The Blood of Dawnwalker: All the key details about Rebel Wolves' dark fantasy action RPG

The Blood of Dawnwalker has been announced as the next project from Rebel Wolves, offering an open-world RPG set in medieval Europe. But, rather than being your standard sword-swinging adventure, there's a significant twist. You will play as Coen, someone plagued with being half-human and half-vampire—known as the "Dawnwalker"—and you best believe that there's a huge number of vampires that despise your existence.

We've only seen a fraction of The Blood of Dawnwalker so far, with a handful of trailers and a few gameplay spotlights to sink our teeth into (get it?), and it could be a while before we get to experience the dark fantasy RPG for ourselves. But, if you were keen to know more about life as a Dawnwalker, we've pulled together everything you ought to know in preparation for its launch.

When will The Blood of Dawnwalker release?

Thanks to its most recent trailer shown at the Xbox Games Showcase 2025, we know that The Blood of Dawnwalker will release sometime in 2026. But unfortunately, that is quite literally all we know about its launch. In fact, it's still listed as "coming soon" on the game's Steam page.

The Blood of Dawnwalker trailers

YouTube

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The most recent trailer for The Blood of Dawnwalker was shown during the Xbox Games Showcase 2025, and offered a more in-depth look at the content of the game compared to the initial cinematic trailer released to announce the game earlier this year. There's a tasty mix of both cinematic and in-game content in the latest trailer, showing all sorts of combat, lengthy shots of the world, and various characters we can expect to meet while playing. Most importantly though, the trailer closes out with the announcement that The Blood of Dawnwalker will be releasing in 2026.

The cinematic trailer shared in January was our first introduction to Coen and the opening events of the game. We also got our first look at the vampires as the cinematic plays out, which are truly terrifying if you ask me. Toward the end of the trailer, we had an incredibly brief look at the gameplay, showing Coen fighting as both a human and a vampire, but that was as much as we had seen of in-game capture until the newest trailer and a handful of gameplay spotlights shared to the Dawnwalker YouTube channel.

What is the story and setting of The Blood of Dawnwalker?

The Blood of Dawnwalker takes place in 14th century Europe during "a moment of weakness" following mass conflict and, of course, the Black Death plague. So it's no surprise that vampires have taken this opportunity to emerge from the shadows and attempt to claim freedom after being denied it for so many years. But once a single domino falls, the rest shortly follow, and after the vampires begin to essentially revolt, other night-dwelling creatures follow.

Luckily the protagonist, Coen, has the ability to walk the line between being a human and being a vampire following the kidnapping of his family in his home of Vale Sangora. As convenient as this is when it comes to being stuck in the middle though, these powers do come with a price: fight for your humanity or harness your vampiric powers to save your family. Thanks to this decision-making, The Blood of Dawnwalker is bound to offer some gut-wrenching decisions to make, which really force you to question your morals too.

Fortunately, this does open up the opportunity to shape the story ourselves rather than have to follow a traditionally linear narrative. Along the way, you'll be able to forge unlikely alliances and interact with people differently to forge your own path. Everything needs to be done carefully though, as every time you make a decision or complete a quest and time passes, your family get closer to meeting their end. Unfortunately you won't have time to do everything for everyone, so you should expect no decision to be made lightly.

The Blood of Dawnwalker describes itself as a "narrative sandbox" which, in an interview with PC Gamer, creative director Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz stated that it "refers to the way we craft our content. It's how we allow you, the player, to interact with it. So the core of it is maximising players' agency and freedom of choice, while at the same time delivering the high-quality narratives that we are known for crafting in the past."

"Dawnwalker is not going to be a game where it's a pure sandbox, where you're just focusing on the gameplay. We do want you to experience these moments with the world of the characters, and the emotions that these situations can evoke and so on, and so forth. But, at the same time you are looking for ways of maximising freedom as you do."

Dawnwalker's design director, Daniel Sadowski, weighed in on the discussion too, sharing "In our game, we want the world to be dynamic. We don't want it to be static, like waiting for the player all the time. So both action and inaction in Dawnwalker have serious consequences, and that's also how we structured the quests, so that it can all be showcased while you play the game."

The Blood of Dawnwalker day/night cycle explained

The Blood of Dawnwalker — Gameplay Overview [4K] [subtitles available] - YouTube

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In a gameplay overview uploaded to the Dawnwalker YouTube channel, the day and night cycle, and how it affects your experience and abilities within the game, has been showcased. Thanks to your Dawnwalker abilities, you'll get to experience two different gameplay loops courtesy of this cycle. Of course, each form you adopt comes with its strengths and weaknesses, but there will be plenty of opportunities for you to harness the power of both.

During the day, you'll be proficient in sword fighting and employing magical abilities to take down enemies and clear whatever is blocking your path forward. However, you are also susceptible to the weaknesses of being a human, which is bound to be an awful lot of things. Your health bar won't regenerate naturally; instead you'll need to find consumables to restore some strength back to Coen.

At night, however, you'll gain access to an entirely different set of skills limited to your vampire form. Of course, you'll still have weaknesses, but they will be entirely different from those you have as a human. As shared in the YouTube video, you'll be able to reach areas of the map unreachable by humans, which is bound to make traversal a lot easier. This includes a skill called "Shadowstep" which lets Coen easily jump to any area within his close vicinity.

Interestingly, your health bar also represents your hunger as a vampire. As you can expect, you will need to quench Coen's thirst as a vampire. Getting too close to groups of NPCs can spur some unpredictable responses from them and potentially put yourself in more danger, so you'll want to single someone out should you need a midnight snack. When feeding, you'll also have complete control over how much blood you drain from your victims too. Whether you're drinking just enough to satisfy your needs and knock them unconscious, or draining them fully and killing them, the power is in your hands. If you don't want to harm humans though, you can always drink from animals instead if you'd rather.