There’s an in poor health wind howling by means of the valley — and no, it is not simply the plague ravaging 14th-century Jap Europe. A household of vampires has taken over the quiet stretch between the Carpathian Mountains that you simply name residence, and so they’ve made you one in all their gifted thralls. Now it is as much as you, a peasant given the powers of the blood-draining undead, to avoid wasting your loved ones, and maybe the valley itself.

At a preview occasion in Los Angeles, California, I received an early hands-off take a look at Blood of the Dawnwalker, the upcoming motion RPG due out in 2026 from Polish studio Insurgent Wolves and printed by Bandai Namco. Whereas I did not play the sport, I watched a prolonged presentation proven to a gaggle of media members as a developer performed a reside construct, strolling us by means of the varied cycles and mechanics that gamers will navigate of their quest to avoid wasting the valley. 

However in dialog with two of the sport’s builders, I heard that Blood of the Dawnwalker has an unusual function — one which’s maybe finest recognized from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. From the start of the sport, you’ll be able to march as much as the sport’s finish boss, the vampire Francis, and attempt to defeat them. 

“We’ve got this narrative sandbox and our purpose right here is to inform the gamers, alright, you are out of the prologue — you do you. If you wish to go and storm Brencis’ Citadel proper right here proper now, go,” mentioned Piotr Kucharski, author at Insurgent Wolves. “The truth is, we invite it, proper? We wish to see these individuals on YouTube.”

That prologue units the stage for the sport: Protagonist Coen’s sister is contaminated with the Black Plague. She’s practically killed by non secular zealots however for the well timed intervention of Brencis’ coven of vampires, who flip her into one in all them. Their try to show Coen fails, turning him into an empowered half-vampire. He has 30 days to avoid wasting his household — however gamers can go about saving them in any approach they select. Every main motion takes treasured time, however gamers can select to progress as they need. This implies it is attainable to overlook a ton of occasions and quests within the sport. 

Play by day or evening — the selection is yours

The demo began on the gameplay overview, embedded above, however prolonged a lot additional. The sport’s builders walked us by means of a fork within the highway in a quest for a magic sword. By day, as a mere human, Coen labored his approach by means of church paperwork by searching down a wayward caretaker who became a monster in a quarantined almshouse. He lastly received entry to a ebook within the church library, which recognized which sigil to look out for within the graveyard. The sword, it seems, was sequestered in a tomb with its bearer.

Daytime exercise can contain swordplay, together with use of magic-like hexes used out and in of fight, however it’s largely geared towards investigation. You will discuss (together with to the lifeless, due to a helpful Compel Soul hex), learn books and get solutions. However, as with nighttime, any extended exercise like a prolonged dialog (indicated on the display with a particular icon, so gamers will not be stunned) may take a section of time, ticking the clock nearer to Coen’s end-of-month deadline.

On the midway level of the demo, the developer went again to point out how issues may very well be finished in another way at evening, utilizing Coen’s vampiric powers to shadowstep throughout rooftops and stroll up partitions — making it straightforward to sneak into that library to search out the proper ebook. However guards patrolling the graveyard must be handled to unearth the tomb, giving the developer the possibility to point out Coen’s undead preventing capabilities (together with goring with claws and draining blood). Descending into the tomb, we discovered the sword, however it was nonetheless held by an undead knight imprisoned within the partitions — a Dawnwalker like us gone mad by an prolonged lifetime of starvation and hunger. 

Killing the knight gave us the vaunted sword, which after reforging, could be a robust weapon when Coen finally challenges Brencis. However that quest is optionally available, that means some gamers won’t ever discover it. There are problems to selecting whether or not to do some quests in the course of the day and evening, too — as an illustration, it may be simpler to sneak round at evening, however that Dawnwalker knight could be more durable to kill along with his personal nocturnal vampiric powers.

