Atlus goes for Baroque

By Tom Magrino, GameSpot
Posted Dec 12, 2007 5:33 pm PT

Sting Entertainment's brutal postapocalyptic dungeon crawler coming to North American shores in February for the Wii and PS2.

In August, niche Japanese role-playing game publisher Atlus Co. brought Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 stateside. Persona 3 gained notoriety for characters' penchants for self-inflicted gunshot wounds to aid them in their magic-making. Running with that theme, Atlus today announced that it would be bringing Sting Entertainment's Baroque, again a game where death helps push things forward, to the Wii and PlayStation 2 in February.

Give mama a hug.

While most would argue that death is a pursuit worth avoiding, Baroque will apparently reward players for meeting their untimely demises. Atlus is promising a punishingly difficult, yet addictive, dungeon-crawling experience, where players search for items and power-ups as they attempt to unlock the secrets of the postapocalyptic world in which they have awoken.

Baroque is rated T for Teen. For more on the unusual dungeon crawler, check out the game's official Web site.

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WitteKraai
Posted May 4, 2008 1:08 pm PT

This is a pretty neat dungeon crawl.
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ebonyflame
Posted Mar 6, 2008 9:26 am PT

You know, a few years ago nobody would have even heard of the name Atlus. These days, Atlus is making a name for itself thanks to its high quality work on several very high profile DS and Wii games. It appears as if their trend toward great games will continue this year and it might take them one more rung higher on the food chain of gaming developers/publishers. I bet they won't sell out to EA eaither.
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Skull-Fire
Posted Feb 28, 2008 9:44 pm PT

Good old Atlus and there love for the post-apocalyptic world, gotta love em!
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game_wiz99
Posted Feb 11, 2008 1:02 pm PT

I already pre-ordered it... i hope it is as good as P3!!! ;-)
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Orasion_Seiz
Posted Feb 2, 2008 7:10 am PT

wow this is interesting. im looking forward to this game
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jaykho213
Posted Jan 31, 2008 6:47 am PT

nice! now all we need is P3 Fes.. pls atlus T_T
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CloudXentar
Posted Jan 19, 2008 3:17 am PT

As a RPG fan, any new games are rather welcome and if it's from creators of P3 then I'm really looking forward to it.
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hellpolice
Posted Dec 28, 2007 3:05 pm PT

looking forward to it I must say Atlus is kicking ass right now. P3, Odin Sphere, Riviera: Promise Land remake, Luminous Arc, etc. Square better watch their back.
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WoWmustbemylife
Posted Dec 24, 2007 7:41 pm PT

yeah i bet there are adds in nintendo power only for this game like rivera and yggdra. not very many people trust the adds in that magazine at all what they need to strive for is more media attention like game sites and the like.
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Chief_Kuuni
Posted Dec 18, 2007 12:57 am PT

hmm, sounds different thats for sure, if I had a wii I would pick it up
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TristanH12
Posted Dec 16, 2007 6:45 pm PT

This looks kind of interesting. Although Im not going to expect amazingly high sells, Atlus has always brought to me games that I tend to like while no one else really does or even knows about. I will just have to see how this is going to do.
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ben_grasso
Posted Dec 14, 2007 5:09 pm PT

Wii and PS2.....Thats not good. Looks like another PS2 port for wii. -_-
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mcknightvt
Posted Dec 13, 2007 8:57 pm PT

Anyone wanna speculate how this will use Wiimote functionality?
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V-Nine
Posted Dec 13, 2007 5:19 pm PT

quote Halo "..suicide..". Now lets see how many ways the characters can meet their doom. Could have sworn i've played something with a similar theme before....hmmm...Flatout?..no...rrrg cant recall. Oh well sounds fun.
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ctg867
Posted Dec 13, 2007 3:28 pm PT

Yay more PS2 to Wii ports. AWESOME! I'm so psyched about this game!
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yentar480
Posted Dec 13, 2007 12:59 pm PT

I
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Tycerion
Posted Dec 13, 2007 12:30 pm PT

I'm in...Atlus has an odd way of bringing the world of wierd to life and doing a pretty good job of it.
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noxian
Posted Dec 13, 2007 10:35 am PT

Atlus Japan makes a lot of games. Atlus US is purely a publisher. it seems a lot of people still don't realize that not all publishers use their main publishing name for everything. Sega, Nintendo, Atlus, Namco, Capcom; its a pretty common practice to divide your development force into separate studios, and allow them semi-autonomy and let them adopt their own names. despite doing this, the publisher still wholly owns the studio and thus (in this case) Atlus still developed it, its just organized under several layers of names, but its all Atlus.

S-E simply adopts the other approach of using their main publishing name for everything (partly because they mix up most of their teams after a given game is finished thus generally not creating any permanent internal studios)
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Telekenesis123
Posted Dec 13, 2007 10:20 am PT

Yay I love Atlus, I just wish they were more involved in cool SHMUPS like they used to be...those are my all time fave.
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Shisus
Posted Dec 13, 2007 9:56 am PT

looks interesting...time to search for that ps2, where was it?
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gajdut
Posted Dec 13, 2007 9:32 am PT

ha, its nice. like Japans
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pppjjj
Posted Dec 13, 2007 9:05 am PT

i just check the website of this game and it looks pretty good.
http://www.atlus.com/baroque/
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Bloodflowers
Posted Dec 13, 2007 8:58 am PT

Again my faith in video games restored by Atlus.
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gajdut
Posted Dec 13, 2007 8:48 am PT

ha, its nice. like Japans
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drogaz
Posted Dec 13, 2007 8:16 am PT

Sounds interesting although I'm not a big fan of dungeon crawlers or extremely difficult games. However the story sounds interesting so I'll be watching this game.
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rkgambill
Posted Dec 13, 2007 7:52 am PT

May have to dust off and plug the ol' PS2 back in for this one.
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majadamus
Posted Dec 13, 2007 7:10 am PT

I will track this game.
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skrutop
Posted Dec 13, 2007 7:04 am PT

Nice headline, Tom!
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dkn29
Posted Dec 13, 2007 4:11 am PT

diablobasher:

Atlus actually does develop their own games, this year alone they had Etrian Odyssey, Persona 3, and Trauma Center 2. Also, most of the other game's they have localized are also published by Atlus in Japan. Atlus USA isn't really bringing non-Atlus material into the mix.

