It wasn’t too long ago that legendary creator Shinji Mikami revealed his new studio, UNBOUND, which is already hard at work on their first project. Then today it was announced that the studio has been acquired by Korean developer and publisher SHIFT UP, who you might know from their work on Stellar Blade.
I’ll be honest: given that today is April 1st, 2026, I was initially hesitant to report this news, since you never know what is real or fake on April Fools’ Day. That being said, I can assure you that several colleagues, including our Editor-in-Chief, Keith Mitchell, and I, have checked this thoroughly before reporting, and it seems to be completely legit.
Below you can find the video version of the announcement:
The video was accompanied by the following announcement:
Following the announcement, both SHIFT UP CEO Hyung-Tae Kim and UNBOUND CEO Shinji Mikami shared some comments on the acquisition:
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