In The Blood of Dawnwalker
from the makers of Witcher 3, time plays an important role. The developers want you to feel this and make sure you reconsider multiple times whether you really need the minigame right now.
What kind of game is The Blood of Dawnwalker? The Blood of Dawnwalker is an upcoming single-player open-world role-playing game. It should be especially interesting for fans of The Witcher 3 since Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, the former game director of Witcher 3, is working on it with his studio Rebel Wolves. Alongside him, his brother Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz, who was the lead quest designer for Witcher 3, is also involved.
Developed with Unreal Engine 5, it will be available for PC, PlayStation, and Xbox. The game offers a narrative sandbox experience with a day-night cycle that allows for different approaches to missions. A detailed gameplay presentation is set for summer 2025, and a release date is still pending.
Set in a dark fantasy world, the game places great emphasis on an engaging story and intense storytelling, where time plays a crucial role. The players should also feel this, as the developers revealed in an interview with PCGamer.
“Both actions and inactions have consequences”
What role does time play in Blood of Dawnwalker? Protagonist Coen becomes a vampire out of necessity, known here as Dawnwalker. You decide whether to retain your humanity or use the new powers—potentially endangering your family’s life. You have 30 days and nights for rescue or revenge.
The struggle against humans, vampires, and monsters brings potential allies, while the time of day and encounters influence the gameplay. Those who want to experience everything must play through the game multiple times, as time is creeping up on you and every decision for or against the minigame peeking around the next corner can have consequences.
As design director Daniel Sadowski mentioned in the interview:
We want the time system to be part of the narrative experience and part of the whole ‘both actions and inactions have consequences’ [concept]. It will function in interesting ways. It will definitely force you into decisions at some points, such as what you should do and what you should ignore, since you also need to decide which content you want to engage with and which to ignore to maximize your chances of defeating the main antagonist.
With this decision, they aim to draw players deeper into the story and enhance immersion. Players should feel that every decision for or against a quest or activity, no matter how minor it may seem, can impact the gameplay.
Besides time, the classic bloodthirst of your vampire plays a significant role in Blood of Dawnwalker. Compared to other games, this title is said to offer unique freedom that can completely ruin your game if you aren’t careful about your bloodthirst: In the new RPG by a lead from Witcher 3, you can ruin the whole game if you don’t pay attention to your bloodthirst.
