Sleeping Dogs is a 2012 open world action-adventure video game developed by United Front Games in conjunction with Square Enix London Studios and published by Square Enix, released on August 14, 2012, for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.[6] Sleeping Dogs takes place in Hong Kong and focuses on an undercover operation to infiltrate the Triads. It is the first installment to the Sleeping Dogs series.

The game started development as an original title, but was announced in 2009 as True Crime: Hong Kong, the third installment and a reboot of the True Crime series.[7] As a result of the game's high development budget and delays, it was canceled by Activision Blizzard in 2011. Six months later, it was announced that Square Enix had picked up the publishing rights to the game, renamed Sleeping Dogs, without a relation to True Crime.[8]

In October 2013, it was confirmed by United Front Games that a game, titled Sleeping Dogs: Triad Wars, set within Sleeping Dogs' universe was in production. They also confirmed that it would be the second installment to the series and published by Square Enix.[9]