Stellar Blade director receives Presidential Commendation award from South Korea
Kim Hyung-tae was honored at the 2025 Korea Content Awards
The director of Stellar Blade has won a top award for his contribution to the South Korean video game industry.
Kim Hyung-tae was given a Presidential Commendation at the 2025 Korea Content Awards, which were held in Seoul last week.
The awards are hosted by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and are designed to honour people and companies who have contributed to the development of South Kora’s content industries.
As reported by Daum (via Automaton), Kim was given the prestigious award for his work in developing the South Korean games industry with games like Stellar Blade and Goddess of Victory: Nikke.
The award recognised his continuous efforts to strengthen the global competitiveness of Korean game IP, most notably over the course of the past 12 years following the founding of Shift Up.
Accepting his award, Kim said (via machine translation): “This Presidential Citation is thanks to the developers and fans who believed in and supported Shift Up. We will continue to do our best to further promote the competitiveness of Korean games on the global stage.”
Also acknowledged at the Korea Content Awards was Maggie Kang, the writer and co-director of KPop Demon Hunters, who received the ceremony’s top award, the Order of Cultural Merit.
Stellar Blade, which was originally a PS5 exclusive, was released on PC in June and became a hit on Steam, smashing PlayStation’s record for concurrent player count on PC for its single-player games.
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Earlier this year, Shift Up confirmed it’s planning a sequel to Stellar Blade, with a projected release window listed in its financial results as coming by the end of 2027.
Following this, the studio is set to release Project Spirits, a cross-platform game coming to PC, consoles and mobile which will be published by Tencent Games’ global publishing brand Level Infinite as part of a recently announced agreement.
“Leveraging Shift Up’s expertise and their proven success with globally acclaimed IPs such as Goddess of Victory: Nikke and Stellar Blade, Level Infinite aims to deliver the next generation of gaming experiences to players worldwide,” a statement on behalf of both companies read last month.
