In The Blood of Dawnwalker, 14th century Europe, still suffering the effects of war and plague, sure looks like the kind of muddy hellhole Geralt would tromp across in The Witcher 3. And its protagonist, the half-vampire Coen, has a similar “almost human but actually something more” vibe to him—a gruff but acceptable monster we need to fight the real villains for us.

When asked if he was comfortable seeing The Blood of Dawnwalker compared to The Witcher 3 by The Game Business, game director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz said he was, “Really comfortable. I feel really confident about our game.”

As well as being game director on The Witcher 3, Tomaszkiewicz was a story designer/scripter on The Witcher and lead quest designer on The Witcher 3, as well as second director and head of production on Cyberpunk 2077. He founded his own studio Rebel Wolves in 2022 to make more of this kind of thing, what he calls “story-driven, open world games with some twists.”

Those twists are important. In The Blood of Dawnwalker they include a more impactful day/night cycle, with Coen only having access to his full suite of vampire abilities at night. There’s also an element of time pressure—where Cyberpunk 2077 put a chip in your head and said it would kill you if you didn’t get it out, then let you free-roam as much as you wanted, The Blood of Dawnwalker will expect you to snack responsibly from its selection of sidequests. You won’t have time to do everything in a single playthrough.

“Opening a new company to do exactly the same things we did in the past is a problem,” Tomaszkiewicz said, “because we’ll not feel that we’re evolving, or developing ourselves. It was really important for us as artists. We want to push the boundaries of AAA RPGs by adding some risky stuff, which gives you more immersion, more emotions, and a different feel when you play.”

And while he’s happy for their new game to be compared to something as beloved as The Witcher 3 (even the music harks back to it), Tomaszkiewicz doesn’t want Rebel Wolves to become the next CD Projekt. Rebel Wolves currently has 160 employees, and his dream for The Blood of Dawnwalker is that it’s successful enough to fund two more games at the same scale.

“The vision for our team is to stay the size we are,” he said. “Maybe we’ll need some help in some areas after this game comes out, so we probably will grow a little. But I’m afraid that if we grow more, we’ll lose this communication and process we have right now. I want Rebel Wolves in 10 years to be exactly the same size.”

The Blood of Dawnwalker is scheduled for release this year, and you can wishlist it on Steam to keep up with development.