After the success of its Silent Hill 2 remake, The Bloober Team is now looking to shake things up with Cronos: New Dawn, a survival horror title that brings some unique twists to the genre’s familiar trappings.
With its release date inching ever closer, this new title is all set to bring a chilling new world and story for its players to enjoy, even as they remain acutely aware of potential dangers that lurk around every corner.
If that sounds exciting to you, here are fifteen things you should know before you decide to pick up a copy for yourself.
1. A Unique Story and Premise
As its title suggests, Cronos: The New Dawn brings an element of time-travel to its survival horror gameplay loop, placing you in the shoes of the mysterious Traveller, who works for the equally murky Collective.
Tasked with the retrieval of key figures from 1980s Poland, where an event called The Change devastated most of the world, you must navigate desolate streets and ruined buildings in search of your objectives.
Making things more complicated is the presence of monstrous beings called Orphans that are a direct result of The Change taking place. It’s a great way for The Bloober Team to introduce a touch of sci-fi to its ambitious new title, and the setting works well to convey the tension that the studio is attempting to build up.
2. A Slower-Paced Gameplay Loop
Recent gameplay showcases from the developers indicate that this is not a title that encourages you to go in all guns blazing. Indeed, that approach is likely to spell out certain death for the Traveller, considering how the Orphans tend to burst out of their nests with little to no warning, or hide behind corners waiting to ambush you.
You will need to take things slowly, carefully considering your environment and looking for potential ways to gain an advantage against any monstrosities that decide to make a meal out of your Traveller. Even the game’s combat reflects this philosophy. More on that in a jiffy.
3. Clever Environmental Puzzles
Navigating what remains of Poland in Cronos’ take on the country in the wake of The Change means carefully creating a route to your destination, with some of the survival horror genre’s common obstacles in your way. There are gates that require you to find a code that lets you through them, or perhaps a couple of fuses to power them open.
However, the game’s time-travelling mechanics are soon brought into the fold, with several points where you reconstruct crumbled walkways being a part of the showcase. Those puzzles are likely to get more complex as you progress further in the adventure, making good use of Cronos’ innovations in ways that challenge you.
4. A Strategic Approach
The game’s slow pace is further accented by the need to approach its environments quite strategically. With limited ammo at your disposal and threats likely waiting to take you down at every turn, where you fight is as important as how you fight.
And by that, we mean that you could try luring an Orphan to where there are explosive materials for you to shoot, ensuring that your bullets are put to good use instead of having to use more of them to take it down. Your other tools are equally limited, requiring you to think very carefully about which encounters you should take on, and which ones you would rather avoid if the situation allows you to.
5. The Merging Mechanic
An important reason for trying to avoid risky encounters comes from the Merging mechanic, in which downed Orphans can be consumed by others, allowing them to become dangerous hybrids that are likely to cause you a lot of problems in the field.
The Bloober Team’s creative chops are on display here, and while some of you might prefer the added challenge, most of us would probably want to ensure that we burn the corpses of Orphans we take down lest those very corpses serve as the reason for the Traveller’s untimely death later down the line.
6. Weapons and Upgrades to Suit Your Playstyle
While the Traveller must be careful as they navigate the scary world that Cronos places them in, that’s not to say that they are not entirely helpless. The Bloober Team has been quite enthusiastic about providing you with options when you find yourself threatened by the Orphans, with a variety of weapons that you gradually uncover as you go.
There’s even an option to generate flames from your suit when you need a breather or to incinerate a corpse in a pinch. If all else fails, you could always let your fists do the talking! Nifty upgrades could also add a layer of functionality to your loadout, such as the weapon-mounted scanner that lets you see how much health your opponent currently has.
7. Terrifying Enemy Classes
Those weapons are sure going to come in handy, considering the many terrifying enemy types that the developers have created for you to take down. There are Runners who like to quickly close the distance and come at you with melee strikes, while other Orphans stay out of range and pester you with their attacks. The Bruisers tank a lot of damage while dishing out some of their own, while Doppelgangers currently come with a classified skill set.
There are “special” enemies too, and of course, the Merging mechanic could mean that you could find yourself facing down deadly combinations of Orphans that mix and match their abilities, intent on sending your Traveller back to their timeline.
8. Excellent Level and Audio Design
One thing that stood out to us during the previews is how each level is designed to build tension, backed up by a very well-implemented soundtrack that operates in the background to great effect.
Even though we weren’t actually playing the level on our screen, our hackles were definitely up as the Traveller entered new areas, and even jumped at the sight of an Orphan that chose to pull off an admittedly brilliant jump scare.
9. Exploration Is Key to Your Success
In Cronos, you are encouraged to go off the beaten path to try and uncover as much of the world as you possibly can. Finding NPCs, potential upgrades, ammo, and health drops, and perhaps even shortcuts that make backtracking through hostile areas a bit easier are all crucial parts of the experience and should not be neglected.
You’d do well to explore as much as you can, although you might want to be careful about taking on every Orphan that happens along.
10. Recruiting Survivors
An interesting facet of your journey in Cronos is the fact that the Traveller is going to find survivors of The Change out in the world, and gets the option to recruit them to the cause after rescuing them. While the rewards for doing so are currently a closely guarded secret, the developers have confirmed that there is a “gameplay element” to these rescues.
According to The Bloober Team, they are a part of your journey and contribute to the overall experience.
11. Your Choices Carry Weight
In an interview with WCCFTech, the developers clearly state that your choices carry weight during a playthrough, confirming that there is no coming back from certain decisions and that you will have to replay the game if you want to see what happens if you pick another option.
That could mean a lot of replay value for Cronos: New Dawn, especially with the next couple of entries on this list.
12. Multiple Endings
With branching paths to take based on your choices, it’s no surprise that multiple endings have been confirmed for the game. That’s a great addition considering the unique story that Cronos is offering, giving you a reason to dive back in once you roll the credits.
It also helps that each of these endings comes with its own pros and cons, with even the developers being on the fence about which one they would choose, apparently.
13. New Game Plus Confirmed
The presence of varying consequences for your choices and multiple endings for the game is made even better by the addition of a New Game Plus mode. While details are scarce about what you get to keep from your previous run, the developers have confirmed that there will be difficulty modifiers for those of you who want to test their skills even further.
14. A Switch 2 Version Is Available On Release
Nintendo Switch 2 owners will be glad to know that the game is available to play right off the bat, with a physical release matching other consoles on 5th September, 2025. While details about how it will perform on the new console are currently unavailable, expect it to run at 30fps on medium to low resolution settings when compared to its counterparts on other platforms.
15. System Requirements
Speaking of other platforms, if you’re planning to experience Cronos: The New Dawn on your PC, you might want to know what specs The Bloober Team believes you should be running. The minimum requirements include Windows 10 x64, an Intel Core i5-8400F, Intel Core I5-8600K | AMD Ryzen 5 3600,16 GB of RAM, an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080, or AMD Radeon RX 5700-XT, or Intel Arc A770 graphics card, DirectX Version 12, and 50GB of storage.
A recommended setup includes Windows 10 x64, an Intel Core i7-10700K | AMD Ryzen 5 3600X,16 GB of RAM, an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 3080, or AMD Radeon RX 6800-XT, or Intel Arc B580 graphics card, DirectX Version 12, and 50GB of storage.
And that’s a wrap on everything you need to know about Cronos: The New Dawn. Will you be picking up a copy? Let us know in the comments below!