The Blood of Dawnwalker came out on Wednesday, September 3, and the short version is this: the studio full of ex-Witcher 3 people made a very good RPG, with a couple of rough edges worth knowing about going in.
It's the debut from Rebel Wolves, the Polish studio led by Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, who directed The Witcher 3. Bandai Namco is publishing. You play Coen, a half-human, half-vampire "Dawnwalker" in a fictional 14th-century corner of the Carpathians called Vale Sangora, and the hook is a day-night split: human by day, leaning on talk and daylight; vampire by night, leaning on blood, stealth and wall-climbing.
How it reviewed
Well, mostly. It's sitting in the mid-to-high 80s on Metacritic depending on platform: 84 on PC, 83 on PS5, 88 on Xbox Series, and OpenCritic has 93% of critics recommending it. IGN went 9/10, Destructoid 9.5. The praise lands where you'd hope from this team, on the writing and the cast, and on a time system that makes your choices actually cost something.
It's not spotless. Game Informer's 7/10 is the outlier, and the notes that keep coming up across reviews are repetitive combat and some performance wobble. So temper the game-of-the-year talk a little. It's a strong first outing, not a flawless one.
Available now on PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. If you liked The Witcher 3's writing more than its combat, this one's aimed squarely at you.
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