So, technically, gamers can select to play fully in the course of the day or solely at evening in the event that they like one half of Coen’s talents higher than the opposite. However they’d be lacking out. Whereas some quests have each day and evening layers, others can solely be accessed in daylight or after the solar falls, mentioned Rafał Jankowski, lead quest designer at Insurgent Wolves.

“Some quests require Coen to talk to some corpses and equally, sure locations can solely be reached with planeshift or shadowstep,” Jankowski mentioned. 

Splitting real-time fight with motion RPG mechanics

The slice of fight we noticed in the course of the demo likewise break up between day and evening methods. However a lot of the preventing will likely be finished with a longsword, counting on rhythmically alternating between protection and offense. When enemies come at you swinging their very own blades, directional indicators will pop up, requiring you to dam in one of many 4 cardinal instructions earlier than counterattacking your self.

When Insurgent Wolves revealed Blood of the Dawnwalker’s fight in gameplay reveal movies, followers within the feedback critiqued the potential issue of predicting instructions to dam. So the studio took that as suggestions and got here up with an answer so as to add one other omnidirectional blocking capability, however which might drain Coen’s stamina in trade. Likewise, when viewers complained the digicam adopted the participant too carefully, builders added a zoomed-out choice.

“I do consider that we’re nonetheless on the stage of growth when it is invaluable to get individuals concerned extra within the manufacturing, to listen to their opinions on the challenge. We’ll maintain our ear near the bottom,” Jankowski mentioned. 

In any other case, Blood of the Dawnwalker follows some anticipated motion RPG standbys, with equippable weapons and armor, therapeutic objects and upgradeable expertise. The sport has a trio of talent timber, break up between daytime-only, nighttime-only and shared talents. 

The affect of Warhammer and The Witcher

Set within the Carpathian Mountains that stretch from modern-day Czech Republic to Romania and in the course of the 14th century, with loads of period-accurate trend and structure, Insurgent Wolves’ sport seemingly vibes with the extra reasonable Kingdom Come: Deliverance (set in modern-day Czech Republic). However a much bigger inspiration, the builders instructed me, is Warhammer, the darkish fantasy tabletop sport about warring armies of males, elves, dwarves and monstrous creatures.

“I like the thought of a society, a medieval society that has a metropolis, a thriving group however there’s additionally this exterior hazard. You’ve Chaos, you’ve Skavens, you’ve every kind of creatures, Orcs and so forth,” Kucharski mentioned. “Right here [in Blood of the Dawnwalker], we now have a little bit of a unique scenario, as a result of all these creatures come out into the sunshine and so they say, OK, we’re going to rule you.”

With its corruption of Christian church buildings into incorporating seeming blood rituals as a vampiric contact, Blood of the Dawnwalker positive takes cues from Warhammer’s darkish medieval vibe. However Kucharski additionally talked about the tabletop RPG Vampire: The Masquerade (in its medieval variant) as one other inspiration, in addition to the Dragon Age collection for its consequence of selections and system of magic.

However with its third-person sword-and-magic gameplay, supernatural monsters and vaguely Slavic setting, Blood of the Dawnwalker jogged my memory much more of one other common sport from a Polish studio: The Witcher 3.

It is a comparability that the builders have been getting loads. Jankowski is fast to level out the totally different natures of each video games’ protagonists, particularly with Coen’s day-and-night cycles of human and vampiric capability. However extra importantly, Kucharski famous how a lot historical past Geralt already has within the video games, sourced from the favored collection of Witcher novels — he is the Butcher of Blavikan along with his personal status, whereas Coen is just a few man. 

In fact, Coen will construct his status as the sport progresses in its zero-to-hero narrative, Kucharski mentioned. And maybe there’s extra to his saga after Blood of the Dawnwalker ends, too — however the builders have been coy about what plans that they had coming for Coen.

“We hope that we’ll see another adventures going perhaps sooner or later,” Kucharski mentioned. “Now we’re specializing in the primary one — simply to get it proper.”