Shift Up’s follow-up to its 2024 PS5 hit Stellar Blade launched its first controversy before anyone could play a single level. The reveal trailer for Stellar Blade: Blood Rain, dropped at Summer Game Fest on June 5, 2026, introduced new protagonist Evie, an android operative in a cyberpunk cityscape, and split the game’s fanbase within hours.
The original Stellar Blade built its audience the hard way. Released in April 2024, it earned a 9.3 Metacritic user score, the highest for any PS5 game at that time, and hit second place on the PlayStation Store’s best-sellers chart for the month. Players backed it through a contentious launch: a day-one patch had quietly altered several of protagonist Eve’s outfits, sparking the #FreeStellarBlade petition, which collected over 80,000 signatures, and a wave of Sony PlayStation Network cancellations. Shift Up eventually reversed the costume changes. The mainstream gaming press, led by outlets like Kotaku, covered the outcry with thinly veiled contempt. The audience bought the game anyway, and Kotaku laid off four staff members in the aftermath of that coverage cycle.
That audience is now the one asking questions about Evie.
