The Blood of Dawnwalker, the debut title from Rebel Wolves, is one of the year's best releases, and my personal pick for GOTY 2026. While it's likely to be passed up by more critically acclaimed horror games like Resident Evil Requiem and, for the top award this year, GTA 6, I found it to be a delightfully old-school horror RPG with gothic vibes galore and a story worthy of multiple playthroughs. The secret sauce, according to the studio itself, is not to chase any current trends, but to make the game that you yourself want to play.

Korean publication Inven (via Otakukart) recently visited the Rebel Wolves headquarters in Warsaw, where studio leaders shared insights into their game development philosophy. Not unreasonably, the developers just want to make games they want to make without influence from the stock market or industry trends. Speaking on the studio's founding, a Rebel Wolves spokesperson described by Inven as "a marketing representative" said: "We wanted to create an environment where we could focus entirely on the project itself without being driven by stock market pressure or tight deadlines."

While Rebel Wolves does receive support from outside backers like minority stakeholder NetEase and The Blood of Dawnwalker publisher Bandai Namco, it's still an independent studio with full creative control over its games. With The Witcher 3 director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz as co-founder and CEO and other ex-CDPR devs working at the studio, there are obvious Witcher influences in The Blood of Dawnwalker, but the game very much has its own identity that I'm looking forward to seeing expanded in the sequel. That's because, in the studio's words, "We are rebels. We don’t want to follow trends. We want to make games that we ourselves want to play and enjoy."

What exactly that looks like probably won't come into view for quite some time, but it's very possible it'll include The Blood of Dawnwalker's somewhat controversial time limit mechanic. I thought the timed quests were a genius way to add stakes and consequence to the game's missions, but understand the potential for FOMO some other players have experienced.

6 things I need from The Blood of Dawnwalker's sequel