Securing Consecutive Rounds of Funding, AI-Powered 3D Game "Sherlock Holmes: Nightstalker" to Launch Next Year | Exclusive by 36Kr
36Kr has learned that Meikurui, an AI game developer founded in 2024, has received two rounds of financing. The investor in the first round has not been disclosed, while the second round was led by LinkSure Network, and several institutions are in talks for follow - up cooperation.
It is understood that Meikurui's AI - driven 3D detective game Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker is scheduled to be officially launched on all platforms in 2026. During the period when AI games are transitioning from concept to commercial implementation, Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker has the opportunity to become an important work in the era of AI games.
In 2025, many people regard it as the year when AI truly begins to integrate into the gaming world. Against this backdrop, Meikurui combined AI technology with detective gameplay to develop Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker. This not only achieved a breakthrough in the technical scope of traditional independent games but also explored the possibilities of AI games in terms of gameplay experience, narrative structure, and commercialization system.
Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker
It is understood that in the game, players will assume the role of Sherlock Holmes and conduct investigations in Victorian London. In terms of art, the game adopts a Baroque - style visual design to recreate the classical atmosphere of London. From lighting, street scenes to character costumes, all are presented in high - precision 3D models to restore the social environment of Sherlock Holmes' era.
Different from traditional linear storylines, Detective Sherlock constructs a non - linear, multi - ending dynamic narrative system. Every question asked and every piece of evidence presented by players will change the direction of the case. Through the AI - driven free dialogue system, players can also have real - time voice conversations, and AI characters will generate instant responses and expressions based on emotions, motives, and logic.
It can be said that with AI, whether interrogating suspects, tracing clues, or engaging in psychological games in the game, each experience can be unique, allowing "every player to create their own detective story."
Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker
In recent years, AI - related games and social products such as AI dating and AI text games have attracted a lot of attention. However, most of them are based on 2D interfaces or light - interaction experiences, with simple graphics and limited logic. The Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker team believes that the true potential of AI is more suitable to be fully activated in a large - scale 3D immersive world. Only when the scene, characters, and narrative are integrated can players feel the power of "AI truly participating in the story."
To this end, this game redefines the role of AI in games at the game engine level. It is reported that the team independently developed an AI character generation and expression system, including real - time facial expression driving, voice lip - syncing, voice cloning, emotional expression, and multi - modal interaction, enabling AI characters to have more realistic feedback capabilities. When players talk to characters, they can not only hear real - time generated voices but also see expressions, emotional changes, body feedback, as well as sound effects and scene special effects closely matching the content, achieving "natural interaction with AI characters."
Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker
To ensure the personality consistency and logical integrity of characters during long - term interactions, the team introduced the cutting - edge Stanford technology Dynamic Persona Refinement Framework (DPRF), which is one of the core technologies driving the innovation of the game experience.
Traditional AI characters often have problems such as "forgetting previous conversations," "sudden emotional changes," and "inconsistent behaviors." In simple terms, it is difficult for AI to have memory. Through continuous personality modeling, behavior feedback reinforcement, and emotional evolution, DPRF allows each AI character to continuously refine its personality during repeated interactions with players, keeping its behaviors, motives, beliefs, and emotions stable and naturally evolving.
Therefore, every follow - up question, doubt, or presentation of evidence by players will affect the psychological state of the characters to a certain extent, turning the interrogation process into a real psychological game. Suspects may break down due to the player's persistence or become more cunning due to the player's hesitation.
Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker
In addition to the upgrades in technology and narrative, Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker also integrates psychological theories into its commercialization system and independently developed the Emotion - Adaptive Item Recommendation System. Through real - time analysis of players' multi - modal data such as voice, text, click rhythm, pause time, and emotional tendency, the system can determine whether players are in different emotional states such as anxiety, tension, frustration, excitement, immersion, or confusion. Combining the "emotional heuristic" and "emotional consistency effect" in psychology, the system recommends tools or content that best match the players' mood at the right time.
This not only improves the smoothness of the detective experience but also further strengthens the emotional connection between players and AI characters. At the same time, it has the potential to increase the game's payment conversion rate and ARPU.
Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker
Previously, Detective Sherlock: Shadow Stalker received high attention during the 2025 Gamescom. A large number of on - site audiences queued up to experience it, and some overseas media called it "the first game to deeply integrate AI dialogue into the core of the narrative."
2025 Gamescom
During the Steam Next Fest, after the game released a one - hour trial version, it attracted more than 10,000 players to make reservations for the experience. The average trial - play duration was nearly 40 minutes, higher than the industry average. In the content dissemination on overseas platforms such as TikTok and Facebook, the click - through rate of core gameplay videos exceeded 10%, making it one of the first new AI games with global dissemination capabilities. At the same time, Detective Sherlock won multiple awards in the "Shulong Cup" Global AI Game and Application Innovation Competition hosted by Century Huatong and won the "AI Technology Application Award" in the 2025 Tencent Game Creation Competition, receiving high recognition from authoritative industry institutions.
Century Huatong's "Shulong Cup" Global AI Game and Application Innovation Competition
2025 Tencent Game Creation Competition
Currently, the team has confirmed that the game will be launched on iOS and Android mobile platforms, as well as on Steam, PS5, Xbox, Switch 2 and other platforms in 2026. The production of the second - season content is also in progress, and more complex psychological AI models and multi - perspective case systems will be introduced in the future to further expand the depth of the combination of AI and narrative.
The founder, Zhu Xiaojing, said, "We hope to let players feel the'soul' and emotions of AI characters, making every conversation feel like communicating with a real person. For the first time, AI truly conveys emotions, understanding, and the unknown in a narrative way, which may change the entire entertainment industry."
In addition, the team also revealed that its new AI strategy game is in intensive preparation, and more details will be announced at the 2025 China Game Industry Annual Conference.