The Blood Of Dawnwalker Review: The Start Of Something Beautiful

The Blood of Dawnwalker is an RPG created by Rebel Wolves, a team created by former CD Project Red members, full of passion and love for video games. The studio, while relatively small, set an ambitious goal: to create something that feels and plays like a AAA role-playing game set in a medieval fantasy world, and it mostly succeeds.

TL;DR

The Blood of Dawnwalker is a 30-hour RPG fantasy game. It has created a perfect balance in the gameplay with the use of spells and vampiric powers while at the same time providing the audience with captivating storytelling and memorable moments. It is more than worth exploring the game and what it has to offer.

Story – Find The Strength To Save Your Family

In this dark, atmospheric game, you take control of Coen, a farm boy living in Laslea, a small village that is under the reign of a vampire-like species called Vrakhiri. Things take a turn when the leader of the Vrakhiri decides to destroy the village because the people were plotting against them. Coen wakes up only to find himself transformed into a Vrakhiri, and his family abducted and set to be slaughtered in 30 days. As Coen embarks on a journey to save his family, little does he know his life will not be the same again.

I found the overall story of The Blood Of The Dawnwalker excellent, with great voice acting and script, and over-the-top set pieces. The game warns you before you start your adventure that you have 30 nights and days, so it is impossible to do all the missions and to choose carefully which ones you prefer doing.

Despite going against every instinct I have while playing RPG’s, if you play by the rules, The Blood Of The Dawnwalker does something special by giving complete control over how things can alter. Declining certain missions can cause the death of the NPC and therefore any future missions with them. The same can happen if you take too long to go to the mission. This makes the world of The Blood Of Dawnwalker feel alive and reactive to your choices.

Gameplay – Satisfying And Gory

Another sector where you can definitely see the experience of veterans in combat. The Blood of Dawnwalker’s combat is very close to the Witcher games, with beautiful choreography and move set, but with its own style to it. The game introduces a mechanic similar to the Kingdom Come games in which you have to block from the direction the enemies attack, combined with the popular mechanic of perfect parrying to create something new that offers thrill and can turn the sides upside down. 

Each day is divided into day and night cycles. When Coen enters a mission, a certain amount of time bars will be consumed, making time pass when the mission is over. This forces the player, in a way, to think about which missions are worth your time. I enjoyed this mechanic a lot, as it made me rethink the choices and the people I choose to follow. My note if you play the game yourself is to go against every instinct you have to do every quest available, as it is impossible and will just ruin your experience with The Blood of Dawnwalker.

Gameplay Changes After The Sun Sets

While in the day the main focus is on sword fighting, at night the claws and the teeth grow and Coen becomes vicious. Vrakhiri Combat is much more aggressive and powerful, with more emphasis on speed and reflexes rather than strategy, but it would not be balanced if it did not come with a price. Coen can only recover his health by drinking blood at night, either from an animal or a human. The more blood he consumes, the more powerful he gets by unlocking new abilities. There’s a variety of abilities that you can unlock that change the gameplay drastically in The Blood of Dawnwalker.

Another whole chapter in the gameplay is Witchcraft. At the beginning of The Blood of Dawnwalker, you meet Anca, a childhood friend of Coen’s and a love interest. She will introduce you to Witchcrafting in order to help you on your quest. Witchcraft blends beautifully with the sword combat as you can combine spells to inflict more damage and debuffs on enemies, such as blinding, bleeding, and more.

In my personal opinion, both day and night cycles are lots of fun with a lot of variation and richness to them, but I found the Vrakhiri powers to be a bit too powerful against enemies. The developers tried to balance it out by making the enemies absorb more hits, scaling along with your statistics, but it still needs work.

I also found the lack of mounts in The Blood of Dawnwalker disappointing, considering the game is set in medieval times where everyone had a horse, but the developers made up for it by having other ways of transport, such as transforming into a wolf to run faster or slowing down time as a human to also traverse faster. Lastly, they added a lot of shrines on the map that you can teleport to, but I found that rather annoying because it threw me off the vibe having to use it all the time.

Large Variety Of Items

Like every other RPG, The Blood Of Dawnwalker has a wide variety of weapons, armour, clothing, and more, leaving a player like me confused at first, but after you spend some more time in the game, you will find the combination that gives you the buffs you want. Every piece of armour and weapon can be upgraded at the local smith store in exchange for some in-game currency.

Another aspect of The Blood Of Dawnwalker is crafting. You can create different recipes with materials you find in the world that give you all sorts of boosts that you would need during the fight. In order to craft a recipe, you need to find the instructions first in a book or on a page. Although that idea is interesting, I did not find myself spending time on it, as the game was pretty easy to use consumables. Maybe if they altered the gameplay so that certain monsters were greatly affected by it, like in the Witcher games, I would have better use for them.

There are a total of 3 different skill trees in The Blood Of Dawnwalker: a witchcraft, a swordsmastery, and a vampirism skill tree. You can spend your points by upgrading your skill tree, which offers you new abilities and passive stats. Be wary, as unlocking some skills and passives require time bars as well. I would prefer a bit more depth in the skill trees, as they mostly consist of passive abilities, but nonetheless, it did not impact my view of the game.

Visuals & Performance – A Stunning Game That Needs Some Tweaks

The Blood of Dawnwalker is an astonishing video game. It captures the European 14th century perfectly with the vast mountains and terrains, the forests, and the lifestyle of its citizens. The central town called Svartrau is filled with people and details in every corner that reveal the history of the place. There are some visual and terrain glitches now and then, but nothing game-breaking.

Another thing about the visuals that impressed me was the outstanding amount of detail they put into the ancient wall paintings and generally into the art inside The Blood Of Dawnwalker.

I played The Blood Of Dawnwalker on a simple PlayStation 5 on Performance mode, which theoretically should play at 60 fps at a lower resolution. The game struggled a lot,ot as I experienced a couple of frame drops during my playtime, especially in crowded areas or with heavy combat. I think this is because the studio added a performance mode at the last minute, with their main goal being 45 fps at 2K resolution. All of the above will probably be improved with future patches and did not ruin my experience.

Sound design & Soundtrack – Carefully Designed And Sweet To The Ear

The sound design in The Blood of Dawnwalker is excellent. You can hear the swords clashing, the sound of a vampire eating the flesh of a human. The voice lines are also very well made, with the lead actor and important characters standing out for their performances and adding to the immersion. As for the soundtrack, it is very unique, adapting nicely to the Balkan and European tradition, with my only complaint being that I found it short and a bit repetitive at times.

Conclusion – Should You Play The Blood Of Dawnwalker?

I definitely suggest The Blood of Dawnwalker to anyone looking for a new RPG adventure. The combat is refreshing yet familiar; I would compare it to the new God of War entries. The story is pretty unique and interesting, making you want to explore all the land and speak to as many people as you can. The whole concept of 30 days is a very good addition that makes the game stand out and also stresses the player, in a good way, about what is going to happen.

There are a few problems, with the most annoying being the frame drops, but with a few patches, most of them will be gone in the next patch or so. For their first entry as a company and as a team, Rebel Wolves did an excellent job, and I cannot wait to see what the sequel will bring for us.

I am very happy about games like The Blood of Dawnwalker, which are created by small studios and people with years of experience and passion because they have no restraints, and they can create gems like this because they believe in their idea and no big corporation is overseeing every single move they make.

A big thanks to Bandai Namco Europe for providing us with a key!