Last week, Bloomberg Japan reported that Atlus parent Index Corporation had received approximately 20 bids for the RPG-focused publisher. It was previously unclear whether Index would be including Atlus in the bidding procedure being conducted under the company's rehabilitation process.

As detailed in our previous coverage, rehabilitation is an expedited form of bankruptcy. We also know that key Index officials have stepped down in light of the ongoing fraud investigation. Index is accused of "round tripping," which artificially inflates sales numbers while offering no financial benefit to the guilty company.

One of the bidders is reportedly Sega, which is coming off a very strong quarter, bucking a trend amongst Japanese publishers. We reached out to Atlus for comment last week to confirm this report (to ensure that our translation is accurate) and have not yet received a statement.

The Bloomberg report indicates that the bidding pool will be narrowed this week.

[Source: Bloomberg]

Our Take

It had been my hope that Atlus' success would have made it something Index wanted to keep intact. It seems that all divisions are on the table, and Index could very well be offering up the RPG powerhouse to a new parent.

There's no word yet on which other companies are bidding, but one would think that if Nintendo or Sony were in the pool, their names would have floated to the top. Wherever Atlus ends up, we hope a new owner will let the publisher continue doing exactly what it has been: delivering quality RPGs around the world.