Persona Studio Atlus Raises Average Annual Employee Salary By 15%

Atlus has announced an average employee salary increase of 15%, and it's raised the starting salary for graduates too.


Published: November 14, 2023 10:26 AM /

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Ann, Ryuji, and Joker in Persona 5, an Atlus game

Persona and Etrian Odyssey developer Atlus has announced an annual average employee salary increase of 15%.

In a press release (which is in Japanese; we're using additional reporting by Noisy Pixel), Atlus announces the raise, as well as a boost in new graduate pay from 257,000 yen per month to 300,000.

That's an increase from around $1700 a month to almost $2000 (at time of writing), which isn't too bad at all.

Akihiko saying "Besides, I'm curious to see how strong I can get." to his fellow S.E.E.S. members in Persona 3 Reload, an Atlus game
You and Atlus both, Akihiko.

This news follows on from a prior salary increase of 5% effected by Atlus back in April this year, putting the total salary increase for the studio at 20% over last year's.

Atlus isn't the only studio to announce salary increases for its employees this year; back in February, legendary Japanese studio Sega, which also happens to be Atlus' parent company, also announced an average monthly salary boost of 30%.

Elden Ring publisher Bandai Namco also announced a big pay increase for its employees around the time of that game's release, and around a month later, Capcom followed suit with a 30% average pay increase for Japanese employees.

Morgana warning Joker of "lookouts" in the Atlus game Persona 5 Tactica
Atlus' upcoming slate includes the strategy RPG Persona 5 Tactica.

If you're not familiar with Atlus, the studio is perhaps best-known for its Persona series, which is itself a spinoff of the long-running Shin Megami Tensei franchise.

Other games developed by the Japanese studio include the Etrian Odyssey series of dungeon-crawling RPGs, as well as other Shin Megami Tensei spinoffs like Soul Hackers and one-off projects like Radiant Historia (although the latter did receive a 3DS remaster).

Upcoming projects include the strategy RPG Persona 5 Tactica and the long-awaited remake Persona 3 Reload, as well as the fantasy RPG Metaphor Re Fantazio.

The studio is also currently gearing up to release Vanillaware's upcoming Unicorn Overlord. Atlus and Vanillaware have collaborated a number of times, most recently on the idiosyncratic visual novel-come-mecha strategy RPG 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim.

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