The Duskbloods: What We Know So Far
The Duskbloods is a multiplayer action game developed by FromSoftware in partnership with Nintendo for Nintendo Switch 2. The game centers on the Bloodsworn, powerful beings with vampiric characteristics who participate in an event known as the Twilight of Humanity in pursuit of a mysterious prize called First Blood. According to director Hidetaka Miyazaki, development began as early as 2021, while FromSoftware was still working on Elden Ring.
He explained that the project was not created simply as a response to Elden Ring’s popularity or the success of Elden Ring Nightreign. Instead, the multiplayer concept grew from ideas that FromSoftware had accumulated through earlier games, including online systems such as Covenants and Invasions.
Platform, publisher and development history
| Claim | Grade | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive | Confirmed | Repeatedly framed as such in interviews; Miyazaki discusses the Nintendo partnership directly |
| Directed by Hidetaka Miyazaki | Confirmed | Miyazaki identifies himself as game director in interviews |
| Nintendo is a development partner, not just a publisher | Confirmed | Miyazaki credits Nintendo with feedback, balancing input, and specifically with onboarding and tutorial design |
| In development since 2021, overlapping Elden Ring | Confirmed | Stated to press by Miyazaki |
| Not a reaction to Elden Ring Nightreign's multiplayer direction | Confirmed | Miyazaki calls the release timing "circumstantial" and says this was simply the game he wanted to make |
| Concept originated from unused online ideas | Confirmed | Miyazaki cites Covenants and Invasions from Demon's Souls and Dark Souls as ancestors, and describes years of accumulated multiplayer ideas that never fit a single-player game |
| Pitched to Nintendo as this concept from the start | Confirmed | Miyazaki: it was "one of the things we pitched" |
| Shares technology and know-how with Elden Ring Nightreign | Confirmed | Miyazaki confirms internal sharing of tech, insight and feedback between the two online projects |
| Switch 2 hardware-specific features | Planned | Miyazaki: "probably some smaller features," declined to detail |
| Release date | Unconfirmed | No date appears in any pre-release interview or preview in our source set |
| Price, monetisation model, season pass structure | Unconfirmed | Never addressed |
Match structure: the Dusk Battle
| Claim | Grade | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Eight players per match | Confirmed | Consistent across all previews |
| Four timed phases | Confirmed | Consistent across all previews |
| Full match runs roughly 30 minutes | Test build | Testers estimated 8–10 minutes per phase; one preview reported closer to 8 |
| Phase I has no eliminations | Confirmed | Every hands-on account agrees |
| Three players reach the final phase | Confirmed | Every hands-on account agrees |
| Eliminations are called "culls" | Confirmed | The game's own term |
| Exact players culled per phase | Conflicting | See reconciliation below |
| Final phase is a last-player-standing arena fight | Test build | Two lives each; a third death eliminates you |
| At least one arena has no walls, allowing ring-outs | Test build | One tester described players being knocked off the edge "Super Smash Bros.-style" |
| A co-op final phase exists | Confirmed (Planned in build) | Miyazaki confirms it exists but says it was not in the Network Test |
| A PvE boss final phase exists, selectable via your build | Confirmed (Planned in build) | Miyazaki: "there is also a pattern in which the final battle is not PvP, but PvE against a boss enemy," not available in the test |
| A final battle was considered optional during development | Confirmed | Miyazaki: versions without a final battle were tested and "didn’t feel satisfying enough" |
Virtue: the scoring system
| Claim | Grade | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Repulsion Virtue | Confirmed | Defeating bosses, from mid-tier Great Foes up to Trespassers |
| Commendation Virtue | Confirmed | Volume feats — killing large numbers of common enemies, out-collecting rivals on dropped items |
| Flame Virtue | Confirmed | Locating a special throne; a one-time boost, flagged by map markers |
| Sword Virtue | Confirmed | Beating other players inside a Ritual Site |
| Pledge Virtue | Confirmed | Activating golden symbols inside a Ritual Site; can be stolen if a rival activates your Pledge |
| Virtue from corpses and secrets | Confirmed | Virtue-infused corpses found while exploring |
| Virtue system was inspired by board games | Confirmed | Miyazaki confirms the influence directly |
| "Acclaim" | Unconfirmed mechanic | Miyazaki names it and reveals the internal nickname "Longest Road," after the Catan card awarded for a continuous five-segment road. The trigger condition has never been described. It may also be the same resource other previews call Commendation under a different translation — treat the two as possibly overlapping |
| Ritual Site Virtue scales as a catch-up mechanic | Player-reported | Testers holding roughly 200 Virtue reported earning only 4–5 per red-stone kill, implying rewards shrink as standing improves. Never confirmed by FromSoftware, and whether it keys off placement or absolute Virtue is unknown |
| Killing another player usually awards no Virtue | Confirmed | Consistent across hands-on reports; the exceptions are Ritual Site combat and Sigil targets |
PvP, PvE and the accessibility question
This is the single most misreported area of the game, so the wording matters.
