If you have a taste for zombies and post-societal breakdowns, you will want to check out Techland’s newly released gameplay video of Dying Light 2! This sequel maintains the same heart-pounding pacing, thrilling parkour stunts, and savage combat from the multi-award-winning original.
Turns out, the video contains Hidden Messages, and those who figure them out, could be rewarded with a Limited Edition E3 2019 Aiden Caldwell figurine. Run through The City with Aiden, find Hidden Messages, enter them here for a chance to win. There are three chances to win – three Hidden Messages, and three figurines.
Where It All Began (Spoilers for Dying Light 1):
The virus initially broke out in Harran, 2014. The middle eastern city was quickly quarantined in an attempt to halt its spread. Kyle Crane, the protagonist from the first game, was airdropped into the city and soon became enmeshed in the local struggle for survival. Between ravenous zombies and volatile warlords, simply stepping outside meant rolling the dice with his life. By the end of the game, Crane managed to save the city from being firebombed out of existence by the government and left us with the promise of a cure for the virus.
It seems that Crane’s efforts in Harran were not enough, though.
Where We Stand Now:
Set fifteen years later, Dying Light 2 follows Aiden Caldwell as he navigates The City; the last known bastion of humanity on this planet. While we do not yet know how the virus spread from Harran or how the cure failed, simply looking at the decaying cityscape gives us a sense of how far things have fallen. The hollowed out skyscrapers, crumbling chapels, and stagnant rivers are reminiscent of a dying Boston or Washington D.C.. Looking at this metropolis pocked with hollow ruins, it is like the city itself is infected with the virus, as its beauty has sloughed off like the ravaged flesh of the game’s zombies.
As Aiden struggles to survive and to make a better life for the The City’s citizens, we see a return of the old game’s beloved mechanics and some new features that ought to set this title apart from its predecessor.
Gameplay and Features:
Aside from a facelift to the graphics, Dying Light 2 has also touched up its gameplay. The parkour appears to operate more smoothly. Furthermore, the local inhabitants have implemented various devices and pathways to facilitate your free running. Among other things, you can now use lifts akin to those in Assassin’s Creed to reach rooftops or run on walls and jump between them to investigate new areas or evade pursuers.
The first-person combat has also improved. Fighting appears more crisp while maintaining its old brutality. For one, strike precision looks to have increased, as you leave visible wounds where you strike your enemies. In the previous game, you could still cut someone in half, for example, but it was inaccurate. While still satisfying, it made for comical moments when slicing horizontally could lead to vertically bisecting a zombie from head to coccyx. This time, when you strike someone in the arm, that arm comes off.
Also, even though the previous game frequently mentioned the infection coursing through your veins, the virus did little to influence gameplay. This time, though, the virus can have immediate repercussions on your abilities and where you can safely go.
Your Choice:
More than any of those, though, in Dying Light 2, you as a player have the power of choice! In the first game, you could not do anything to affect the plot or environment. This time, though, Techland promises that the player’s decisions will change the course of the story and the city itself. For example, our host in the gameplay trailer cites that “life is booming on the rooftops and this is something you can change by your actions and decisions.” This mechanic, although a fairly common feature in modern open-world games, has the potential to change the franchise’s tone and our gaming experience.
In other words, simply watching this gameplay sample was a joy. We can only hope that the game itself will live up to expectations upon release!
More About The Developer:
Techland is an independent game developer centered in Poland. Founded in 1991, this studio created the Dead Island and Call of Jaurez games. After that, they developed its critically and popularly acclaimed game Dying Light and its expansion The Following. For more information about this company of over four hundred hard working individuals, visit their official website here.
You can also follow them on Twitch, Facebook, Steam and YouTube!
