Citizens of Earth: Retro-Inspired RPG Out Today on PS4, Vita

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Citizens of Earth: Retro-Inspired RPG Out Today on PS4, Vita

Greetings, citizens of Earth — I’m here to talk about, uh… Citizens of Earth. Errr, right! Today, ATLUS and indie developer Eden Industries will put you in the role of the second-highest bureaucrat on the planet, the Vice President of Earth. But don’t let the politics fool you, because there aren’t any in the game. It’s a retro-inspired RPG through and through, where as the VP you have to go around and figure out why the world has gone mad.

Citizens of Earth

But here’s the deal. When you’re a career politician, you don’t get your hands dirty, you make other people do it for you. As the VP, your job will be to recruit as many citizens as possible and use their special abilities to round out your party. There are more than 40 citizens total, but you can only bring three of them with you at a time. And in addition to basic combat skills, the citizens also have special talents that can be utilized to help outside of combat. Deep in a dungeon and need some health items? Have your Brother order some health items from FedUPs delivery. Difficulty too easy/hard? Check in with the School Mascot. Tired of traveling on foot? The Used Car Salesman can hook you up with a sweet ride!

And then there’s the combat: it’s not quite as simple as mashing “Attack” for every fight. Every skill either depletes or replenishes energy — the more damaging or powerful skills require more energy, so it’s best to put a bit of thought into your attacks beforehand. Of course, if you really wanted to, you could avoid combat as much as possible — there are no random encounters in Citizens of Earth, you can see every enemy on the world map. If you’re quick enough, you can slip through unscathed! Alternatively, if you’re overly powerful for some enemies, you can send your citizens charging through their ranks and earn XP without even having to go into combat!

Sounds pretty awesome, correct? Correct! But we want you to start off on the right foot, so we put together a list of some of our favorite citizens to have in your party:

Citizens of EarthCitizens of Earth

  • Baker — He has a lot of funny lines in the game and is just a really well-rounded character that gets fire elemental attacks early on. Plus, you can score some super useful baked goods from him.
  • Handyman — There’s no skating around this, he’s seen some… things… in his life, and his world-weary demeanor leads to some great interactions between him and the Vice President. Plus, if there’s a broken door blocking your egress, the Handyman’s got you covered. Oh, plus his combat philosophy is “there’s no problem a power tool can’t fix”, and let’s not forget about the healing powers of duct tape.
  • Pilot — Straight out of Top Gun and a total badass. Once recruited, she can fly you around to different map locations making life much easier. And there may be no greater joy than watching her turn on the afterburners on some dirty hippies.
  • Musician — They must’ve pulled him from a back-up band, because the Musician is an excellent support class. The dulcet tones of a funky bass line will heal your party over time, while his inspiring pop-ballads will damage enemies every turn.
  • The Cat Lady — She loves cats more than the internet does. So much so that her abilities scale with not just her energy but the amount of Cats she has on her. The additional resource management takes some strategizing, but like her 2-story in-home cat gymnasium, it’s worth it.
  • The Captain — Yarr! This heavy damage dealer is the scourge of the seven seas! …And also the scourge of various lakes and streams, and at least one fjord! Plus, he’s a %&$@ pirate! What’s not to like!?

Citizens of Earth

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60 Comments

17 Author Replies

  • Price Tag?

  • @1 according to the 3ds eshop, it’s about $12. Looks kind of like an earthbound type of RPG, so I’ll bite. Just not sure when and for what system.

  • Yea, no random encounters.

  • I’m pretty excited to get a smaller JRPG experience. And I love the aesthetic. So glad it’s not a super serious game. And excited for no random encounters! Can’t wait to play it on Vita.

  • C’mon Sony! We need great titles (AAA) for PSV, not games that seems to be designed for ps1.

  • Hey John,

    This game is going to be a blast to play.

    I wanted to ask if you guys would consider on making “Dynamic Themes” and “Avatar Pictures” for the PS4. Your game would look cool displayed on everyone’s PS4.

    Cheers!!!

    Rob aka Graf

  • Playstation TV compatible?

  • Looks awesome!! Can’t wait to play it this weekend.

    Is there a platinum trophy to earn?

  • @2. The title say today for vita and ps4? Ha

    @urubublue. Nobody cares about your spoiled entitled opinion. First Sony can’t make publishers spend time and money on “AAA” vita games. If it wasnt for these Japanese and indie games there wouldn’t be anything released except for the few AAA titles Sony has released recently. Sony is the only company working on AAA titles for vita, but they will mainly be ports like the Resident Evil and Borderlands 2.

    @Atlus. Thanks for picking up this game after the kickstarter failed. I have been really looking forward to this title. We’ve been needing a Earthbound style rpg for a long time now. Keep up the good work Atlus.

  • @5: This is Atlus, not Sony. Vita’s not their responsibility. That said, Atlus have been an incredible help with Vita since the beginning with Persona 4 Golden still being, one of, if not the best game on the system. They’re making Persona 4 Dancing All Night exclusively for Vita, which is gonna be awesome if you love Persona’s music like I do.

  • @1 and 2

    It’s $14.99, with a week one discount for Plus members that puts it at $11.99.

  • Is it, or will it ever be compatible with Playstation TV?

  • The game looks cool in a Earthbound way, but I’m not too keen on the aesthetics. Looks kinda like a mobile phone game.

  • I dont get the low rating of the blog post, do these people hate constant flow of games? They really think that weekly releases of AAA games is realistic? bahahaha! Playing this tonight along with Resident Evil and Ironclad tactics.

  • [Insert Want of a Nail Joke here]

  • This is awessome! congrats for bringing anothe game to our favourite portable console!

    Would be nice to see Demons Souls droping on PS Vita.
    Can’t Atlus + Sony make an effort to port it!?

