The Blood of Dawnwalker's Vampire Protagonist is Cut From a…

Vampires may be prevalent in gaming, but there are surprisingly few games that are centered specifically around being a vampire. This interesting dichotomy created both a challenge and an opportunity for Rebel Wolves as it was designing and developing the upcoming The Blood of Dawnwalker, an action RPG where players get to step into the shoes of a newly cursed vampire. While there are aspects of Coen that will feel familiar to fans of vampire fiction in Blood of Dawnwalker, he's also unique from the playable vampires in games that have come before.

Similar to the conflicted protagonist from Dontnod's Vampyr, The Blood of Dawnwalker's Coen is torn between being a human and a vampire, forced to choose between his morality and satiating his bloodlust. But the game's specific day and night cycle, in which Coen only transforms into his vampire self when the sun goes down, created an interesting opportunity for Rebel Wolves to factor in video game player agency regarding how players choose to tackle quests. It's this aspect of choice and branching paths between day and night versions of specific quests that help separate Coen from what players might expect out of a vampire protagonist.

The Blood of Dawnwalker's Coen Has Human and Vampire Halves At Odds With One Another

While most vampires spend their days sleeping and their nights stalking, The Blood of Dawnwalker's Coen has the benefit of still being able to access his human self during the day. It's not until the sun goes down over Dawnwalker's version of the Carpathian countryside that Coen's vampire half comes out, and that day and night cycle plays a huge part in how players approach the game's critical path.

Lead quest designer Rafał Jankowski states that Blood of Dawnwalker is "very open, and another layer of it is that many of our quests have two paths — the day path and the night path." Choosing whether to complete quests as either a human or a vampire has a major impact on both Coen's humanity and how he's perceived by other characters.

The Blood of Dawnwalker Blood Drain Gameplay Reveal

In addition to that day and night cycle changing how certain quests play out, players also have to contend with Coen's growing hunger as a vampire. The protagonist's growing bloodlust takes shape in an in-game mechanic known as Blood Hunger, which Jankowski further elaborates on:

"Coen’s powers come at a cost; he needs to feed on other beings, and if this is ignored by the player, it may cause some unforeseen consequences."

That struggle between human morality and a recent vampire curse is a key conflict in several iconic pieces of vampire fiction (films like The Lost Boys and Near Dark, for example), but it also helped Rebel Wolves put its own spin on a familiar mythology.

Coen's Place as a 'Baby Vampire' Circumvented a Gameplay Challenge

Vampires are well-trodden territory both in traditional folklore and in modern pop culture. That said, one of the greatest challenges in adapting these characters to video games can be making them actually fun to play.

Too powerful, and all semblance of meaningful challenge and progress goes out the window. Too weak, and players feel like they're missing out on the power fantasy that playing as a vampire should provide. Interestingly, developer Rebel Wolves' solution to this was to make Coen, as writer Piotr Kucharski puts it, a "baby vampire," described as "a very fresh Dawnwalker, so he's not overpowered; he's not the most powerful being in the valley."

Ultimately, Rebel Wolves is aiming for Coen to be one of the rare vampire protagonists that's able to circumvent the issues that other similar video game heroes have faced. Speaking on how Coen's place as a newly cursed vampire shapes the experience of playing as him, Kucharski elaborates: