Sony XDev is working with Team Ninja on Rise of the Ronin

Sony Interactive Entertainment’s XDev studio has confirmed it’s collaborating with Team Ninja on Rise of the Ronin.

Announced last week, the action RPG will be released as a PS5 console exclusive in 2024.

Team Ninja president and game director Fumihiko Yasuda has said the game is “undoubtedly the most ambitious and challenging project” the Japanese studio has undertaken, which may go some way to explaining Sony’s involvement.

Sony XDev works with external studios across the globe, providing production, management, design and publishing support, among other services.

Yasuda told the PlayStation Blog last week that Sony has been supporting Team Ninja since it started work on the project seven years ago.

And senior XDev producer Jason Stewart tweeted on Monday: “Privileged to work on an exciting title as Rise of the Ronin with Yasuda-san of Team Ninja Studio, [Team Ninja game producer] Masaaki Yamagiwa, and our Sony XDev JP team.

“Only right to visit the Meiji Jingu Shrine. Birth of the Charter Oath in Five Articles and end of Feudal Shogunate Japan.”

Prior to its closure last year, Sony’s Japan Studio was largely responsible for collaborating on the company’s domestic external projects, a role which is seemingly now being handled by an XDev Japan team.

Liverpool, UK-based XDev has previously helped to create and publish externally developed titles in Europe including LittleBigPlanet 1-3, Sackboy: A Big Adventure, Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls, Tearaway and Returnal.

Rise of the Ronin is described as a “combat focused open-world action RPG” that takes place in Japan during the end of the 300-year long Edo period, commonly known as Bakumatsu.

Further reading

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“Set in the late 19th century, Japan is facing the darkest of times as it struggles with its oppressive rulers and deadly diseases while western influence permeates as civil war continues to rage between the Tokugawa Shogunate and the Anti-Shogunate factions,” the game’s synopsis reads.

The game’s developer describes it as “a new Team Ninja experience that will immerse you in a historically inspired world while bringing together its renowned combat action with Katanas and the likes, with new firearm weaponry that depicts the unique personality of its time period.”