Dying Light Review

Lately you heard or read a lot of reviews about Dying Light. That is the reason why we want to do it another way. First of all we would like to say, that this game deserves a large test because it is huge and it takes a long time to get through.

The first time we heard about Dying Light, we thought: “maaaaan another Zombie-Game?” After we played the game for a while we have seen that IT IS A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT ZOMBIE-GAME. And we think it is great. The polish studio Techland released a game that has created his own genre between the DayZs, Left 4 Deads, Dead Islands, H1Z1s and other horror survival games. The mix of fast action, overall existing horror and the wish to survive fits great together.

Dying Light has not a deep story but it keeps you playing so that you want to find out what is really going on. The game puts you in the shoes of Kyle Crane – an operative sent to the Middle Eastern city of Harran, where an unknown infection triggers aggressive and cannibalistic behavior in its victims, turning them into flesh-hungry monsters. Your objective: infiltrate the quarantine zone and locate Kadir Suleiman, a high-ranking military officer gone missing. However, from the very start your mission goes sour, and you soon find yourself in the midst of a desperate fight for survival.

Like we said, the story is not the one thing that turns Dying Light into A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT ZOMBIE-GAME. The game surprises you with its gameplay mechanics, which are not new, but have proven themselves. Most people would say at this point, that the game is similar to games like Dead Island, but we think that the parkour mechanics and the more powerful zombies, who come out at night, give the game an action boost and a great feeling of ‘paranoia’. What do we mean? From the first moment we fell in love with the great atmosphere, we love jumping from rooftop to rooftop, from broken car to broken car and to fight our way through the zombie hordes. Especially at night we wished we had diapers on. That is the moment when the shadow-hunters appear and we felt that they are always straight behind us. We can only take a short breath after we reached the safe zone. WELL DONE Techland.

You do not have to fight every zombie in Dying Light while you running through the damaged city that looks amazing. As we said, the parkour mechanics push the dynamics in this game. That is the reason why this game is not so ‘sluggish’ like for example Dead Island. The controls are great for a first person game like this one. The verticality of this game is a great way to freshen up the genre and it is surprisingly not frustrating. Most people would say at this point, the game reminds you of Left 4 Dead. We think, that the game is located between Dead Island and Left 4 Dead. The reason for that is, on the one hand you get into a great flow with all the running and jumping after playing for a while and on the other hand your are able to shoot with different weapons. We noticed that the developers did not focus on the shooting mechanics. That is the reason why the mechanics cannot compete with other games in that genre. Because of that we decided focus on close combat weapons.

You have to pay attention. The Zombies are not alone most of the time or even in majority and you have to take care of your stamina. In the beginning you cannot hit zombies more than three or four times successively. After that you have to retreat to take a breath. So we are beginning to ask ourselves: “How could Kayn pass the exam to get the job at the GRE?”

Anyway it is important, that the weapons you use have to be repaired after using them. It is great that you do not need a special station to get this done. If you have the materials with you, repair them! If you take the time to look around thoroughly you will find enough weapons to use. BUT: On the other side, one of the weapons you can use for example is a hammer, A Hammer, A HAAAAMMMMMMER. How can a hammer break after killing a couple of zombies. I mean, that thing is made of steel, OF STEEL!! And zombies are just dead humans with bones, BOOONNNEEESSS. Ok, we want to mark it as ‘Designers Freedom’. But that is the reason why we are asking ourselves: “Why should we update our weapons? Players can only repair them a couple of times. After that the weapon is not available anymore.” We think weapons should last longer and should be harder to find in this game. Because of that, we missed the personal connection to the weapons and did not take the time to care about them or update them. But it keeps the player moving to search for a new one.

Besides the main quests, which kept us busy for more than 20 hours (We played slowly to enjoy the great graphics and atmosphere), players are able to do some secondary tasks in Harran. It is great that you will not be annoyed of them. They are only shown by a small popup on the map. These side-missions are for example errands for survivors or setting things right at some spot of the city.

Like we said, you can find a lot of loot in this city. Most of the loot is inside locked cars or in hidden crates, which are locked, too. As you known it from games like Fallout, Assassins Creed or The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, you can open them in a mini game with a picklock, which provides variety in this game. We also told you that players are able to escape from zombies into safe areas. But before you can enter them, you have to conquer this area. To do this you have to close the door, kill all zombies inside of this area and turn the power on. Players are able to store collected loot there or sleep through the night in these camps.

We have to honestly say once again, that the mix of running, shooting, fighting is great. On the one hand there is the sad side that most missions are similar to others, but on the other hand there is the amazing atmosphere. The agile Zombies, the worn down weapons and the constantly low stamina keep the players moving.

Luckily we will not be weak for a long time. Players collect XP in Dying Light, according to the tasks they do. These points can be used for three separate skill trees: Survivor, Agility and Power. You get Survivor XP for finishing missions, Agility XP for running, climbing and Power XP for smashing zombie skulls. The greatest update is the grappling hook. With this you will get through the open world of Dying Light faster. Leveling gives us the feeling of growing up with the character.

Generally what is the difference between the single- and multiplayer. First of all, we think that the singleplayer lays more emphasis on the survival components, the Co-Op-Mode gives us more of the fun components. While you are playing Co-Op you will joke around more and you will try some experimental stuff. It is easy to switch from singleplayer to multiplayer-mode in every safe zone. Players are able to play all Campaign Missions together after switching to MP-Mode. The missions are getting easier and it is more fun to search for loot with people.

Unfortunately, we had to find out that there are less zombies in the Co-Op-Mode and that there is no opportunity to exchange items with one another. Players who would like to join the dead side can play as a Zombie in the “Be the Zombie”-Mode. This mode give players the opportunity to be really quick. You can also use the two tentacles to jump over long distances and kill humans with only one hit.

From the visual point, the game just looks terrific and definitely belongs on the list of the most beautiful zombie games. Okay, most buildings look the same, but the high level of detail in light effects, a great looking sun and shadow effects help to feel the well done atmosphere. The weather effects and the switch between day and night are realized very well and they give the players a visual variety of the gaming world.

The soundtrack fits well to the atmosphere, but we have to think about the fact, why that many people have a russian accent while the game takes place in Turkey. Anyway the sounds of smashing bones, weapons etc. are superb and especially the screams at night gave us a feeling of being hunted.

All in all, Techland built a great game that thrilled us for several hours. Because of the great implemented Parkour running, which allowed us to run, jump and climb very fast and smoothly, the fighting elements and with the paranoia feeling, this game is full of action. If you take a look at other reviews, every time they nag at something. In this game there really is nothing to nag about so we can definitely recommend Dying Light to you. Well done Techland.