Built in Unreal Engine 5 and brought to life by a team led by veterans of The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077, The Blood of Dawnwalker promises a grim adventure set against the backdrop of a plague-ravaged 14th-century Europe. Players assume the role of Coen, a tortured human soul on a desperate quest to rescue his family from the ruthless ancient vampire lord Brencis.
With impactful choices, emergent outcomes, multiple endings, and fluid melee combat blended with supernatural powers, The Blood of Dawnwalker promises a richly reactive and hauntingly immersive medieval experience. We were lucky enough to be able to catch a glimpse of the impressive demo at Gamescom as well as having a chat with Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, the founder of Rebel Wolves who are developing the game.
One of the most surprising aspects was how much investigation and exploration there actually is in the game. Which almost reminded us of the Batman detective games. When asked about this, Tomaszkiewicz explained their approach to gameplay and said:
“We want to evolve the genre because opening the new studio without doing something crazy is pointless and we thought, ‘ok, how we can make the genre fresh'”
Tomaszkiewicz went on to explain that:
“The game structure is not like the classical game where you have the route with the main quest and the side quests which are around, but we have a narrative sandbox which means that we have one goal and only let’s say the side quests around and you decide by yourself how you will put together this content to achieve your goal”
He also went on to say that the day and night loop in the game will play a major role in the game.
“Additionally we add the day and night loop which makes it more complex even because you can do your choices and you have different consequences depending if you play at night or in the day and of course you will also have the classic choices and the consequences from the other roleplaying games”
In regards to the combat in the game Tomaszkiewicz described it as a hybrid based on the Arkham games, but with added immersion.
“This combat [system] is a hybrid other games because when we thought about the combat, we thought we see the Arkham Asylum combat everywhere and this looks beautiful, it’s great but we miss a little immersion and we feel that we’re watching the movie instead of the inside of the action on the other hand, we have directional combat which appears in other games and it’s quite complex”
When The Blood of Dawnwalker was first unveiled, its unusual mechanics sparked both excitement and uncertainty. The team admits they were nervous. “I mean it was my fear… but what the focus test companies said was that this is the most innovative thing they saw in years, and they liked it really much. That’s fantastic and really good news for us,” the developer explained. At the heart of the design is a unique time mechanic. Instead of a traditional fail state, players face consequences. “It’s not game over when the time passes. There will be consequences, but you don’t just lose the game. That time pressure creates the rush, the tension.”
The world itself is steeped in historical detail. Set in 14th-century Carpathian mountains, the team went so far as to create authentic pant models to avoid inaccuracies. “It’s this level of craziness,” they laughed. Then there’s Cohen, the fragile-yet-powerful protagonist. By day he’s vulnerable, by night he wields vampiric abilities — a duality born from silver dust in his lungs. “We wanted a hero who isn’t overpowered. Someone human by day, with vampire powers at night.” With the game roughly 75% complete, the developers are pushing toward beta sometime next year.
Be sure to watch the entire interview here below.