Atlus Faithful fan club members received a bizarre mailing today in the form of a newsletter dated June 23, 1999. What's significant about that date? Why that's when the only Persona game not to hit North America was released in Japan. How odd.
For all intents and purposes it looks as if Atlus simply made a mistake and sent out an old archived newsletter. It features an argument over which is better, the Nintendo 64 or PlayStation, a review of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, some Y2K hysteria, and a very misleading sentence up top. "Absolutely no new games releasing today in Japan." Why that's not true at all.
The character we added to the image up above is Tatsuya Suou, the protagonist of Persona 2: Innocent Sin. The second game in the Persona series was actually two games: Innocent Sin, which never made it to North America; and Eternal Punishment, which is currently sitting on a shelf to the left of me.
Why did Atlus localize the second game but not the first? I don't know, maybe because Hitler was in it. All I know is that it was a grievous oversight, and one that Atlus might be correcting soon.
The newsletter makes mention of the no news in Japan thing several times, and also features a reader poll that asks the question "Is there anything you regret that you wish you could go back and redo?"
Funny they should ask. A remake of Persona 2: Innocent Sin for the PSP was released just a few weeks ago in Japan, complete with a redesigned user interface, new character portraits, another difficulty level, and a completely new soundtrack (though players can still choose to use the game's original music instead).
All signs point to that remake getting localized for North America, finally giving Persona fans here in the states a taste of the events that led up to Persona 2: Eternal Punishment for the PlayStation.
With E3 just around the corner, this is a time for announcements. Hopefully Atlus will have one for us soon. Until then, we're simply speculating in an educated fashion.