Sony China Hero Project to Publish Convallaria and Lost Soul Aside

Sony is stepping forward to publish two new games developed in China: Loong Force’s Convallaria and Ultizero Games’ Lost Soul Aside. The games debuted as part of the PlayStation China Hero Project, a Sony-funded initiative supporting new and emerging developers in China. The China Hero Project previously produced titles like Anno: Mutationem. New footage and trailers for the games debuted  Sony will handle publishing for the games worldwide.

Check out a trailer for Convallaria, courtesy of YouTube channel gamefront.

The Convallaria trailer shows team-based third-person shooting gameplay, featuring a player character traveling through an expansive open-world space. They combat a creature called Captain Chimera, and use various skills to dart around the battlefield. Players are also shown moving around with jetpacks, as well as using various types of weapons to defeat monsters of grand scale.

Lost Soul Aside, meanwhile, is an character action game starring a man named Kazer. Check out its first trailer via IGN China.

Kazer has merged with a lifeform known as Arena, and derives fantastic combat prowess from the merger. The trailer focuses on traversal and combat, as Kazer uses Arena to run at high speed, deploy powerful melee weapons, and fly through the air to get past obstacles. Large boss encounters also show off fancy graphics and elaborate special moves.

Besides Convallaria and Lost Soul Aside, Sony said that it intends to expand the China Hero Project initiative. According to a report in Reuters, the upcoming third phase (or season) of the program will “far exceed” the scale of the previous two. It will fund not just small teams, but some larger ones as well. Sony was on hand at a re-launching event in Chengdu on November 22 to hype the program.

Check out a trailer for the China Hero Project, courtesy of Gematsu.

Over two seasons, the China Hero Project supported 17 titles, seven of which made it to market, including Anno: Mutationem, FIST: Forged in Shadow Torch, Hardcore Mecha, and Immortal Legacy. The The third phase alone is expected to include at least 10 more titles. Convallaria and Lost Soul Aside were incubated during the first two phases.

According Sony, one factor in its increased interest in China is the success of Genshin Impact, developed by miHoYo (known overseas as HoYoVerse). HoYoVerse has a partnership with Sony that has seen Genshin Impact be, at least so far, a console exclusive on PS4 and PS5. SIE Shanghai President Tatsuya Eguchi said that Sony management is prepared to allocate more resources than ever to supporting Chinese-made games as they go global. Speaking to The Gamer, Niko Partners analyst Daniel Ahmad said that China is already the 6th largest market for the PS5. By comparison, it’s just the 11th largest for the PS4.

Convallaria and Lost Soul Aside are in development for the PS4 and PS5. They do not have a release window.