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Forums - Gaming Discussion - The Blood of Dawnwalker by Rebel Wolves, ex CDPR folks

Not too long ago there was a thread titled "Several of CDPR's top talent leave to form Rebel Wolves studio. Just... Why?".

Well, finally there's trailer for why:




"14th century Europe. Bloody conflicts sweep the lands, and the Black Death comes for the
survivors. In the wake of the disasters claiming thousands of lives, the decimated human
population struggles for survival. It's a moment of weakness. In Vale Sangora, somewhere
in a forgotten corner of the Carpathian Mountains, vampires seize their opportunity to walk
out of the shadows, overthrow the feudal lords and claim what they've been denied for centuries:
freedom, and ultimate power that comes with it. Legends turn into reality, and history as we
know it will never be the same.

The Blood of Dawnwalker is the first chapter of the Rebel Wolves’ original dark fantasy saga.
You play as Coen, a young man turned into a Dawnwalker, forever treading the line between
the world of day and the realm of night. Not fully human, not entirely a vampire, you have
30 days and nights to save your family or swear revenge on your sire and destroy everyone
standing in your way.

“Inspired by classic RPGs, we want players to feel the sense of urgency in an open world game.
There are multiple approaches to saving Coen’s family with no clear division between main and
side quests, you decide on how you spend the time.”, explains Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, Game
Director and Co-Founder of Rebel Wolves. “Time is a resource and with each quest progressing
its passage, it is impossible to complete all stories and arcs before the dreadful deadline, making
each playthrough unique. We call it a narrative sandbox.”

The freedom in gameplay is reflected in Coen’s very nature as a Dawnwalker. Depending on the
time of day, players will have different skills, abilities and storyline outcomes.  Players must choose:
do they fight for humanity or embrace the cursed powers?

The Blood of Dawnwalker is developed by Rebel Wolves in Unreal Engine 5 and published by
Bandai Namco Entertainment America Inc., for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam."

So far, really liking what I've seen, and that 30 day limit with "narrative sandbox" approach is a big plus in my book.

Last edited by HoloDust - on 14 January 2025

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Time limits in an open world rpg are an instant pass.



Ride The Chariot | ‘25 Completed

VersusEvil said:

Time limits in an open world rpg are an instant pass.

Yeah, I don't like that. With worlds like this, you want to take your time and experience all of it. Having to rush sucks.

There could be some time limits in individual quests or something, but not like this.



What Versus Evil said. After Metaphor I just can't, even KCD2 is getting a pass for me unless they've come up with a better way to be able to do side stuff without being timed out.



Whether time limit is good or bad really depends of the setting and goals.

If your designing game around exploration of the wilds, with no BBEG, or BBEG that it's taking his time, than time limit is probably not be a smart choice (though I like that even then time is taken into account in development of BBEG's plans and how far he progresses in that case).
But if you designing game as "narrative sandbox", then frivolously wasting time in game world, while important things are at stake, is really breaking verisimilitude and brings unnecessary ludonarrative dissonance, like in so many modern open world games.

At least, that's my POV, and I'm glad at least some devs are trying to make something different.
With high replayability and taking completely different choices, leading to (it seems) completely different endings, I actually hope that actual play time is around 30-40 hours at most, so that I can do few meaningful playthroughs for a total of 100-120 hours - this is actually what I've been missing for quite some time now.



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Unless they do something like Majora’s Mask where there are schedules based on the time and some way to travel through time, I don’t see the benefit.

If anything, it might come off as frustrating - especially if you’re playing and realize you have to rush (or even abandon) your playthrough because you spent a bunch of having fun experimenting within the game, exploring and uncovering details, and entertaining yourself.



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

Unless the days in this game are really short, the 30 day limit doesn't seem to be that big of deal to me.



"The game itself doesn’t have a hard time limit and it doesn’t require you to rush anything."

Following up on that, Rebel Wolves senior PR manager Mateusz Greiner added, "In short - the player has limited time to complete the main goal - exploring the world doesn't move the time forward, but every quest does. It plays a huge role in our narrative setup, and we'll be expanding on what it means later on.

Greiner confirmed that "all quests" move the in-game timer, but assured "it will be always clearly telegraphed to the player if an activity moves time forward (and by how much) - players will have control over it."

Finally, Greiner said it "won't necessarily be game over" when the timer runs out after 30 in-game days and nights, but stopped short of explaining any further."

"Citing classic RPGs as the inspiration, Tomaszkiewicz and narrative director Jakub Szamałek noted Fallout 2 as one reference for what they are trying to accomplish, where the game allows the player to shape their own narrative right out of the gate."

I haven't played Persona, but apparently this is somewhat similar to its time mechanics.

Personally, I would rather that time ticks all the time, but this is fine as well.

 

Last edited by HoloDust - on 16 January 2025

So Persona, ok I can live with that.



Ride The Chariot | ‘25 Completed