Stellar Blade Archives - Dot Esports

Developer SHIFT UP shared its plans for Stellar Blade and beyond, including a PC version, a sequel, and a new IP.

In an initial public offering filing on the Korea Composite Stock Price Index shared by Gematsu on May 20, SHIFT UP revealed it’s planning a PC version of Stellar Blade as well as a sequel. “For Stellar Blade, we have plans to introduce new gameplay elements, including downloadable content releases, a PC version, and new collaborations,” the document says.

Stellar Blade has been slowly overtaking the world of gaming, for all the right and wrong reasons. But, even with all the controversies, the game is seeing stellar performance as it overcomes Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and Helldivers 2 with the best user Metacritic reviews of 2024.

The game is currently topping the user review charts on Metacritic and trading blows with Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. Stellar Blade has a 9.3 average score out of nearly 2,000 reviews, whereas Square Enix’s revived flagship is carrying a 9.0 based on 3,360 player scores. Another 2024 heavy hitter, Helldivers 2, has also been toppled, though the margin is much wider as the extraction shooter has an 8.2 average grade. Stellar Blade has been the source and target of several controversies, mainly to do with the protagonist’s physical looks and an accidental reference to a racial slur. It has nevertheless come out on top and is, as things stand, the best user-reviewed title of the year so far.

Stellar Blade launched at the end of last week, and it seems like there’s been more discussion over the minor changes made in its launch day update than over whether the game is any good (it is, by the way.)

On 26 April, the game’s launch day, a Stellar Blade fan called Mark Kern started a petition on Change.org called Free Stellar Blade. Under the heading “Why this petition matters,” Kern claims that Stellar Blade has been censored and that the game is now “a cultural beacon for freedom of expression.”

Stellar Blade is out and receiving (wait for it) stellar reviews from players and critics alike. Though many are focused on Eve’s (the protagonist’s) physical looks, there is one feature that particularly caught players’ eyes—the hair animation.

Several Reddit threads have cropped up since Stellar Blade came out, focusing on Eve’s hair and the way it is animated. An April 24 thread praised Eve’s hair as being the real X-rated part of Stellar Blade and included a video of her moving and jumping around and the hair flowing accordingly. It floats around and falls on Eve’s model fantastically, though many in the thread disapproved of the animation with claims that it looks “unrealistic.” Those players think the hair flows too slowly and feels floaty, almost as if Eve was submerged in water, and they say the clipping issues are also significant.

There are only two days left before the official release of Stellar Blade, but a new discovery in various reviews had the game’s developers scrambling after players found artwork in the game that “unintentionally” referenced a racial slur.

During various playthroughs, users were stunned to find graffiti sprayed on the walls that, when combined with a nearby neon sign, seemed to reference a racial slur. The graffiti was originally supposed to only say the word “hard” and could be found around multiple areas in the game.

Stellar Blade hacks ‘n’ slashes multiple genres and iconic franchises, takes the best bits, and combines them into something special. The result is an epic action adventure that not only shows its pedigree and holds up as an excellent first-party PlayStation exclusive but has the potential to grow into something bigger and better.

At first glance, you might think Stellar Blade is a half-baked sci-fi thriller that underdelivers—but this couldn’t be further from the truth. Shift Up’s new IP genuinely sets a high bar, and its combination of exhilarating combat, sumptuous graphics, and deep systems makes it flourish in an era chock-full of high-class contemporaries.

As Stellar Blade‘s release slowly approaches, rating boards are weighing their opinions on the game and whether or not it requires censoring to launch in certain countries. Japan’s CERO (ESRB equivalent) said it doesn’t, and leading to an EA Japan executive questioning the decision.

In an April 21 post on X (formerly Twitter), EA Japan executive Shaun Noguchi called out the Computer Entertainment Rating Organization (CERO). The board gave Stellar Blade, an upcoming hack-and-slash published by Sony, the CERO D rating, allowing the game to launch uncensored in Japan for audiences aged 17 and above. This confused Noguchi since EA’s Dead Space remake was not allowed to show certain gory elements which he claims Stellar Blade also has. “I don’t understand,” he said.

Stellar Blade developers Shift Up have today confirmed its action-adventure title will be ‘uncensored [in] all countries’, including Japan, where the rules around gore and dismemberment in video games laws are usually quite rigid.

In a surprising move, the devs confirmed the news in an official post on the Stellar Blade X (formerly Twitter) account on April 21, writing that: “Stellar Blade offers the same uncensored version in all countries, including the Japanese version.” This is surprising considering Japan’s regulatory system in video games, CERO, is quite strict about blood, gore, violence, and dismemberment animations.

Stellar Blade is getting ever closer to its release date, and developer Shift Up has released a new trailer showing off some of the flashiest moves in the game called Beta Skills.

In Stellar Blade, players can use a wide range of attacks on enemies, some more versatile and effective than others. The trailer shows how each Beta Skill can be charged and followed up with successive attacks, including a multi-thrust move that ends with a high damaging finish, a heavy single-thrust, a double backflip effective on single targets, various wide swing attacks, and more. 

With hype levels for PS5-exclusive Stellar Blade reaching critical mass, K-pop star BIBI has joined forces with PlayStation for a tie-in song and music video named after the game’s heroine.

BIBI, the K-pop sensation who placed second on the reality show The Fan, stars in the sultry music video for the song “EVE,” which just dropped today, less than one week from the game’s full release on April 26.