  • Really surprised by the low ratings from the Blog commenters on this post as well. I’m personally looking forward to eventually trying out this RPG. If Atlus green lit it, then it’s gotta have something going for it, right?

    Follow me on Twitter @brg_esq
    Friend me on PSN: GStylez1980

  • When people have asked about Vita TV compatibility you answer it as a question like Maybe? or Probably not?. Does that mean you don’t know or what does that mean? Is it just whether or not Sony has decided to list it in the PSN as Vita TV compatible or something?

    • It means we didn’t develop or test for PSTV compatibility. So maybe it works? I’m not sure.

      It’s possible we could patch in compatibility later, but we haven’t discussed it with the dev.

  • i was really excited for this game, just wish there was clarification about PS TV, thats where i plan to play it mostly, but if not something else thats turning me off is no Cross-Buy, again an awesome feature that is left out. would have been awesome to have for this game. if not i guess i can buy it for Vita first and wait for a sale to get it on ps4!

  • Well John Hardin. I think they should work on that!!!
    Good luck!

  • I seem to be a slight bit confused maybe…..
    I see Citizens of Earth out on Vita, and a demo available on PS4 (which was released today, on release day…. odd but okay), but I see no ps4 version of the full game… maybe its just not up yet? Its supposed to be out today, correct?

  • Okay, thought it was just me. Only the Demo is available for the PS4.

  • @10 I mean, like you’re not wrong about Atlus on Vita, but I don’t really think you’re right either. Atlus (JP specifically – USA has at least tried to do some stuff with Conception II, Rollers of the Realm + this) has kind of snubbed Vita for no apparent reason. Persona 4 Golden is a PS2 port with some slight modifications. It sold incredibly well for Atlus. As did the Vita version of Dragon’s Crown. What do they follow that success up with? Uh, pretty much nothing. I mean, yeah, Persona 4 Dancing is coming this year, but that was originally intended to be a quickly churned out outsourced spinoff while PS3, PS4 and even 3DS got brand new RPGs from the internal teams at Atlus. They couldn’t even throw Vita a pity port of Arena or Persona 3. I guess Atlus JP were too busy being a Nintendo second party dev or something …

  • If you guys end up looking at reviews for this game, please actually read the text instead of just skipping down to the number. I reviewed this game for a website, and it simply cannot be quantified into a score. Sure, there are issues with the game, but if these specific issues do not bother you (you find this out by reading the review), then please pick the game up!

  • Cross-Buy/Cross-Play for Vita/PS4?

  • Cross-Buy/Cross-Play for Vita/PS4?

  • PS4 Full version is up now guys.

  • Been looking forward to this for a while. Glad to see it’s been released on so many different platforms. I am pro-multiplat!

  • I was under the impression this is Cross-Buy. I purchased it on the store for PS4 but nothing about Citizens of Earth is showing up on my Vita download list. Was I wrong about that? Am I doing something wrong?

  • I was pretty disappointed when the Kickstarter failed… not anymore!

    Big thanks to Atlus for publishing this title… never enough turn-based rpg’s these days.

    • Thanks! I really enjoyed the combat in this, it’s different and challenging. Lots of buff/debuff and status effect things.

  • @29 I do not believe there is a cross buy for this…. I just bought it for ps4 and no vita for free, so its not just you. I didnt hear anything about cross buy either.

  • @31 I must have misread that somewhere then. Oh well, thanks for the info man!

  • Sucks that this does not have a platinum, but I am happy that at least someone is making a game for the vita, I’ll probably pick this up let it suck up my time till Majoras Mask comes out!

  • If we had to select just one version, would it be PS4 or Vita?

    • If you travel a lot on public transportation or fly very frequently, I’d probably recommend Vita. It’s not the best short-stretch game like a Hotline Miami or Olli Olli, so if you don’t spend lots of time on your Vita, maybe PS4 is the way to go.

  • ATLUS, greetings from Brazil. Any news about Persona 5?

  • So my PS Plus Account lapsed. Since I had the subscription during the outage, will I get 5 free days?

  • looks funny and weird at the same time and a two week discount. not bad…

  • This is a day one for me. I LOVE how Atlus is creator driven and allows for games with this kind of creativity and diversity. I’ll be getting this for the vita so I can play it at work on my coffee breaks. I’ve been waiting for this one since it was announced!

  • Atlus I love you!

  • The game at first glance just seems like another generic title, but it looks like it has real potential to be a very enjoyable experience.

  • seriously thinking of getting this friday or saturday with the 20% off plus 10% off that under right under 11$
    game looks funny, colorful cast plus i love the old school pokemon style fight system with owning a ninten console

  • This game will immediately be bought on the principle that anyone that builds their game inspired by Earthbound probably deserves my money.

  • Was on the fence but buying this TODAY purely because there are more than 4-5 red comments on this whole page. Props for keeping with people most of the way through. Looking forward to this on my Vita tonight!

  • Looks pretty cool . I’m just not sure why ATLUS hired a bunch of random companies here .

  • Please fix the game.. trophies wont unlock:(

  • Game looks great, it’s nice to see something familiar yet unique… Can’t wait till I get to playing it. Would of loved if it was cross buy but considering the plus discount it won’t be so bad buying it twice.

  • I was waiting for this day to come. The game is awesome! I’ve been playing it for 3 hours and I’ve really enjoyed it. Hope there’s DLC in the future.

  • We ever going to see a ps3 version? thanks game looks great

  • Has anyone tested this with PSTV yet? I really want to buy it, but don’t want to waste my money if it doesn’t work.

  • This game looks awesome.I usually support Atlus on Day 1, however I decided to wait until the PSN 10% code dropped. Can’t wait until Friday morning!

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