Techland’s Dying Light 2 - E3 2019 Impression

Techland has already announced Dying Light 2 to us last year and one of the big features they revealed was a narrative sandbox style gameplay. As you play, your decisions in-game will have massive consequences on the game from the environment to how the AI reacts to you which alter events along the way. Techland told us about how the choices you make manifest themselves within an immersive story. In a nutshell, the gameplay can affect the narrative story and the story can affect the gameplay based on your choices, so choose wisely. Techland then showed us a new part of the city which is in a new modern-dark age. The infection and the infected have also evolved in the game since the first Dying Light, and we also found out how to deal with new ways to cope with new challenges like combat and parkour which may hinder your progress in Dying Light 2.

Dying Light 2 does take place in a post-apocalyptic modern-dark age that is grim and primal but set within the boundaries of a modern city. There are buildings aching to castles throughout the city with familiarity to the modern-day buildings in the present—just aged—, and a society trying to survive at all costs. The city is divided into 7 sections and each has its own unique environment that boasts new parkour moves, new enemies, and new combat mechanics. The demo being shown was taking place in district two which has us seeing our first mission. This is where we get to see how our choices impact both the game’s narrative and the city in a dramatic way.

An emphasis on how your decisions will affect you and the gaming is real. Even if you don’t expect to run into anything that may have been your doing—ripple-effect and all—you’ll have to deal with it once you come across them. Techland also said that if you complete the mission stories and reveal hidden locations as well as killing important NPCs on side-quest, you’ll only uncover about 50% of the entire game...what?! That is huge! Another huge thing they did was incorporate more parkour moves in Dying Light 2 than they could have ever imagined in the first game. We can expect new offensive and defensive combat moves, new ways to traverse throughout the city, and they have also improved gear, weapons, and tools like the grappling hook and modes to your weapons. There are two big factions in the game, Peacekeepers and Scavengers, but there is also a lot of the community there as well. A lot of the community.

Dying Light 2 takes place 15 years after the first game and the infection that changes people into monster/zombies, has evolved. There will be newly infected to fight, new behaviors, and new ways to find them light using the new UV light mechanics. In Dying Light 2, your character is Aiden Caldwell, a survivor in the city where everyone is infected, including himself, and we were able to see him in action for the first mission in the game that is a crucial moment in the narrative of the game. We start in a tavern owned by our friend Frank, who believes that the Colonel and his group called the Renegades, are the only ones who can save their society because they’ve just about used up all of the water supply. The Colonel is said to have control of the water pumps to bring more water for the people but we don’t know what will happen as a meeting is about to be held.

Something goes array and the meeting turned into an all-out attack injuring Frank and you, Aiden, on hot pursuit to follow and secretly enter the Colonel’s domain to interrogate him and turn on the pumps. Of course, there is another group who are out to sabotage the Colonel and disrupt society as we know it. During this time, we are shown several new features which include your decision making and how it affects the story, to new parkour moves and combat system. You are able to pick up weapons and/or tools lying around on the ground to your advantage. For instance, grabbing another enemies makeshift sword/machete and using it to chop off their limbs and you can do this to all of their limbs if you see fit.

Once the fighting stopped at the initial meetup which turned sour, Aiden is then pursuing the assailants where we are shown new features for traversing the city via parkour moves. Most objects in the environment are interactive. You can climb almost anything, you’re able to have “far” jump and run on walls. You can even jump on and over the infected if you encounter them. Techland even added a parachute to the mix so you can glide from area to area, you can slide now which makes going into small areas easy and extravagant. Using the UV light when you encounter the infected really helps escaping areas of danger. You also still have flares to help out with that as well. In some areas, the walls are loose so you can run through them and piping you can balance walk on.

This is all happening as we are in pursuit of the truck that fled the scene of the attack on poor Frank. Aiden has finally caught up the truck in the most spectacular way possible, and now we are on our war to the Colonel island to get some answers. When we arrive at the island, we sneak in and find our way to the Colonel where we find out that he had nothing to with the sabotage meeting and Frank’s apparent death. Something is afoot and Aiden soon needs to fight his way out. This is where we got to see more of the combat system and it was great. With your opponent attacking you, you can figure out their movement and display a range of new combos and ways to kill the enemy, like picking up their weapons and using it for your advantage.

Throughout combat, you will also come across new types of human enemies, not just the infected. Some of these new types can have new weapons light a shock stick, rifles, snipers, and more. After completing the mission and figuring out the puzzles to turn on the pumps, the mission was compelted and due to its completion, new areas were uncovered and new enemies as well.

So, the first thing that did come to mind was if the player is able to go back and revisit those choices and possibly take a different route? Techland basically said that there is always to go back and if you decide to take different routes, your experience is going to be significantly different from what you experienced before. In order to have the best experience and if you want to go through all the routes that you can possibly take in Dying Light 2, you would need to play the game over and over and with that, the replay value for Dying Light 2 is very high and they feel that it will keep players busy for weeks to maybe months on end.

In regards to the story, Techland switched it up and have gone from an over-arching story for a game to playing a character and making your own story instead. If you were to compare other players experience to your own, it will be very different and that is something to think about. In addition to knowing more, we also wanted to know if picking up any weapon from an enemy is possible and if you can also upgrade those weapons as well? Techland told us straight up, Yes, and that the upgrade system in Dying Light 2 is more complex than it was in Dying Light. Crafting becomes a big part of the gameplay experience as it allows you to fuel your satisfaction of killing more monsters.