DISTRAINT Developer Reveals New Game Without a Dawn
Solo Finnish developer, Jesse Makkonen, has revealed details on his next title, Without a Dawn, a dark visual horror novel with distinctive pseudo-ASCII artwork. It’s set for release on PC on May 19, 2025.
Without a Dawn marks Makkonen’s first foray into the visual novel genre, and follows a woman as she seeks refuge in a remote cabin, only to find things aren’t as peaceful as she hoped. Plagued by weird dreams of a gasmasked man and strange images of a lighthouse, the protagonist begins to question what’s real and what isn’t.
“Without a Dawn masterfully immerses the player in introspection, intertwining psychological and philosophical elements to create a narrative that blurs the line between reality and fiction,” said Makkonen in a press release.
“In the dark stillness of the night, the silence has begun to take on physical form.”
Handmade Horror
Without a Dawn follows in the footsteps of the developer’s previous horror-tinged and atmospheric titles DISTRAINT (and its sequel), Heal, and Afterdream. Each game builds upon themes of dreamlike ambiance and incorporate side-scrolling, puzzle-solving mechanics.
Each of Makkonen’s games also come with notes on how they’re handmade with no cheap asset flips. Whereas previous titles have used hand-drawn and pixel-art graphics, Without a Dawn presents a unique ASCII-style look, with art made to appear as if animated from symbols and letters.
Player Customization
Without a Dawn will be released with a variety of community features already in place, so players can easily tweak and expand upon the game in meaningful ways. Among these features is the ability of the game to read and load language localization, create custom color palettes, and even load and read external audio files (so players can add their own voice acting, for example).
Without a Dawn is Makkonen’s fifth game, and is currently being developed for PC with plans to release on consoles at a later date.