Hound13 released a trailer today (the 1st) for its upcoming open-world action RPG, 'Dragon Sword: Awakening,' introducing the new hero, 'Dana.'

'Dana' is the youngest member of the Red Fox Mercenaries and an alchemist. She possesses a unique mechanic that allows her to summon an ice golem named 'Chako' using frost energy to fight alongside her. The trailer shows Dana summoning Chako from thin air to slam into enemies, followed by Chako mimicking Dana's motions to launch coordinated attacks. Other scenes demonstrate various combat styles, such as Chako spinning in sync with Dana’s staff movements to deal frost damage to all surrounding enemies, or launching ice shards at targets.

Alongside the trailer, Hound13 published its content plan for the second half of the year and answers to user questions from a recent livestream on its Steam page ahead of the July 23 launch. Following the release, four new heroes will be updated sequentially, and these characters will be provided for free via updates rather than as paid DLC.

The first character to be introduced is 'Liza,' one of the six heroes of Orbis, who specializes in electric shock damage. She features a unique mechanic where she teleports to the location of her thrown spear to continue the fight. Following Liza, three more characters will be released sequentially: 'Jerome,' a character specialized in 'down' attacks who uses a massive greatsword despite his small stature; 'Veronica,' who specializes in stunning enemies by switching between bare-handed combat and firearms; and 'Logan,' who is specialized in tanking with a shield. The release order will be finalized after internal discussions and announced later.

In the second half of the year, the developer will also update 'Hero Requests,' which cover stories of heroes not explored in the main plot, and a 'Rift System' that allows players to travel to other dimensions through rifts appearing across the world to engage in combat. The Hero Requests will begin with Othello’s story, followed by Liza’s. Furthermore, the developer announced broad improvements to convenience features mentioned during the CBT, including combat controls, controller support, camera and jump adjustments, a photo mode, and a help system.

The team also addressed questions regarding editions and DLC. In addition to the Standard Edition, which includes the base game, a Deluxe Edition will be available, featuring the game, a digital artbook, the soundtrack, and an exclusive 'Valiant Hatchling' familiar. Images of five costumes and several familiars to be sold as DLC at launch were also revealed. The developer added that there will be approximately 30 familiars at launch, with two-thirds obtainable in-game and one-third sold as DLC. Additionally, Calien’s costume will be an in-game hidden element rather than DLC. Future updates will also include swimsuit costumes for Reina and Astria, among others.

Finally, the development team compiled and answered questions from the livestream on their Steam page. Regarding in-game monetization, they emphasized that the game follows a package-game business model with no gacha or microtransactions other than costume and familiar DLC. The Deluxe Edition is priced at $49.99, though they are considering a launch discount. Domestic pricing will be announced later, reflecting exchange rates and other factors. As this is their first Steam release, they noted that limitations on pre-purchase functionality make it difficult to offer pre-orders or disclose pricing early, so the game will be available for purchase on the July 23 launch date. To compensate, they plan to provide the 'Abyssal Direwolf' familiar for free to all users who purchase the game by August 31.

There are several character costumes prepared beyond those currently revealed, and a separate costume roadmap will be shared later. A feature for small groups to explore villages together is being slowly reviewed as an R&D project, but there are no plans for player-to-player trading or shop features. There is no functional difference between paid and free familiars; regardless of how they are obtained, collecting the same species of familiar unlocks and enhances abilities such as stamina reduction. Regarding character acquisition, the developer stated that all 19 characters will be obtainable after launch either directly through quests or by combining a material called 'Nameless Soul.'

Dragon Sword: Awakening will launch on Steam on July 23, and further information can be found on the Steam page.