''The Blood of Dawnwalker'' is an upcoming

action role-playing game An action role-playing game (often abbreviated action RPG or ARPG) is a video game genre that combines core elements from both the action game and Role-playing video game, role-playing game genres. Definition Action role-playing games empha ...

developed by Rebel Wolves and published by

Bandai Namco Entertainment is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game video game publisher, publisher, and the video game branch of the wider Bandai Namco Holdings group. Founded in 2006 as it is the successor to Namco's home and arcade video game ...

. It is set in 14th-century

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with the fall of the West ...

Southern Europe. The game was announced in January 2025. It is scheduled to release for the

PlayStation 5 The PlayStation 5 (PS5) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It was announced as the successor to the PlayStation 4 in April 2019, was launched on November 12, 2020, in Australia, Japan, New Zealand, North ...

Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

and

Xbox Series X/S The Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S are the fourth generation of consoles in the Xbox series, succeeding the previous generation's Xbox One. Released on November 10, 2020, the higher-end Xbox Series X and lower-end Xbox Series S are part o ...

in 2026.

Settings

''The Blood of Dawnwalker'' is a

vampire A vampire is a mythical creature that subsists by feeding on the Vitalism, vital essence (generally in the form of blood) of the living. In European folklore, vampires are undead, undead humanoid creatures that often visited loved ones and c ...

-themed dark fantasy

(action RPG) set in a

gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, a Germanic people **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Gothic alphabet, an alphabet used to write the Gothic language ** Gothic ( ...

, fictional 14th-century kingdom called "Vale Sangora", located in the

Carpathian Mountains The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians () are a range of mountains forming an arc across Central Europe and Southeast Europe. Roughly long, it is the third-longest European mountain range after the Ural Mountains, Urals at and the Scandinav ...

. Drawing from Eastern European folklore, players explore a richly detailed world filled with supernatural creatures, moral dilemmas, and political intrigue. It’s a mix of predominantly Romanian motifs with broader influences of Balkan cultures. The protagonist, Coen, struggles with silver poisoning and a vampiric curse, attempting to save his family within 30 days. His journey is shaped by his unique bond with sickened sister, Lunka, a cryptic figure pivotal to the story’s exploration of survival, morality, and power. Brencis is the primary antagonist in the game, an ancient and formidable vampire who has seized control of "Vale Sangora". Under his rule, the kingdom has fallen into darkness, with vampires imposing a "blood tax" on the human populace. This oppressive regime has led to widespread discontent among the inhabitants, who are forced into servitude under the vampire lords.

Development

Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, a director of '' The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt'' (2015) and head of production for ''

Cyberpunk 2077 ''Cyberpunk 2077'' is a 2020 action role-playing game developed by CD Projekt Red and published by CD Projekt. Based on Mike Pondsmith's ''Cyberpunk (role-playing game), Cyberpunk'' tabletop game series, the plot is set in the fictional metrop ...

'' (2020), left his position at

CD Projekt CD Projekt S.A. () is a Polish video game company based in Warsaw, founded in May 1994 by Marcin Iwiński and Michał Kiciński. Iwiński and Kiciński were video game retailers before they founded the company, which initially acted as ...

in May 2021 following an internal investigation into workplace bullying allegations that found him not guilty. Afterward, he took an extended break to consider his next steps. Having spent 17 years at the company, Tomaszkiewicz wanted to shift to smaller projects with a smaller team, hoping to avoid the challenges he faced while working on large-scale games at CD Projekt. In February 2022, it was announced that Tomaszkiewicz had founded a new studio, Rebel Wolves, which was working on its first game. The development team includes Tomaszkiewicz's brother and creative director, Mateusz, as well as design director Daniel Sadowski, narrative director Jakub Szamalek, and art director Bartłomiej Gaweł, all of whom previously worked on ''

The Witcher ''The Witcher'' (, ) is a series of 9 fantasy novels and 15 short stories by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The series revolves around the eponymous witcher, Geralt of Rivia. Witchers are monster hunters given superhuman abilities for the ...

'' series and ''Cyberpunk 2077''. By May 2024, Rebel Wolves had expanded from around 20 to 90 team members. The studio envisions the game as the first installment in an eponymous series, describing it as a dark fantasy "narrative sandbox" featuring non-linear quests set in

Europe. The game is being developed using

Unreal Engine 5 Unreal Engine 5 (UE5) is the latest version of Unreal Engine developed by Epic Games. It was revealed in May 2020 and officially released in April 2022. Unreal Engine 5 includes multiple upgrades and new features, including Nanite, a system that ...

Release

The first trailer for the game was released on January 14, 2025. ''The Blood of Dawnwalker'' is scheduled to release for

, and

in 2026.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Blood of Dawnwalker, The 2020s horror video games Action-adventure games Action role-playing video games Bandai Namco games Dark fantasy role-playing video games Fantasy video games set in the Middle Ages Gothic video games Hack and slash role-playing games Historical fantasy video games Open-world video games Single-player video games Unreal Engine 5 games Upcoming video games scheduled for 2026 Video games about vampires Video games developed in Poland Video games set in Europe Video games set in fictional countries Video games set in the 14th century