Rebel Wolves has clarified its use of generative AI during development of The Blood of Dawnwalker, saying the vampire RPG used generated voices as temporary production tools before final actor recordings replaced them. The studio also says no generative AI-made content is present in the finished game.
The comments come from a Eurogamer interview with Rebel Wolves co-founder and game director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, who was asked whether smaller AAA studios feel pressure to use AI tools to compete with larger teams. Tomaszkiewicz said Rebel Wolves did not feel that pressure, but did use generated voices early because an RPG with voice-over in multiple languages can become expensive and difficult to change once recording begins.
"Actually, we don't have any pressure to be honest, but we obviously used some technologies like the generating of the voices in the game in the early stage, because in our genre, when you work on the RPG game, which is recorded in [six-to-eight languages - he wasn't sure there on the spot] in VO, the VO is really costly stuff to do," Tomaszkiewicz said.
He said the temporary voices helped the team hear NPCs and story scenes earlier, then make changes before bringing actors in. Once the writing reached the right place, the generated voices were removed and replaced with recorded performances.
Rebel Wolves says AI should assist, not replace people
Tomaszkiewicz said his view is that AI can be useful when it takes dull or repetitive work off a team's plate, as long as it does not replace developers. He used QA terrain checks as an example, arguing that staff could spend more meaningful time testing quests, characters, combat and the gameplay loop if tools helped with tedious inspection work.
"My approach to AI is like this: I think that companies should use AI but in a way which helps people to work, not replace the people," Tomaszkiewicz said. "My approach is I feel that we should use AI to help our people to work and take from them these tasks which are annoying and frustrating and allow them to do this more fun work, which is needed, actually."
That distinction is likely to matter to players following The Blood of Dawnwalker, especially because the game is coming from former CD Projekt developers and is being pitched as a story-heavy RPG where performance, quest design and hand-authored consequence are central to the appeal. Rebel Wolves and Bandai Namco recently dated The Blood of Dawnwalker for September 3, with the game's 30-day vampire countdown and branching quest outcomes doing much of the selling.
The studio says the final game was made by people
Rebel Wolves co-founder Tomasz Tinc gave the clearest statement during the same Q&A, saying the team wanted to remove any ambiguity about what players will actually see and hear in the RPG.
"I will just say one thing, because the subject of AI was raised, and whenever AI is raised, there's controversy," Tinc said. "I wanted to make one thing absolutely clear: nothing that's in The Blood of Dawnwalker was created using generative AI, nothing. People with their blood and flesh made this game from the beginning till the end. I just wanted to make this 1000 percent clear."
Eurogamer also asked lead quest designer Rafał Jankowski and environment artist Adam Payet about the same subject. Jankowski said he is not using generative AI in his professional work and described coming up with and refining stories as one of the best parts of quest design. Payet said he enjoys handcrafting environments and works in a studio where that approach is valued.
The issue is not going away across game development, where AI tools are increasingly part of software pipelines and production debates. Rebel Wolves' position, at least for The Blood of Dawnwalker, is narrower: temporary generated voices were used to test story material during development, while the content shipping in the dark fantasy RPG was made by the studio's human team.