Atlus to be sold off by Index Corporation

[NoirSon]

Nintendo, Namco Bandai and maybe Microsoft would be the best for Atlus to get sold to.

Microsoft: Hopefully, will allow them to be themselves but just make their games MS exclusives without hampering development. It will also somewhat help Microsoft in Japan by having big name Atlus RPGs locked only on their own machines. That is the best case scenario, unfortunately the worst case is Atlus becomes a shell of itself, the games are watered down for international audiences and is silently killed in a manner similar to the desertion of all of Rare's talent from the late SNES and N64 glory days.

Namco Bandai: They are basically EA of the East so they have the cash to do it and keep everyone. The only problem would be they are likely not to do that if they do take over Atlus and one wonders how this will work given they already have a major RPG franchise and thanks to the tons of licenses really don't need anything Atlus brings.

Nintendo: Pretty similar to the problems Microsoft would have except they really don't need or likely want the Atlus properties if Miyamoto's tenure directing most of Nintendo's software output is a clear indication of his preferences. Like the other two they have the money but more so then the others, outside of Iwata having a sweet spot for the company and having them operate almost on their own, I suspect the worst case is going to be Nintendo harvesting them for the talent (much of which already have experience developing HD which Nintendo apparently needs help with) and dropping the occasional release of SMT or one of the other major Atlus franchises every few years.


Sadly, outside of SMT, I suspect many of the other spinoffs and separate franchises and games like Etrian Odyssey are screwed without some outside investor that doesn't want to change much swooping in.