“Hack away at the unessential.” (Bruce Lee)
DAWN ONE is a top-down hack and slash pure action gauntlet controlled with the mouse. It’s unique, minimalist cut-to-the-core, centered around overcoming and mastering difficulty. It will not feel familiar, and doesn’t play like any other game. I hope you will stick and connect with it.
MASTER THE CHALLENGE
100% mouse-driven, 2 buttons. Move, attack and jump at a precision, accessibility and speed only a mouse can provide. Difficulty ramps up and a couple of mistakes can send you back to the start, like in old arcade games. No fluff, no filler, 100% gameplay. Nothing to wait for, no meters to fill, no cooldowns. Some numbers do go up though!
A SOLO PROJECT MADE WITH ❤️
No asset flipping, no GenAI. Solo developed from start to finish, everything in DAWN ONE, models, textures, effects, animation, gameplay timings and systems — everything — has been carefully handcrafted and balanced over years of development.
NOW WITH A NEW SURVIVAL MODE!
Survival Mode is in, with its own leaderboard. Survive a single night at maximum upgrades and keep the chain going for as long as possible with gradually increasing difficulty, while competing for high scores.
WHAT’S NEXT
A Tutorial (I thought a mouse-only minimalist game wouldn’t need one, but I was wrong :)) and Steam Achievements are in the pipe. However, I can’t commit to release dates because life often gets in the way (hashtag solo dev life) so please stay tuned! I’m working on this as fast as possible.
BIG THANKS
A big thank you to everyone who tried the playtest build and the demo, wishlisted the game, made videos, gave feedback, liked and/or re-posted my tweets, told their friends about it, and most of all…
THANKS FOR PLAYING!
Posted by the game’s developer or publisher to its Steam community hub and published by Valve through Steam’s public news API. Sifter reproduces it unedited and writes none of it.