Warlock: Dungeons & Dragons is an action-adventure sport set in an open world. That a lot we knew after its late 2025 reveal. But it surely’s at Gamescom 2026 that Invoke Studios and writer Wizards of the Coast revealed the primary in-game demo and elaborated on who Kaatri – a warrior with entry to forbidden magic – actually is.
After sitting by a reside hands-off demo – which seemingly ran at 60 FPS on a PS5 Professional – that mirrored the one launched in video kind to the general public (watch it under), I sat down with Dominique Guay, the studio head at Invoke. His credit embrace a future at Ubisoft Montréal, engaged on Watch Canine 1 and a pair of, so he clearly has an understanding of what works (and what doesn’t) relating to open-world video games. However in fact, the market is stuffed with them proper now, so how does Warlock differentiate itself from the remaining?
What I noticed firsthand jogged my memory of a barely old style kind of action-adventure (sans substantial RPG programs) sandbox within the vein of Shadow of Mordor/Warfare. There’s area for one thing like that within the triple-An area proper now, however on the identical time, a easy and floaty melee battle in the direction of the top additionally had me barely nervous. In any case, I attempted to get solutions that went deeper from Guay and be taught extra about what we haven’t seen but.
The next interview has been trimmed for higher circulate and ease of studying.
GW: When did growth on this sport begin?
DG: We began again in 2022 kind of; early conception, taking part in with concepts. It’s been some time, so it’s thrilling to lastly present the place we’re at.
GW: Are you able to inform us one thing concerning the studio dimension for this sport?
DG: We’re about 160-170 individuals in Montréal. It’s an attention-grabbing mixture of workers. There’s a whole lot of core people who have labored collectively earlier than at earlier publishers, totally on open-world motion video games.
GW: What are you able to say about how Warlock differentiates itself from the usual open-world RPG?
DG: There’s fairly a little bit of RPG programs in lots of action-adventure video games, not simply ours. When it comes to character development, a whole lot of it’s centered round magic. So there’s discovering new spells on this planet, however you’re gonna need to work for them and discover. And most of them are non-obligatory and might be upgraded with particular person ability bushes the place you spend currencies to improve them.
Then your character sort of ranges up, and you’ll spend some attribute upgrades to unlock abilities and perks aligned with the warlock class. Then there’s the gear… They’ll change your look, however most significantly, they’ve traits. We attempt to use bespoke gear as an alternative of similar to +2 sword. You possibly can create builds relying on the way you wish to play.
GW: You talked about in the course of the demo that you would be able to work out issues in several methods. Can you “sequence break” quest chains or do you’ve a most important path you’re pressured to comply with in a sure means?
DG: The principle path will not be a collection of missions. You’re set on an goal of discovering somebody necessary to you, and also you’re gonna have to determine tips on how to get there. You don’t begin with a waypoint that you would be able to belief. It’s important to work your means in the direction of it by exploration.
Give it some thought on this means: You could conquer the world and unfold out and discover issues on this planet. Whereas doing this, yow will discover nooks and crannies and what’s hidden on this planet. It’s extra world-based; you’re gonna bump into aspect quests or mysteries. And many of the aspect quests have a number of entry factors.
GW: What are you able to say about how completely different the areas on this planet (we obtained a tease of them) are?
DG: We wished to have a whole lot of selection. I’ve labored on video games earlier than the place we finally had a number of biomes, nevertheless it was not that numerous when it comes to areas. Darkon was nice for that as a result of it has a whole lot of selection within the lore and supply materials, so you’ll be able to count on some fairly radical adjustments in look.
It’s an amazing model to do some loopy issues, so we’re embracing that. The spells you’ve are gonna take completely different meanings in these completely different environments… For monsters, it’s sort of the identical factor. They’ll have completely different vulnerabilities to spells, so that you’re gonna discover a bit of bit on tips on how to take care of new conditions.
GW: Does the world go on with out you once you’re not wanting?
DG: You bought a bit of piece of that within the demo. Once you go into the sector, the ogre zombie is being taken down by some vampire enforcers as a result of it’s actually close to the settlement and it’s a settlement they’re making an attempt to guard. That is occurring no matter you, and really this battle is made quite a bit simpler due to the vampires taking a whack at it earlier than you bought there.
These factions will meet one another and react accordingly. You possibly can even use that to some extent by creating tensions… The state of the world is chaotic within the sense that it’s nearly apocalyptic for the individuals dwelling there. ‘How are individuals adapting to that craziness in that world?’ That’s an attention-grabbing thematic for us… One factor I might say is we’re not creating big cities. We don’t wanna offer you waypoints as quickly as you’re in an enormous metropolis. We go for small settlements the place you’ll be able to go into every constructing and discover.
GW: Is there an infamy or notoriety system, relying in your actions?
DG: To take a very good, well-known model like Fable, the place you might be evil or good, that’s their factor. We’re undoubtedly not going there with this sport. Kaatri has a written morality. You possibly can’t go right into a village and kill individuals, for instance. It wouldn’t make sense for our character. We additionally don’t have a dialog system the place you’ll be able to select to be evil or good. The advantage of it’s we are able to inform a coherent story throughout the board and ship it with excessive manufacturing worth.
GW: Taking a look at that first cutscene within the demo, is that one thing we’re getting early on to set issues up, or will we get extra of them all through the journey?
DG: Yeah, undoubtedly. The advantage of having a written story is to go all out in manufacturing worth, so we’re embracing that. We have now a construction that’s exploration-driven open world, so we couldn’t have like 100 cinematics. We stability it out and attempt to watch out to not give the participant crumb traces, giving them the liberty to take their very own course by the world. However we had sufficient alternatives to create these cool moments.
GW: The main target appears to be on magic and the way you mix spells, however are you giving gamers the choice to make their melee assaults extra highly effective or craft melee builds?
DG: Positive, and we’ve obtained weapons that grow to be actually highly effective with magical and ingredient upgrades… Gamers are gonna use melee for positive. Perhaps somebody goes for a full magic playthrough, however typically, each participant is gonna combine melee and magic.
We all know some gamers err extra on the aspect of melee, and that’s completely wonderful. So long as you’re having enjoyable, that’s good with us… The optimum method to play is to make use of spells to arrange monsters to be susceptible. These important animations, like with the ogre zombie… they’re important assaults since you put them at an obstacle utilizing your magic.
GW: We will use spells to traverse and clear up issues. Do you’ve additionally like large set piece puzzles peppered all through the journey?
DG: We might use the time period puzzles, however there are conditions and challenges… I’m struggling to say there are puzzles as a result of we typically attempt to keep away from one-solution issues. Typically, we maintain within the spirit of the participant being inventive and making an attempt various things.
GW: What’s one thing that you simply’re significantly pleased with on this sport?
DG: I’m actually proud that we had been capable of come out with a like a ten-minute gameplay sequence proper off the bat. We’re seeing a whole lot of trailers and that’s nice, however with the ability to, in spite of everything this time, come out with a gameplay sequence that we are able to play reside working on a console, proper? To me, that felt actually good.
Warlock: Dungeons & Dragons is focusing on a 2027 launch on PC (Steam & Epic Video games Retailer), PS5, and Xbox Sequence X/S.
