A remastered version of Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 for will be heading to PS Vita this fall in North America.

Persona 4 has a Metacritic score of 90 and have collected dozens of awards from various gaming publications. Persona 4 is the second highest rated PSP title and will now be expanded on PS Vita.

Vita’s Persona 4 Golden will have 1.5 times the voiced dailogue and a new online dungeon rescue feature. There will also be additional content such as new Personas to find, new story events, and a host of “fan suggested tweaks and changes.”

A listing on the GameStop website offers a release date of October 23, 2012 for the updated version of Atlus popular RPG Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4.

Good. I ate up Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor so fast that I barely tasted it. It was that good, folks. No indigestion, either. It went down so smooth.

It would have went down smoother on a portable with a bit more graphical power and bigger screens. A system like the 3DS maybe? Sure. This morning, at a Nintendo 3DS press conference, Reggie Fils-Aime listed the 3DS upgrade of SMT:DS among the launch window games for the US. That means that Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclock could be a launch game for the 3DS in the US. How delicious would that be?

In case you missed it, Overclock will be an upgrade of the Atlus SRPG that uses the 3D tech to have demons flying out at you. It will also use the increased graphical power to give us higher resolution maps, and more space for text and stats. And more demons. It will also feature full voice acting and brand new game content with a new episode called “8th Day.”

Announced last year, some brand new details on the Nintendo 3DS Devil Survivor re-hash has come to light via Japanese gaming magazine, Famitsu.

Shin Megami Tensai: Devil Survivor is a tactical RPG originally released on Nintendo DS in Japan and North America only. The story follows a group of teens in modern day Tokyo trying to survive as the city is taken over by demons.

The Nintendo 3DS version, called Devil Survivor: Over Clock extends the gameplay in various different ways. One change is the storyline now goes over 8 days, rather than 7 of the original DS title.

The game also features over 150 different monsters, the original featuring 130. Over Clock will be fully voiced, the magazine stating there will be over 200,000 lines of voice work. Levels have been redesigned to take advantage of the Nintendo 3DS screen and the game also takes advantage of the 3D effect.

According to Famitsu, the game is around 90% completed, meaning a 2011 release is likely.

Originally released in 1997 for the Sega Saturn, Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers is the sequel to Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner (also never released in the West) and a dark RPG that Hardcore Gaming 101 describes as “like .hack but without all of the extraneous nonsense”.

I’ve mostly heard great things about its mix of occult and hacker themes, but apparently Sony turned Atlus down when the developer/publisher sought to localize Soul Hackers‘ PS1 re-release years ago. Fan translation group Devil Hackers, which also released the Persona 2: Innocent Sin English patch, is working to fix that!

The team started working on the Soul Hackers PS1 translation last year and have just released a trailer showing off its progress. It hasn’t announced an expected released date, but one of its members shared some info about what he’s working on while making sure to trash TOSE’s work on the port:

Finally, Atlus revealed what they’re using the Devil Hunter trademark for. Like Persona 3 Social it’s a net game.

Specifics were not released, but Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Hunter popped up in an Index Holdings financial presentation. It’s coming out next month and it’s a proper Shin Megami Tensei spinoff. Apparently Atlus is working on some kind of dating simulation game too.

Sister company Rosso Index is working on an online game based on Arcadia Saga and an unnamed “famous title” for December 2010.

Developer and publisher Atlus has seen its operations dissolved by its parent company Index Holdings.

Originally formed in 1986, the company has released a number of very memorable and popular games over the last few years including multiple Shin Megami Tensei titles, the Trauma Center series, and the hardcore DS dungeon games carrying the Etrian Odyssey name.

The reason for the demise of the company has been put down to a necessary business refocus by Index. The Index press release (translated) suggests that Atlus was not profitable enough as an independent company and therefore had to go. However, the Atlus name will live on in some form, but it’s unclear exactly what the plan is going forward. 

As to the fate of games currently in development at Atlus, there may be good news. The director of Atlus’ horror game Catherine has stated (translated) that his team intends to keep on working as will other teams. Either those teams haven’t been told their fate yet, or Index has decided to allow development to continue.

PlayStation Network has a big week in Japan with a surge of PsOne games. Top on the list, because its being sold at a premium price, is Shin Megami Tensei II. The enhanced PsOne port costs 1,000 yen ($12).

The ultra rare dream simulator LSD is also available and its only 600 yen ($8), way less than 18,000 ($210) on Yahoo Auctions.

Other (mostly obscure) Game Archives titles on PlayStation Network include Marionette Company, Ano ko Doko no ko, Love Game’s Waiwai Tennis, Dokapon! Rage of the Iron Sword, 0 Kara no Shogi, and a ton of budget games games like Simple 1500 Series: The Kendo plus Superlite 1500 Series: Hooockey!!.

Fans of the popular Shin Megami series love every release they can get their hands on. While US gamers have had the first Persona for a while in the US and Euro and Australian gamers have had hard copies of the game, it’s certainly good news to hear that the game is now available on PSN in those two regions. Atlus U.S.A., Inc. today announced that Shin Megami Tensei: Persona for PSP, the handheld remake of the first chapter in the critically-acclaimed Persona series, is now available on PlayStation Network in Europe and Australia.

