Johnnysworld

Zombies ya’ll.

I loved Dying Light. I beat it twice. Probably one of the best zombie experiences I’ve had in a game, combining parkour, survival aspects, and a great cooperative experience.

Well I was excited when the news broke of a sequel coming up. It feels like it’s been forever since the E3 reveal, but we finally have 26 minutes of crispy gameplay with my reaction/summary below.

This might seem dumb, but I don’t like how they’ve revealed your character is infected. I feel like it would’ve been cooler to find out come play time. Anyways, on topic.

This game looks freaking good. I actually said that last sentence out loud while watching the video. Graphically, it’s really impressive what developer Techland is managing to pull from current generation consoles to make such a remarkable looking city. I think the first game looked good, but this is miles better. It makes me wonder if this will be part of the last group of games for consoles before we jump to the next generation. Minus the blood though; it looked like paint especially when he lands on the human at the 4:51 mark.

Another note I wanted to make is that while watching this, it reminded me of Mirror’s Edge (not the sequel). The fluidity of the moves, the blur you get while running, landing and doing a roll to soften your impact: it all looks fabulous. I loved Mirror’s Edge (fun fact: I got the Platinum trophy for it on PS3 because I loved it that much), and I think that’s why I’m loving the way this looks.

There’s a lot of cool new gameplay additions they’ve showed off in this video such as the ability to turn mods on and off whenever you want. I like that, and I hope it makes the weapon more durable (I don’t know if that makes sense or not). We also got a glimpse of the grappling hook that can be used in combat or just to swing around like Spider-Man. Another cool addition is the paraglider which will definitely be needed since the city looks huge. It could definitely help with avoiding any platforming mistakes.

Sequels tend to change the formula a bit to make the game better and deeper. Dying Light 2 is no exception as we are shown dialogue options and told how your actions impact the world around you. The end of the video is pretty cool at illustrating the consequences of your actions. I feel like a lot of games go that way and sometimes fail going in that direction. It’ll be interesting to see if Techland can capture that feeling and deliver that consistently throughout with rival gangs and factions warring over the city opening up a ton of possibly cool side quests and narrative angles.

Like I already mentioned this looks damn good, and definitely something I won’t miss out on. If this is how this generation of consoles ends, I think it’ll be a fitting ending to a great generation.

Dying Light 2 is scheduled to release Spring 2020 on the PS4, Xbox 1, and PC.

P.s. I hope co-op is in there and sick as heck.