You cannot play The Duskbloods as pure PvE. Miyazaki: "It isn’t possible to play the game exclusively as PvE." You are not required to fight players to reach the final phase. Multiple testers advanced on PvE and exploration alone, and in most situations killing another Bloodsworn awards no Virtue at all.
Winning PvP is not a prerequisite for story progress. The game has multiple endings, and Miyazaki says progression does not depend on winning matches. Full-release customisation will let you lean on Kin companions heavily enough to "take a bit of a backseat" in the final fight.
An Invasion-style system where a ninth player joins an in-progress match purely to fight, with no Virtue objective. Miyazaki confirms this is planned but says there is no dedicated PvP mode.
Characters
Six Bloodsworn were playable in the Closed Network Test: Albert, Zork, Jan, Sniper Layla, Senator Samir Patres and Trang Lanh. All six are confirmed by hands-on reports. The final roster size is unconfirmed.
Also confirmed by Miyazaki: the playable characters are deliberately not called vampires. He describes the Bloodsworn as a race with "intelligence, philosophy, culture, and history, rather than simply monsters," and cites Zork as evidence of how loosely the studio interprets vampire imagery. Every Bloodsworn carries both a melee and a ranged weapon as standard — a design consequence, Miyazaki says, of the characters’ high jumps and air dashes.
Maps and locations
| Claim | Grade | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Three maps at launch | Reported | Appears in preview coverage from the test period; not restated by Miyazaki in our source set |
| One map in the Network Test: Lowanro City | Confirmed | Named in preview coverage |
| Lowanro City splits into distinct areas | Confirmed | Reported as Cathedral, City Streets and Nether Gate Lake, with foggy swamp, rooftops, sewers and a central bridge among its features. Note: "three areas in one map" is frequently misquoted as "three maps." They are separate claims |
| Final maps will be about the size of the test map | Confirmed | Miyazaki: map size is tuned to a balance window, and each map sits inside it |
| Maps are built vertically and deliberately lack strong route guidance | Confirmed | Miyazaki designed for three-dimensional traversal and for replayability over directed progression |
| The world layer is called the Lands of Dusk | Reported | Used in hands-on coverage |
| Warping exists on the map | Test build | Observed by testers |
| Map region markers show per-phase perks | Test build | Flame Virtue, weapon perks and bonus Kin EXP were observed |
Progression and customization
| System | Grade | What is established |
|---|---|---|
| Kin — summonable NPC companions | Confirmed | Summoned from glowing circles, stay for the rest of the match, come in combat and support types, level independently, and go on cooldown if killed |
| Sigils — role objectives that rewrite your backstory | Confirmed | Tabletop-RPG-inspired. Rival players are silently assigned passive Sigils that make them participants in your objective. Reported examples: mark a rival as your sworn enemy for bonus Virtue; find an old friend and ally with them; find your lost love, who is another player, and propose to them |
| Sigils will get more complex at launch | Confirmed | Miyazaki calls the current version deliberately simple and the system "quite expandable," and names "Fleeting Love" as a personal favorite role |
| Alliances between players | Confirmed | Prevent accidental friendly fire, last as long as both players agree, and dissolve automatically if both reach the final round |
| In-match leveling (HP, stamina, capability) | Test build | Testers reached roughly level 17–20 by the final phase when playing aggressively |
| Signature ability unlocks at level 12 | Test build | Confirmed by testers across multiple characters |
| Powers of Blood | Test build | Earned from Great Foes and Trespassers; effects such as continuous HP recovery or increased attack power; up to five can be stacked |
| Weapon upgrade crucibles exist | Test build | Testers report 2–3 per active zone |
| Affinity stacking is a major power spike | Player-reported | Five iron stacks reportedly made basic attacks dominant, and lightning stacks reportedly let Zork stun a player in two hits. Affinity could reportedly be maxed by Phase II |
| Two healing flasks, expandable via a special item | Test build | Consistently reported |
| No death penalty during Phases I–III | Test build | You respawn in an area of your choosing |
| Final customization depth | Unconfirmed | Miyazaki says the full game’s customization is substantially broader than the test exposed, without detailing it |
Live service, ranked and post-launch
