Just Weeks Before Launch, The Blood of Dawnwalker Stirs Up Controversy
Developer Rebel Wolves sparked confusion by initially announcing The Blood of Dawnwalker wouldn't include a 60fps performance mode on consoles, only to reverse course days later and confirm the mode will be available after all.
PR Stunt or Genuine Mistake?
The Blood of Dawnwalker has recently found itself at the center of an interesting media storm after its developer, Rebel Wolves, revealed the game's graphics and performance modes for home consoles in a rather odd fashion. The company initially announced that the game would support two main modes: a "Quality" mode delivering 30 frames per second alongside high graphical fidelity, and a "Balanced" mode offering variable performance of up to 40 frames per second. This announcement sparked considerable online discussion due to the fact that Rebel Wolves didn't provide players with a performance mode targeting 60 frames per second—something that's now considered an industry standard for virtually every game (I say virtually because we can't know what we'll get with GTA VI, but we'll find that out this coming Thursday, hopefully).
Now, just days after Rebel Wolves' original announcement, we're getting the much-needed reassurance that The Blood of Dawnwalker will indeed support a "Performance" mode after all, with this mode delivering refresh rates of "up to 60 frames per second." This game mode will be available on all consoles the game is launching on, except for the Xbox Series S, where the game will be limited to around 30 frames per second only.
At this point, it's unclear what Rebel Wolves' intention was regarding how they announced the game's various performance modes, but there's no doubt this raises serious concerns about the game's capabilities and optimization on home consoles. It's worth noting that Rebel Wolves is a relatively new company in the market, comprised in part of former CD Projekt RED developers who previously worked on The Witcher series—which originally raised the level of curiosity and interest around The Blood of Dawnwalker due to the high quality associated with The Witcher games. Now all that's left for us to do is wait for the game's launch on September 3rd, hoping that beyond the various performance modes, we'll also get a good, interesting, and hopefully technically stable game.