SMT: Persona was well-received in North America, gaining multiple positive reviews. Our own Samuel Evans said of the game, “Persona is a classic game and while the Playstation version has become a hard to play relic, this remake is easy to pick up and play.”

Completely remastered for the PSP and now finally available in Europe and Australia, SMT: Persona boasts a fully redone English localization, all-new music from composer Shoji Meguro, beautiful new animated sequences overseen by famed artist Kazuma Kaneko, and enhanced graphics optimized for the PSP system’s widescreen aspect ratio.  With new content, adjustments to game balance, and a number of technical and design improvements, this is the definitive version of one of the most sought after RPGs of all time.

From IGN.com:

If you’re new to the Persona series, getting into the swing of things can be pretty intimidating. The Persona games belong to the Shin Megami Tensei franchise of videogames, and the original Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 came out on the PlayStation 2 back in 2007. In 2008, publisher Atlus released an enhanced version of the game titled Persona 3: FES, which not only featured a handful of notable improvements but it also boasted an entirely new chapter of the story known as the Answer. Both titles were fantastic Japanese role-playing games which balanced social interaction and classical sim elements with traditional dungeon crawling and turn-based battles.

Now, the Persona 3 experience has almost arrived on Sony’s little black (or white… or silver…) handheld in the form of Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Portable. The game takes almost all the content from the original Persona 3 and comes with a few of the tweaks from FES (though it doesn’t pack in the Answer chapter). With only a few omissions made, the developers have squeezed an awful lot of the PS2 experience onto one UMD.

As was the case with the original, Persona 3 Portable is set in modern day Japan. You’ll balance out living life as a student in high school while spending nights vanquishing the forces of evil. Yes, there are ample evil forces to vanquish, as every night at midnight the world enters a strange phase called the Dark Hour. During this time in between one day and the next, normal people are unknowingly entombed in coffins and dangerous Shadows roam the streets. The heroes of Persona 3 Portable are special, though; they do not transform into coffins and instead use the power of the Persona to fight the Shadows and unravel the intrigue of the Dark Hour.

The biggest addition in Persona 3 Portable is an entirely new playable female character. Although the story and gameplay will remain fairly unchanged, the female character will give players a different perspective on the events of Persona 3, which is an enticing reason for gamers that finished the first Persona 3 to go back and play through it again.

After choosing your character, you’ll soon find that Persona 3 Portable is a bit different from its older brother/sister. Instead of anime cutscenes, there are more in-engine cutscenes, as well as still pictures. These changes make sense, considering the size of the original Persona 3 and the addition of the new main character, but it was still a little disappointing.

Another notable change is that certain exploration segments, like wandering the high school and dorms, is now done on a static screen with points of interest marked by icons. Some players might lament the loss of free movement here, but on the other hand it’s a lot easier to move from one place to another and all the dialogue is still there.

Dialogue is an extremely important part of Persona 3 Portable. By building your character’s Social Links (a fancy way of saying “makin’ friends”), the power of your character’s Persona will grow. These Personas are physical manifestations of a character’s mind and give the character abilities that they wouldn’t normally have access to in battle. So during the day, players need to build social relationships, attend school and lead a normal life. But come night time, the members of your party will head to Tartarus.

During the Dark Hour, a massive, haunting tower called Tartarus erupts from underneath the party’s high school. By exploring Tartarus every night, players will experience the dungeon crawling portion of Persona 3 Portable. Players must take a group of three students up the tower, floor by floor, and conquer the increasingly resilient Shadows that occupy the tower’s blood-stained halls.
The tower of Tartarus will challenge you.
Participating in a battle is fairly straight-forward, though there’s a lot of strategy in combat. But at its most basic, Persona 3 Portable battles are turn-based affairs where you directly control your main character and AI patterns handle control of the other two. By attacking with your currently equipped weapon and using your Persona to cast spells, you can defeat all the super creepy-looking Shadows that want you dead.

One of the best parts about Persona 3 Portable is the collecting of Personas, which have some of the coolest designs around. By collecting (and subsequently fusing) Personas together, players can give their characters a whole boatload of different abilities. And with an entire school year to play through and a dark tower to thoroughly explore, this has to be one of the most robust PSP games yet.

Persona 3 Portable hits store shelves and the PlayStation Network early next month.

More Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Portable Videos

Atlus USA has released the official full trailer for its upcoming Nintendo DS release of Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey. Here is a brief description of the story from the official site.

“A slowly expanding black spot has begun to cover the Antarctic, and if left unchecked, it could swallow the world. Don your cutting-edge Demonica suit and join an elite group of soldiers tasked by the Joint Project to enter and explore the Schwarzwelt, with the primary objective of destroying it from within, but stay sharp: there are things inside the Schwarzwelt man was not meant to know…”

Strange Journey will be the next game to carry on Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne’s demon negotiation system, which is used to get the various demons you will come across to join as allies with you and help you fight, once you acquire demons you can also begin using the demon fusion system which has always been one of my favorite parts about the Shin Megami Tensei games, as you can merge different demons together and make an even more powerful one, or sometimes weaker ones if you aren’t paying attention.
 

The game released in Japan October 8th last year, and will see its North American release on March 23rd, 2010.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24nMjEWuFho