When another user called them Sega’s “Big 3”, she replied, “This is correct information. Like a Dragon, Persona and Sonic are called the Main Pillar Brands at Sega.” She also clarified that it was Persona and not Shin Megami Tensei in a broader sense. However, “There are plans to expand the Shin Megami Tensei brand, and Sega is confident in the upcoming Shin Megami Tensei 5: Vengeance.”

Each IP will reportedly receive new content yearly, with “other media” referring to crossovers and collaborations with other titles. There are even “early plans” for collaborations in upcoming titles like the Crazy Taxi reboot, allegedly a live-service/games-as-a-service title launching in 2027.

As for its big three, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio will host auditions for its next Like a Dragon, and indicated that Like a Dragon Kiwami 3 would happen “sooner or later.” Persona 6 is rumored to launch next year and features a semi-open world with more open Social Links. Alongside the recently announced Sonic Rumble, a remake of Sonic Heroes and a Sonic Frontiers sequel are reportedly in the works. Stay tuned for more details and potential announcements in the coming months.

The current plan at Sega is to make Like a Dragon, Persona and Sonic annual franchises through new titles, remakes and remasters, DLC expansions and other media.

I think this is unannounced information.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

This is correct information.

Like a Dragon, Persona and Sonic are called the Main Pillar Brands at Sega.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

Persona.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

But there are plans to expand the Shin Megami Tensei brand and Sega is confident in upcoming SMTVV title.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

There will be new content for each IP every year.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

Yes.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

And there are early plans for main pillar IPs to have collaborations in upcoming Sega GaaS titles including Crazy Taxi.

— みどり (@MbKKssTBhz5) May 10, 2024

In the interview, when asked about his decision to leave Atlus and join COLOPL, Kaneko revealed that he was introduced to the opportunity by a career agent. With COLOPL working on a new IP, Kaneko felt that “planning and releasing a game from scratch was very much in line with my work.”

“I’m good at creating IP from scratch, so I thought that was a good match,” he said.

Kaneko joined Atlus in 1988, and across his 35-year tenure, he worked in a number of positions, including character designer, art director, creature designer, and more. His credits include major franchises such as Shin Megami Tensei, Persona, Devil Summoner, and more.

It was recently announced by the Japanese developer that Meguro, who joined the company back in 1995, has left his position and has now become an independent freelancer. Atlus writes in its notice that it will support Meguro’s freelancing work, and will also continue to work with him on future titles.

Meguro has been involved in some of Atlus’ biggest and most significant games over the years, including multiple Persona and Shin Megami Tensei games, Catherine, and more. Until his departure, he was also working on Project Re Fantasy.

Of course, given Meguro’s excellent work on Persona music over the years, one has to wonder what this will mean for Persona 6, and in what capacity he will continue to contribute to future instalments in the series.

Sega and Atlus seem to be much more open to porting the latter’s core games to more platforms of late, but while PC and the Nintendo Switch have often come up in conversations about Atlus games, Xbox has mostly been ignored. In its own yearly surveys, when Atlus asks about what platforms players would like to play their games on, Xbox is typically missing from the options. That’s changed this year.

In its newest survey (via Persona Central), Atlus asks if players want to see releases from a number of its core franchises on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S. These franchises include the likes of Persona, Shin Megami Tensei, Etrian Odyssey, and more. Meanwhile, several questions in the survey also seem to be focused on smartphones, while the survey also asks about older games from several franchises.

Atlus is currently at work on a number of upcoming projects, including Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne HD, Shin Megami Tensei 5, and Project Re: Fantasy, while the developer also seems to have something planned for Persona’s 25th anniversary celebrations this year.

In Sega Sammy’s annual integrated report for the year, the company provided an update on lifetime sales numbers for its various franchises. Some of the most noteworthy figures include Persona, which has crossed 13.1 million sales since the first game debuted in 1996. This is in part due to the success of titles like Persona 5 (the Royal edition achieved “record sales” in the West) and Persona 4 Golden on PC.

Shin Megami Tensei lifetime sales are at 17.4 million with its first title launched in 1992. Sales account for all 30 titles in the series along with the free to play games. Despite issues with the recent Shin Megami Tensei III Nocturne HD Remaster, Shin Megami Tensei V is also on the horizon for the Switch. Both titles arrive in the West next year.

It should be interesting to see Sega’s strategies going forward especially with the success of the Persona series on PC. Plans to release more ports, remakes and remasters of Atlus games across “various platforms” were already revealed earlier this month so time will tell. Stay tuned for more details and updates until then.

Atlus has been in the habit of sending out surveys to Japanese audiences in the early months of every year, and their survey for 2020 has gone out as well. It asks the sort of quests they’ve been asking for a while now, getting a rough idea of where people’s interest levels lie for things such as remakes, ports of older titles, sequels of mainline releases, and more.

