbox version. Most people over look this in order to hate on it or spread false information.

[Dunpeal]

wait, is this a forced sale or something? or is someone just looking to cash in?

[gamer42]

Apparently Index (mother company of Atlus) is selling them off

[Dunpeal]

oh ok thnx

[MASTER_RAIDEN]

i dont understand why these stealth disagree'ers are so against the idea of sony acquiring atlus. i mean if one of the 3 console manufactures were the only option for atlus, do you really think MS or nintendo would be better suited to handle atlus's catalog?

[gamer42]

(I'm speaking for myself) It's not that I'm against the idea, I do believe that Sony may be a good match for Atlus, but the ones cheering on Sony up there only seem interested in Only Sony picking them up and keeping them first party and ignoring the idea of keeping them third party, which is imo a horrible position to put atlus in, (whether it be Nintendo, Sony, and MS) Basically, I disagree with them, I can have my opinions can't I?

EDIT: I really need to read over what I write before posting.

[Dunpeal]

I agree with this, however, since I will be supporting SONY with a day1 purchase of a PS4 and they have a stellar rep with their 1st parties, I wouldn't mind if SONY does end up buying them.

[vakarian75]

Yes

[antoniobdo]

I personally wouldn't mind if nintendo got them. I don't see nintendo censoring them like most people saying it will be and I find the idea of them turning PG also pretty baseless.

But, to be honest, I don't actually care that much as long as I get to play the crossover of Shin Megami Tensei and Fire Emblem.

[AznGaara]

If its a 3rd party then I hope its Namco Bandai. I know they don't have a good track record either but at least lately they've been getting their crap together. With Xillia coming out tomorrow, Ni no Kuni was fantastically done. Heck they even had the balls to release One Piece Pirate Warriors with just subtitles so yea.

IF not then XSEED lol.

[Dagobert]

Honestly the only company I would like to see this go to is Sony and that's mainly because of their track record of localizing games for the western audience. It is a big company that I think they could financially maintain Atlus games, and yes I know Sony is losing money here and there now and then but nothing to make them go bankrupt anytime soon or to sell of game franchises. Third party developers would make everyone happy that's a fanboy of either of the big three but then not a lot of the third party developers are doing that great financially as well, not all of them have great track records for localizing games either.

I mean God forbid this goes to Sega. I'm still waiting for Valkyria Chronicles 3 and Yakuza 5, but all I'm seeing is them pumping out more re-releases of Sonic or trying to create more furry Sonic games in hopes that one of them might do well like the original Sonic. Then you have Square Enix, who is just as bad them releasing shit games no one wants. I mean they could have released FFXV by now instead of making 2 shit sequels to an already shit game, FFXIII. Capcom only cares about Street Fighter instead of making a RE game that everyone wants it to be like the older ones. So really I don't see any other third party doing well with Atlus.

Sony has consoles and handhelds, so they wouldn't be limited to just creating it for a handheld or just a console. Sony has my vote (if this was based on voting).

[Dno]

Im with you. Even if SE buys then they haven't even released Some games over here. Sony wil make those games come out of here much more likely then Namco, capcom or even SE.

[VTKC]

I just hope none of them are EA or Microsoft.

[r21]

Oh man oh man! Im very worried a 1st party mostly company will buy them. Best case scenario is a 3rd party publisher bought them. Worst case situation is either Sony or Nintendo OR Capcom/SE/Sega bought em D:

[pyramidshead]

Hopefully Sony picks these guys up.

[NYC_Gamer]

I doubt any console brand[Nintendo,MS,Sony]are willing to spend 246 million dollars on a company that produces niche software..

[Minato-Namikaze]

I guess that would depend on profit returns. They sold 200k copies of 3dot heros and it was 6 times their projections. But yeah 246 million is a lot. It might be better for a 3rd party that needs publishing power to aquire them.

[rainslacker]

Atlus has a lot of of things they do besides games. They also do Anime and Manga, among a few other things I've heard. They could very well be worth that much. The SMT and Persona series alone are probably worth at least 100 million. Sometimes you have to look past the single title sales. For the whole series it's up there as a top seller, and that's not even including merchandising.

Otherwise, I don't care who buys them, so long as they can operate as a subsidiary company and continue to do what they do now. I believe they are one of the few profitable ventures that Index corp actually has.

[Smashbro29]

I want Sega or Capcom to buy them. They'll put more games on more consoles in more territories.

[mitchell1188]

Sega has so many games in japan that they boast about but not one of those games has left japan and true Sega fans know what I'm talking about. If Sega buys Atlas were all screwed.

[Smashbro29]

Yeah but then again we might actually get a single game for PC.

[Drainage]

please no nintendo as we will never see any game in america ever again. And if we do, it will have mario crossover. maybe sony

[Infamous298]

I will choose gung ho or namco,if i have to choose between the big three it will be sony, why? Because sony is the only one that take risks and give more freedom todevelopers by allowing them to make new IPs, Microsoft treat developers badly and they are not interested in JRPG nor japan, Nintendo dont take risks and always stick with old IPs, This sum it up.

[Dno]

Sony does not even know how much they need this company. They are the JP company with zero games targeted to the JP fanbase. That's why ps3 and vita is selling not so great over there. Of course 3rd parties make up for it but Nintendo kills it with software over there.

Sony will benefit more then Nintendo and M$ as M$ doesn't even sell over there and Nintendo already has Monosoft (the xenoblade guys awesome game btw) for the great RPGs they make. Sony doesn't even have a JRP since ps2??? that's so bad. Hell Sony doesn't even have a WRPG made by sony at least M$ has fable. (another great game IMO)

Ima huge Sony fanboy but they really only make action games and racers for the western fanebase. I want great JP games and RPGS also that's what made playstation great back in the day IMO.

[Minato-Namikaze]

I think a new souls game is on the way. But i couldn;t care less about WRPG's. (I dont consider the soul series a WRPG)

[BlaqMagiq24]

Either a third party thats NOT Sega and Capcom or Sony.

[erikthegman]

valve with buy atlus and make persona and smt steambox exclusives. How's that for a twist lol

[wingman32x]

Kodakawa looks like the favorite from what I've been reading/hearing. Which would be good, since that means Atlus would pretty much go about their business as usual.

At any rate, I think a 3rd party resolution is much more likely than a first party one. I honestly think this thing ends without fireworks.

[SonyPS4]

I fear it might be Namco Bandai or Capcom (I especially hate Capcom). Would be nice if NIS bought Atlus though but they probably won't be able to afford it.

[KittyEmperor]

It would be nice is whoever bought them has a good track record of games getting localized quickly. I mean come on Sega I'm still waiting for Yakuza HD, Yakuza 5, and Phantasy Star Online 2. Namco Bandai might not be so bad still had to wait 2 years of Tales of Xillia though.