SquareEnix also uses 2nd/3rd party developers, for instance Heroes of Mana and FFXII: Reverent Wings are not developed by SquareEnix. In fact, throughout this year, the titles developed by SquareEnix were either ports or remakes...FF1,2,Tactics(PSP), and Front Mission(DS). I guess they did develop Dawn of Mana...

As you can see, Atlus has developed 3 great (NEW) games this year, while SquareEnix has only developed 1 mediocre (NEW) game, with a bunch of rereleases.
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Generic_Dude
Posted Dec 13, 2007 4:01 am PT

Bout time the Wii saw some RPGs.
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diablobasher
Posted Dec 13, 2007 12:35 am PT

glitch:

Yeah but the difference being Square actually make their games. Atlus dont.

Atlus is more akin to Funimation than to Squaresoft. They started out by doing atrociously bad localised versions of Shin Megami Tensei and other JRPG games, until people started complaining, and they eventually started putting effort in.

They are now one of the best sources of getting Japanese games to these shores, but 2 problems still remain, months after release Atlus games are like gold dust to find. And there needs to be more publishers like Atlus.
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glitchgeeman
Posted Dec 12, 2007 11:49 pm PT

Sounds interesting. Atlus has honestly become one of the best RPG publishers around in my opinion, especially when considered with the likes of Square. Still, I'm going to reserve my opinions on this one until more info surfaces. What I would want is for them to bring Super Robot Taisen Original Generations for the PS2 to America.
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-Squirrel-
Posted Dec 12, 2007 11:44 pm PT

Very curious about this one. Since I love Atlus I will always give them the benefit of the doubt, so I'll look into this one next February. I could use a good old RPG on my Wii.
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LINKloco
Posted Dec 12, 2007 11:33 pm PT

Interesting.
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NeonNinja
Posted Dec 12, 2007 10:52 pm PT

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]
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NeonNinja
Posted Dec 12, 2007 10:48 pm PT

I'm intrigued.
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pixiedust35147
Posted Dec 12, 2007 10:04 pm PT

Sounds promising
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shabulia
Posted Dec 12, 2007 8:22 pm PT

I tell you, Atlus is one of the greatest publishers/developers out there. Thank goodness they are still around.
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japanesegoth
Posted Dec 12, 2007 8:13 pm PT

not saying that it will suck. and i think the wii does need some rpgs...but why can't they do something original for the wii?
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japanesegoth posted Dec 12, 2007 8:11 pm PT (does not meet display criteria. login to show)
japanesegoth
Posted Dec 12, 2007 8:11 pm PT (hide)

oooh a wii/ps2 game. automatic win! (the previous statement was completely sarcastic...what i really mean is automatic fail!)
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DanBal76
Posted Dec 12, 2007 8:03 pm PT

Actually Baroque was a game originally released for the Sega Saturn only in Japan. I played the import PS2 version for a short period of time, and i was completely lost, since the game requires knowledge of the japanese language.
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_AbBaNdOn posted Dec 12, 2007 8:02 pm PT (does not meet display criteria. login to show)
_AbBaNdOn
Posted Dec 12, 2007 8:02 pm PT (hide)

This is a clone. They already came out with a game where you endlessly get killed. Its called DMC3. Thats pretty messed up making a game that lets you get stronger by dieing. It sounds like they totally fubared the difficulty and programming and instead of trying to fix it they came up with a way to exploit it.. With that stupid name I doubt my local rental place will have it and i sure as heck am not spending my money to buy it.
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DarkBiegus posted Dec 12, 2007 7:52 pm PT (does not meet display criteria. login to show)
DarkBiegus
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:52 pm PT (hide)

[This message was deleted at the request of a moderator or administrator]
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Super-Mario-Fan
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:49 pm PT

Baroque? Wasn't that a time period a few hundred years ago?
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gunblade712
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:48 pm PT

wytefang.. that's a good one..

looks nice... i haven't played any of atlus's rpg.. (well i did but didn't finish it eheheh) but maybe i'll give this a shot.. gonna go home and finish my persona3, though..
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PreLuDe_DuDe
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:46 pm PT

Atlus = New Square(Soft)
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spacemartian79
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:42 pm PT

Yay more Atlus goodies is always good. Now bring over Super Robot Taisen Original Generations!
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nintendorocks
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:40 pm PT

Atlus RPGs= good
Keep 'em coming.
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keeperofgames
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:37 pm PT

This is just what the Wii needs: more gritty games leaned towards core gamers. Not that it doesn't have any, just that the more the better, and this game already looks very promising.
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nravasi
Posted Dec 12, 2007 7:37 pm PT

Watched the trailer, and it reminded me a bit of Persona 3, specially in the art style, and, of course, in the random phrases that appeared during it. So, as of now, it's a must-play. I hope it delivers
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