Atlus Threatens Persona 5 Streamers With Suspensions

A few days ago, we learned that Persona 5 players wouldn't be able to share screenshots or gameplay video natively from their PlayStation 4 consoles. Atlus is concerned about players spoiling the RPG's story for other players, so the publisher blocked the functionality. Today, the company has outlined additional provisions for people who plan on using external solutions to stream the game online, which include filing content ID blocks and threatening account suspensions for players who don't abide by Atlus' rules.

Atlus posted the guidelines here. According to the company, "Our fans have waited years for the game to come out and we really want to make sure they can experience it fully as a totally new adventure." From there, they outline what they are and aren't allowing as far as streaming goes (text quoted verbatim):

• You can post however many additional videos you’d like, but please limit each to be at most 90 minutes long.
• No major story spoilers, and I’ll leave that up to your good judgment. If you need some guidelines, avoid showing/spoiling the ending segments of the first three palaces. While you can show initial interactions with Yusuke, avoid his awakening scene, and that whole deal about THE painting. Also, don’t post anything about a certain student investigator.
• I know I mentioned not showing the end of each palace, but you can grab footage from the Kamoshida boss fight. However, don’t capture video from the other major boss fights.
• Must not focus solely on cutscenes/animated scenes, should prominently feature dungeon crawling/spending time in Tokyo.
• You can post straight gameplay or have commentary.

Then there's the big warning: "If you decide to stream past 7/7 (I HIGHLY RECOMMEND NOT DOING THIS, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED), you do so at the risk of being issued a content ID claim or worse, a channel strike/account suspension."

The post concludes with an acknowledgement that Persona 5 is an unusual case for the company, and that it's in an ongoing conversation with how its policies might evolve moving forward. 

[Source: Atlus]

Our Take
This is absolute nonsense. Threatening streamers with account bans – for failing to adhere to provisions that they never agreed to – is absurd, and it's only going to backfire for Atlus. Good luck with this one.