The medieval town, the swordplay, the flowy hair… Doesn’t The Blood of Dawnwalker remind you of something? Watching the latest gameplay overview video triggered more than a few flashbacks to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt for me, which isn’t wholly unexpected, given that The Blood of Dawnwalker is made by Rebel Wolves, a studio founded by former CD Projekt Red developers, and not wholly undesired either. But as I’m gawking at what could potentially be another magnificent single-player, open-world, dark fantasy action-RPG, I can’t help but worry about its vampiric side.
The Blood of Dawnwalker’s protagonist is, after all, a vampire. His lean, broad-shouldered body type, facial scars across his left eye, brooding gaze, deep voice, and half-up, half-down hairstyle might’ve fooled you, but his name’s Coen, not Geralt. In the gameplay video, we watch him walk the narrow cobblestone streets of the game’s major city, a gorgeous medieval town full of half-timbered houses, stone gates, flags waving in the wind, soldiers wearing kettle hats, and a multitude of random sacks, buckets, and wagons. No, no, this isn’t Novigrad; this is the town of Svartrau.
Once Geralt — I mean Coen — is done chatting with the locals, we follow him as he uses his Witcher senses — I mean his “focus mode” — to investigate a building, leaning over red-glowing points of interest, commenting on his findings, and grunting the occasional “hmm” as he goes. Wouldn’t you know it, there’s a monster hidden in the dusky cellar! Looks like it’s time for our hero to commence the monster-slaying…
As the monster disappears and reappears in clouds of smoke, Coen relies on broad, two-handed sword strikes along with kicks and pirouettes to chip away at its HP. Clearly, the School of the Wolf taught him well. Our monster-slayer then uses the Igni sign — I mean the Burning Blood ability — to deal damage over time before chopping the monster’s head clear off. Although Coen’s comments (“God… What are you?” instead of “Damn, you’re ugly”) aren’t quite as on-point as Geralt’s, it’s good of him to remind us that he isn’t actually Geralt by omitting the use of a silver sword and performing necromancy without the assistance of a sorceress called Yennefer.
Granted, playing “Coen the monster-slayer” is a daytime activity, and as the gameplay video shows, his nighttime shenanigans are of the more vampiric sort. But although nighttime-Coen shows a few abilities far beyond Geralt’s skillset, including walking on walls, teleporting to rooftops, and swapping his sword for claws, that’s about the extent of it.
Don’t get me wrong; the many similarities between The Blood of Dawnwalker and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt aren’t a bad thing at all in my book. As a major fan of the latter, I’d be thrilled to see a Witcher-like RPG, but I’d be less thrilled about a Witcher copycat without an identity of its own. The Blood of Dawnwalker’s latest gameplay overview is promising, but I had hoped to see more features that scream “vampire RPG” instead of “medieval monster-slayer RPG.”
Nightly strolls across rooftops and the need to slurp blood from time to time are a great start, but what about vampire abilities outside of combat? Manipulation techniques, enhanced charm, fancy disguises, the use of ancient vampiric lore, stuff like that? Perhaps Coen subscribes to a specific vampire clan, resides in an epic lair, risks the loss of his humanity, and has a daytime job other than slaying monsters, but so far, I haven’t seen anything of the sort. It would make sense for him to occasionally speak with antagonistic vampires rather than slay them straight away — they are the same species, are they not? While the game’s setting is gorgeous, the fact that it seemingly leans towards a Germanic medieval aesthetic rather than a Transylvanian gothic one makes it all the more important to generate those vampire vibes in other ways.
Is there such a thing as being too similar to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt? If you’d asked me that a while ago, I might’ve said “no,” but now I am not sure. It’s still early days, and I might get to see more of Coen’s vampiric side in the next The Blood of Dawnwalker gameplay video, but for now, I’m not entirely sure if Rebel Wolves turned their protagonist into a vampire because they’re excited to make a vampire game or because they needed a replacement for a Witcher.
