NCSoft said on July 31 it has signed a China publishing agreement with Shengqu Games for its new massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) Aion 2 and is stepping up efforts to target the local market.

The two companies on July 30 held a strategic cooperation ceremony in Shanghai attended by NCSoft CEO Kim Taek-jin (김택진) and Shengqu Games CEO Feng Cheng (펑청). Under the agreement, Shengqu Games will take charge of overall services for Aion 2 in China. The companies have maintained their partnership for 17 years since working together on the service of the previous title Aion in 2009.

On the day of the agreement, Shengqu Games opened an official website and set the local service name as 永恒之塔2 (Eternal Tower 2). The companies will set up a large-scale demo booth and screen a trailer video at the international game exhibition ChinaJoy, which opens on July 31, as they begin full-scale launch preparations. They plan to provide details of the service schedule in stages.

Kim said, "Aion 2 has realised with a higher level of completeness the ideals the original work sought to depict," adding, "I will do my best to show Aion 2 creating new value in the China MMORPG market and establishing itself as a work remembered for a long time."

Feng said, "Aion 2 is not simply a sequel to an intellectual property (IP) but an innovative new title that combines NCSoft's MMO development philosophy and know-how accumulated over a long period with the latest technology," adding, "We will work closely with NCSoft to steadily complete everything from launch to operations."

NCSoft will showcase Aion 2 at the international game exhibition ChinaJoy, which opens in Shanghai, China, on July 31. It will operate a large demo area inside the Shengqu Games booth and screen a trailer video on an extra-large screen.