| Claim | Grade | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Ranked matches, leaderboards and a seasonal system | Confirmed | Miyazaki confirms all three |
| Operational details of ranked and seasons | Unconfirmed | Miyazaki: still being figured out |
| Frequent post-launch updates for balance and content | Confirmed | Miyazaki: "We intend to frequently update the game" |
| Update cadence and season length | Unconfirmed | Undecided per Miyazaki |
| Minimal offline single-player content | Confirmed | Character customization, practice sessions and simulated eight-player battles, so players are not stranded during server maintenance |
| Systems letting skilled players benefit newcomers | Unconfirmed | Miyazaki floats veterans appearing as special allies, special powerful enemies, or triggers for rare events, but calls it "still only at the conceptual stage" |
| Post-launch content schedule | Unconfirmed | Explicitly undecided |
Commonly repeated claims the evidence does not support
"It’s Bloodborne 2, or set in the Bloodborne universe." No. Previewers reach for Bloodborne as a tonal comparison — grim Victorian streets, blood and moon motifs, faster combat — and one who calls it "a spiritual successor of sorts" states plainly that the two games "are not related in any way." No source claims a shared setting.
"FromSoftware is pivoting away from single-player games." Miyazaki rejects this directly. The Duskbloods is described as an outlet for multiplayer ideas that had no home, not a change of studio direction.
"It was greenlit to ride Elden Ring’s success." Development began in 2021, during Elden Ring’s production, and Miyazaki calls the post-Nightreign timing circumstantial.
"The Bloodsworn are vampires." The game avoids the word by design. Use "Bloodsworn."
"You can skip PvP entirely." You can skip it for three of four phases, and co-op and PvE-boss finales are confirmed to exist — but a fully PvE playthrough is confirmed impossible.
"The wheel motif is decorative." Miyazaki gives it a specific meaning, quoted in the story table above.
FAQ
Is The Duskbloods a battle royale? Not in the conventional sense. It shares elimination and a final confrontation with the genre, but progression runs on Virtue rather than on kills, and you can advance through most of a match without fighting a single player. The combination of PvE, exploration, objectives, temporary alliances and a final duel does not map cleanly onto any existing genre label. +
Is The Duskbloods a Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive? Yes, and Nintendo is a development partner rather than only a publisher. Miyazaki specifically credits Nintendo with help on balancing and on tutorials — an area he admits FromSoftware has historically handled by "just dropping players in and hoping they would figure it out."
Does The Duskbloods have a release date? Not in any source on this page. Treat any specific date as unverified until Nintendo announces one. +
Is The Duskbloods connected to Bloodborne? No. The atmospheric resemblance is deliberate, but the games share no story, setting or continuity, and the previewers who draw the comparison say so explicitly.
Can I play The Duskbloods offline or solo? Only in a limited form. Offline content is confirmed to be minimal by design: customization, practice, and simulated eight-player battles so that server maintenance does not leave you with nothing to do. The real game is online. +
Is The Duskbloods PvP-only? No, and it is not PvE-only either. You can reach the final phase without fighting players, and killing rivals usually awards no Virtue — but the final phase is a fight, with confirmed co-op and PvE-boss alternatives that were not in the test build.
Is it Elden Ring Nightreign 2? No. Different project, started earlier, different structure. The two share internal technology and lessons because both are online FromSoftware games from the same studio, which explains surface similarities such as the phase structure and map controls. +
Will there be a ranked mode? Yes. Ranked matches, leaderboards and seasons are all confirmed, with operational details still undecided.
Sources and verification
Fact sources
| Status | Source | Used for | Checked |
|---|---|---|---|
| Official | Nintendo product pageNintendo of America | Nintendo Switch 2 exclusivity, 2026 release year, Bloodsworn wording, multiplayer action, and up-to-eight-player description. | |
| Official | FromSoftware debut announcementFromSoftware | First-party announcement for The Duskbloods and its Nintendo Switch 2 release plan. | |
| Official | The Duskbloods official network test noticeFromSoftware / Nintendo | Official test eligibility, application period, selection timing, download-code timing, five PDT sessions, eight-player test limit, and network-test goals. |