Just like last year, Persona 6 is brought up in the survey, with Atlus asking what platforms people would like to see the game on, with new options for PS5 and Stadia having been added to older options for PS4, PS VR, Nintendo Switch , PC, and mobile devices. Similar questions are also asked for mainline sequels to Shin Megami Tensi and Etrian Odyssey.

The Switch is brought up in plety of other questions as well, including ones for hypothetical of ports of all Persona titles (including expanded versions ad spinoffs), the Shin Megami Tensei series (once again, including spinoffs), and many others.

Remember that a though a survey indicates the the developer is at least thinking about if they have an audience on various platforms, that doesn’t necessarily mean they have any concrete plans for them yet. Atlus has been asking questions like these in its annual surveys for a while now.

Either way, it should be interesting to see if anything comes out of this. For now, they’ve got Persona 5 Scramble coming to the Switch and PS4 in Japan very soon.

Sega’s annual report for 2017 is out now and lifetime sales for a number of high profile franchises under the company have been revealed. The most interesting is that Persona, which launched in 1996, has sold 8.5 million units across 13 editions (which includes retail and digital editions).

Much of this could be attributed to Persona 5, which hit 1.8 million units sold worldwide by July 2017. The Megami Tensei series, which launched in 1987 and has had 28 total editions in the packaged and digital space, notched up 7.2 million units sold thus far. Then there are series like Etrian Odyssey which have sold 1.8 million units across nine editions since launching in 2007 and Yakuza which launched in 2005 with 10.5 million units/downloads across 75 different editions.

Sonic the Hedgehog is still the company’s biggest success with 360 million units/downloads since the series launched in 1991. The number of spin-offs, sequels and packages would be exponentially higher than other Sega franchises (though Sega doesn’t specify exactly how many).

One of the first games that was announced for the Nintendo Switch was Shin Megami Tensei, presumed to be (but unconfirmed as) Shin Megami Tensei 5. This will mark the first entry in the series to be developed in HD, and also the first entry to be built using Unreal Engine. It also marks the next generation transition of the franchise, as well as the first console game in the series since Nocturne came out all the way back on the PS2.

Needless to say, the game is a big deal for fans of the franchise, and for fans of JRPGs. Which is why they have been waiting so eagerly for news on the title- happily, they may not have to wait much longer, as Atlus has confirmed that it will be sharing new information on the game on October 23.

At that point, we should hopefully get a new trailer, as well as the game’s final name (for all we know, it is a remake). We should also learn of its platforms, hopefully (while the game was announced for the Switch, it has never explicitly been confirmed as a Switch exclusive, meaning that at the very least a PS4 entry is not out of the question).

Hopefully it turns out to be a Shin Megami Tensei 5, one that is every bit as revelatory for the franchise as Nocturne was back in the day.

Atlus are one of the companies partnering with Nintendo on the Nintendo Switch. Today at the Switch conference, in one of the most exciting announcements at the event, they announced a bombshell- a brand new Shin Megami Tensei game, coming to the Switch, developed in Unreal Engine 4.

The game has only just started development- Nintendo were pretty clear on that. The trailer we saw was just a concept trailer for the game. But what we saw looked gorgeous, and the chance to play Shin Megami Tensei in glorious HD on the big screen again after so long is an alluring prospect indeed.

It is not yet confirmed if the game will be a Switch exclusive- the possibility is that it will in fact come to at least the PS4 as well, since it’s a Japanese game. Regardless, that’s at least one major third party game that the Switch will have.

Now that Atlus, the development team behind Persona 5, has announced that it is working on a new title it’s time to figure out just what the new project is all about. That project, codenamed Re FANTASY has not had the beans spilled entirely but the team did put out a release where it talked quite a bit about what this new game won’t be.

It appears Atlus is looking to go in a different direction than its other projects. In the announcement the company said this new secret project is going to be a “complete departure” from the Shin Megami Tensei and Persona series.

“For the game itself, though not much information is available as it is in the earliest of stages of development. But a few things are apparent from the outset – it will be a complete departure from the SMT and Persona series, and a return to the roots of where the Japanese games industry began with fantasy role-playing games. However, as ATLUS has always challenged the prevailing styles of RPG design, it is at the core of Studio Zero’s mission to do this again, imbuing the traditional fantasy RPG with a distinctively ATLUS flavor. Hashino is tapped to be the game’s director, along with other legendary ATLUS names. Along on the journey will be Shigenori Soejima from the ATLUS Artwork Team, responsible for creating the character art of the denizens of this new fantasy world, and Shoji Meguro from the ATLUS Sound Team, who will breathe life and depth into the new world as music composer.”

“While Hashino is focusing entirely on building Studio Zero from the ground up, Soejima and Meguro will maintain their responsibilities to the Persona series. Likewise, P-Studio, the production team in charge of Persona, will continue to operate at full strength to develop new entries to fulfill demand for the series. As the startup, Studio Zero will be a driving source of innovation for all ATLUS development.”

Thoughts on the new project? Let us know in the comments section below.