ProbablyMonsters is getting closer to shipping its next two games as it announced a September 2026 release for Crimson Moon and early 2027 window for Nekome: Nazi Hunter.
At the Summer Game Fest, I got my second chance to play Nekome: Nazi Hunter and my first to play a preview of Crimson Moon — two games coming from ProbablyMonsters.
These games are focusing on gameplay and story, but they share a common thread. Both are relatively low-budget games, created by veteran teams at ProbablyMonsters as part of a pivot. The company raised a lot of money started out making big games like Concord with triple-A ambitions, but as the game market slowed, Probably Monsters shifted to games that could be built by small teams in about 18 months or so.
These two fit that bill as double-A games, and you can tell in part by the artwork, which is heavily stylized and does not attempt to be highly realistic. They’re both original games but they play very different. Much of Nekome’s combat is stealth knife fighting with Nazis, while Crimson Moon is a fantasy game where you fight in unforgiving duels with demons.
Gameplay preview for Nekome
The most disorienting thing of Nekome is that it has cartoon-style art that seems like it might be suited for a comedy or kids game. But the blood flows all over the place. It doesn’t surprise me, as the game director is Jeronimo Barrera, who previously worked on the bloody and mature Grand Theft Auto series. Still, there’s a disconnect for me, as I would have expected such a serious story to have a realistic art style. This demo was different from the one I saw at GDC in March.
In the opening scene, a Nazi commander gathers his staff and calls them the finest officers in the Reich. They’re gathered for an elegant dinner and are unarmed. The hero of the story is dressed as a waiter. He closes and locks the doors. The Nazi spews his racist propaganda and our hero pulls out a knife, stabs the commander, and then proceeds to kill all of the officers in the room. Some run away, some fight back with punches, but the knife slays all. It’s like a scene out of Quentin Tarantino’s revenge fantasy, Inglorious Basterds, but in cartoon style.
I spent most of my time playing Nekome, where you play as a young Romani man named Vano Nastasu during World War II. Set in early 1941, this single-player action game sends players from New York to Nazi-occupied Europe in a personal odyssey of revenge, as Vano pursues Hitler’s Hyenas, a pack of Nazi soldiers who brutally murdered his family. Players venture deep into enemy territory to scout routes, plan their assaults, and strike with precision in a mix of stealth and brutal up-close combat to earn every kill.
The preview flashed back to the beginning. Vano works in a butcher shop where there are a lot of knives, but a Nazi soldier comes in and stabs one of his family members to death. Engaged and grief stricken, Vano pursues the thug and stabs him to death.
But he doesn’t stop there. In the next scene, Vano goes through the town and seeks out any Nazi he can find. He breaks into a headquarters building and starts killing the Nazis one by one. You have to be patient as the guards move around and it’s easiest to sneak up behind them and stab them. If you get into a fight, then it’s harder, but you have the advantage of moving faster with your knife. Your enemy can block you and fight back. But if you stab enough times you can stun your opponent and then close in for the kill. A single button push will finish off the kill in a cinematic and bloody execution.
If this type of gritty hand-to-hand combat and firehose of blood disturbs you, then this is not your game at all. There is a variety of approaches you can take. You can take out multiple enemies in a fight, but you have to be wary of the types of soldiers who can call for reinforcements or pull out guns to take you down. There are multiple paths to take and if you run into a cluster of soldiers, you can choose to take an easier path. I died a few times, but during my 30-minute demo I was able to stab dozens of Nazis.
I think it’s well done, but I’m not sure how gamers will react to the contrast in the visceral gore and the cartoon style. I think the team also needs to work on the timing of the combat, so you don’t have to push buttons twice in order to know that you’ve correct hit the right button.
There’s plenty of time to fix those timing issues in the fighting before the early 2027 launch.
“It’s a gift to be working with such a talented team to bring Vano’s thrilling, cinematic, and propulsive tale of revenge to life,” said Game Director Jeronimo Barrera, in a statement. “Nekome: Nazi Hunter is designed around meaningful combat and the strategic orchestration of violence, and we can’t wait to unleash players when the game releases in early 2027.”
Nekome: Nazi Hunter is also available for wishlist on PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.
Crimson Moon demo
Crimson Moon is a fantasy game set in a cathedral, Sanctus Clypeus, as its central hub. You use the place as your base and upgrade your character and your weapons to gain a variety of weapons, abilities, armor sets, and more. You can upgrade your character on two sides: your human form and your angel form. You can switch between the two easily.
I went through a couple of missions, exploring a town that has been taken over by various demons, undead, vampires and corruption. The zombie-like characters were easy to dispatch with my sword. I went from room to room, exploring and picking up loot. I could swing my sword at barrels and destroy them, but they often didn’t have anything to pick up. It’s a shadowy and dark world, but still full of color. And yes, the most prevalent color is red. The environment is meticulously created, but you can seen during fast movement that it’s not really meant to look pristine and realistic.
The deeper I got into the mission, the tough it got. It took multiple strikes to bring down an enemy, but group of them closed in on me. I had to be careful with my strikes, parries and dodges in order to avoid bosses and mini-bosses who carried heavy weapons that could take me out with a single hit. That meant that fast movement was the key, as well as remembering your angelic powers at just the right time.
Crimson Moon is a Gothic High Renaissance action-adventure RPG built around intense, replayable missions. Players will take on the power fantasy of the Nephilim — half angel, half human — and battle their way through the besieged city of Gildenarch using combat that blends brutal precision with deep character progression.
The game is built to scale, with solo slayers getting a satisfying single-player experience, while co-op turns every encounter into a shared onslaught of power and resilience. Players can bring a friend to the fight to unlock devastating synergies that amplify their Nephilim’s abilities. Co- op enhances intensity and strategy without slowing the pace, making every encounter feel larger and more dynamic. I played it in single-player mode.
“Crimson Moon is inspired by the team’s love of classic fantasy, gothic horror, and metal music, all funneled into one epic action-adventure RPG, and we built it so friends can experience it together,” said ProbablyMonsters General Manager and Game Director David Lesperance, in a statement.
He added,“With our release date around the corner in September, players won’t have to wait long to embody the Nephilim and start their journey alone or with their best head-banging buddy through demon-infested streets and towering cathedrals.”
I didn’t face off against the bosses, but they looked plenty difficult. Once you beat them, you get precious stones to take back to your sanctuary. I think players will like it f they come for the combat, rather than the art style. Again, the art is where you can tell this is a double-A title, and not a triple-A game.
One of the tricks: You’ll notice the heroes (and many of the villains) are wearing helmets, and so the art team doesn’t have to go through the struggle of making extremely realistic human faces. But I have no complaints about the overall art.
Let’s hope this one can also find its audience.
You can wishlist Crimson Moon on the PC on Steam and the Epic Games Store. It will also be out on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.