We knew it was coming. There was no way that Atlus USA was going to pass on the sexy PSP port of the PS1 classic RPG Persona.
A press release from Atlus says that Shin Megami Tensei: Persona for the PSP is coming to North America within the calendar year, which they later clarify as fall. They're calling this one a "relaunch" of their popular series, "featuring a completely redone localization and content never before seen in North America." There's also some game play enhancements and new additions hinted at. I can't wait!
Add this to the big PSP announcements listed earlier today, and it looks like Sony's portable is going to have a solid year this year.
We've got more Persona trailers here.
Dale North is Destructoid's Editor-In-Chief, a founding editor, and specialist in Japanese gaming. An accomplished musician, Dale was reporting from Japan during the earthquakes of 2011. Luckily, he got the fuck out alive and is home in America now with his wife and beloved corgi, Einstein. Dale is also a co-founder of Destructoid's sister anime site
Japanator. Likes Corgis, Sega Saturn, PSP, iPhone, Photographic tools.
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Contest:
12:27 PM on 02.24.2009 | 
As a caveat, I hope they manage to eliminate the effect lag that seems to plague the PS1-to-PSP ports. I tried to play PSP eboots of P1 and P2, but couldn't stand it since the lag extended already-long battles by about 200%.
Also, I wonder if they'll finally port Innocent Sin over, so we can actually summon Hitler :P
1. if its as slow as valkyrie profile, i'm going to die
2. innocent sin - i've been begging for that forever
I got into the series with P3, so I don't have nostalgia.
Well, to be perfectly fair, P1 and P2 don't have very much in common with P3 and P4. They have fusion, dungeon exploration, the use of Personas, and high school kids, but not much else. Oh, and P1 has a silent protagonist.
In what little I played of P1 and P2 (I couldn't stand the lag), you can negotiate with the demons you encounter, more like a standard SMT game, all the characters can use multiple persona and multiple weapons.
Both of the original Persona games (and Persona 2's unreleased first episode) have more in common, mechanically, with a standard jRPG.
Also, both games were released in the not-so-happy days of extreme localization, with Atlus removing all possible references to Japan (in P1 at least), going up to changing character names and races.
With this announcement, don't bother to play them, at least not P1. It isn't worth the trouble (or localization horror). P2 is a worthy consideration, but maybe they'll remake that, too.
Persona has become my fave RPG series so the opportunity to play the originals makes me very happy.
I'm hoping as little as possible. It wasn't "spoony bard" bad, it was offensively bad. Those were the days that Atlus fans would rather not remember, frankly.
@comtruise
Atlus does it by knowing their market and catering to it as effectively as possible, playing to their strengths and cutting out overhead, building an entirely rabid fanbase who will do absolutely everything they can to spread the word.
The Atlus Faithful newsletter is the only publisher newsletter worth subscribing to, as it's intelligently and hilariously written. Most Atlus releases come with desirable extras, and their standard of localization, from translation to voice-acting is top-notch, easily rivaling or surpassing their most high-budget competitors.
They cut overhead by having lower and shorter production runs, reducing the amount of extra, un-bought copies sent to game stores (as well as contributing to the impression that all Atlus games are as rare as blue garnets) and partnering with retailers like Amazon.com, which can sell directly to interested buyers.
It also helps that a lot of Atlus games are great :)
@ Dale
There is a translation patch for Persona 2: Innocent Sin, don't forget.
@ unangbangkay
I heard that Persona 2: Eternal Punishment's translation was at least good, and that's the reason why the group that translated Innocent Sin didn't decide to retranslate it.
*wish wish wish*
Crap. I need a PSP.
I'm on board. They can have my $30-$50.
Atlus USA may just be a greater troll than Sakurai.
@unangbangkay: Yeah, there wasn't anything wrong with EP's translation. And both sides of P2 had silent protagonists, not just P1. Also, IIRC nobody could change weapons in either game, it was like P4 where everybody had one thing they could do.
Oh, and they didn't really have fusion either; not in the PS2 SMT game sense anyway. You had to bargain with the demons you fought for Tarot cards, and then trade in X number of a certain type of card to Igor to create new personas. So like, Angel might require 26 Justice cards.
And the announcement says they're scrapping the old translation entirely and we are getting a real Atlus job on this. No more Mark, it's set in Japan, we get the Snow Queen quest, and we even get to meet the guy whose actual Persona is Mara.
I'm buying this day one.
But Maya didn't start silent, right? I remember that ho talking to her boss in the beginning of the game >_>
*throws in mine*