Lies of P continues to be one of the most celebrated Soulslikes made outside of FromSoftware, and we’ve known for over two years a sequel was happening. Now, we’ve learned it’s entered the “vertical slice” stage.

Publisher-developer Neowiz’s Q1 2026 earnings report confirmed the second game has reached the “full-scale dev phase”, but at the time of writing, the report has it limited to the “vertical-slice” step. A vertical slice is a small demonstrable portion of a game that’s meant to represent what the full game will be like, usually used to convince executives about a game’s overall direction and vision.

Neowiz is clearly interested in expanding the IP and turning it into an enduring franchise, but details are being kept a secret for now. Perhaps more interesting is the update on the status of Project Windi, another Soulslike RPG from Kay Lee, who directed Vindictus at Nexon, that’s now in the prototype stage. It’s not the first time we’ve read about it, but we now know it’s been progressing steadily, too.

Meanwhile, the narrative RPG dubbed Project Rubicon, directed by Buried Stars’ Seungho Jin, has entered the vertical-slice phase alongside the Lies of P sequel. While this project – as well as Project Windi – could be new IPs, the real natures of the projects haven’t been revealed yet.

While looking at Neowiz’s recent moves, we’ve also learned Round8 Studio – the developer behind Lies of P – is looking to fill an “AI Creator” role that can create “concept drafts” with tools like Stable Diffusion and Midjourney, and integrate AI software into “existing art workflows to reduce production time and build an efficient AI art pipeline”, among other things. It’s not the first time Neowiz has expressed a growing interest in AI-assisted game development.

Eurogamer’s three-star review of Lies of P said it has “strong enough foundations in its edgy tone and tweaked weapons”, but “it’s highly unlikely that they’ll be able to beat the originals at their own game”.