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On September 5, Rebel Wolves took to Twitter on the official Blood of Dawnwalker account to announce that the dark vampire RPG had already surpassed one million copies sold just three days after its September 2 launch. “Thank you for playing, sharing, supporting, and being part of the community,” the developer wrote in its celebratory post.
I was in a Star Wars Zero Company-shaped hole during Dawnwalker’s contemporaneous review period, but everyone on our team who played has been pretty pleased with this very Witcher-like RPG from ex-Witcher devs. Australian editor Shaun Prescott awarded it an 83% in his review, praising the storytelling and combat, but wishing that Rebel Wolves had gone harder on Dawnwalker’s unique time mechanics.
“Blood of Dawnwalker is an effective piece of worldbuilding and storytelling then, but it doesn’t make good on its promise as an innovative piece of RPG design,” Shaun wrote. “Maybe Rebel Wolves worried that too many players would fall afoul of the passage of time and thus loosened its severity.”
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He was even more on the money than he could have realized when he wrote that: Some of the first mods for Dawnwalker do away with the time limit entirely. I appreciate the “have it your way” ethos mods can have, but I think a bit of friction can be a very good thing. I unilaterally declare PC Gamer to be a pro-time limits publication.
Zooming out, it’s exciting to see both Dawnwalker and Zero Company get rave reviews and strong sales during this challenging time for the industry. Disney hasn’t announced any numbers for Zero Company, but it’s sitting at a beefy 15,562 reviews and “Very Positive” on Steam a week and a half after launch, a compelling indicator that it’s doing well. The similarly multi-platform Blood of Dawnwalker, by comparison, is at 8,296 total reviews after having passed the million mark in total sales.
Of course, Zero Company’s success has a tinge of uncertainty to it that Rebel Wolves has been spared: 80% of developer Bit Reactor’s staff is reportedly on furlough, awaiting sales revenue and further investment to secure their jobs.
