Takara Acquires Atlus

Officials from Japanese toy manufacturer Takara (makers of Transformers and Beyblade) have announced that they have acquired Atlus as a subsidiary company, with the business between the two companies becoming fully integrated on January 2004. Console and arcade developer Atlus are best known for Japanese RPGs such as Shin Megami Tensei and Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, as well as a number of varied GBA titles. Although Takara occasionally publishes titles itself the acquisition of Atlus indicates a renewed interest in the video games industry that will no doubt see many more titles released based on core IPs.