Sony reportedly moves closer to Stellar Blade, Nikke developer Shift Up

South Korean developer enters distribution agreement with Sony

Marco Wutz | Nov 24, 2023

Sony reportedly moves closer to Stellar Blade, Nikke developer Shift Up /

It looks like Sony and South Korean game developer Shift Up are deepening their ties, entering a distribution agreement for the studio’s upcoming PS5 title Stellar Blade, according to Korean site Game Chosun.

“The deal officially marks Shift Up as the first Sony second-party partner in Korea,” the report says.

Stellar Blade is an action-adventure game played from a third-person perspective, which initially was known as Project Eve and was supposed to be released for PC, PS4, and Xbox One. Two years after its reveal, it appeared at a PlayStation Showcase, where it was announced as a PS5 exclusive. In a 2022 State of Play show it finally received its current name, Stellar Blade, and a release window of 2023 was given – that last part did obviously not come to fruition and there is seemingly no new information to be had on that front at the moment.

Stellar Blade features a combo-based combat system that includes countering, parrying, and dodging. These actions fill up a meter that allows players to unleash powerful skills.

Exploration is the other big aspect of the game, which has players return to an alien-occupied Earth, where they find the last city populated by surviving humans.

This will be Shift Up’s third title after the two successful mobile gacha game launches in the form of Destiny Child and Goddess of Victory: Nikke. While the studio’s debut title found most of its success in Korea, Nikke is a fairly well-known title among mobile game fans. It has garnered a reputation for – sometimes quite risqué – fan service among its community when it comes to its character designs.

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Published Nov 24, 2023

MARCO WUTZ

Marco Wutz is a writer from Parkstetten, Germany. He has a degree in Ancient History and a particular love for real-time and turn-based strategy games like StarCraft, Age of Empires, Total War, Age of Wonders, Crusader Kings, and Civilization as well as a soft spot for Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail. He began covering StarCraft 2 as a writer in 2011 for the largest German community around the game and hosted a live tournament on a stage at gamescom 2014 before he went on to work for Bonjwa, one of the country's biggest Twitch channels. He branched out to write in English in 2015 by joining tl.net, the global center of the StarCraft scene run by Team Liquid, which was nominated as the Best Coverage Website of the Year at the Esports Industry Awards in 2017. He worked as a translator on The Crusader Stands Watch, a biography in memory of Dennis "INTERNETHULK" Hawelka, and provided live coverage of many StarCraft 2 events on the social channels of tl.net as well as DreamHack, the world's largest gaming festival. From there, he transitioned into writing about the games industry in general after his graduation, joining GLHF, a content agency specializing in video games coverage for media partners across the globe, in 2021. He has also written for NGL.ONE, kicker, ComputerBild, USA Today's ForTheWin, The Sun, Men's Journal, and Parade. Email: marco.wutz@glhf.gg