Techland's new open world zombie title Dying Light released today, and we've been putting hours into the game's several modes since getting our hands on a review copy last night.
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I've personally spent the most time playing cooperatively through the campaign, and have come away feeling generally very positive about the experience. Worries about negative parallels with Dead Island washed away the longer I played, though they certainly share some similarities in setting and style.
In many ways, Dying Light feels like the game Techland wanted to make the first time around with Dead Island--a spiritual, next generation sequel not bearing the franchise's name. The general idea is the same--survive in an open area filled to the gills with zombies--but the experience is very different.
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First, a few thoughts on the general mechanics. The parkour gameplay is as good as advertised--you really can climb and jump to wherever you need to go in Dying Light, and it's all handled fluidly with a few buttons. It takes a brief learning period, but you'll soon be smoothly swinging from ledges and hauling yourself onto rooftops. What's more, this mode of transportation is actively encouraged by the game, and it's very frequently a better idea to run away than stand and fight. You move pretty quickly when sprinting, and will find yourself leaping off makeshift ramps and through the city with ease. The game is also very attractive visually (I'm playing on PS4), another example of what next gen-only games can accomplish. The character models and textures are good, the lighting in particular looks great, and load times are minimal.
Combat is a little less robust than the climbing and jumping, mostly offering just the ability to simply kick and swing your weapon, but it feels satisfying to beat down on zombies in the early game. There are plenty of skills to unlock that let you do more, such as slide into enemies off a sprint and vault over their heads. Character progression on a whole looks promising, and there are some abilities I can't wait to unlock. The weapon repair system--a mechanic I dislike in almost every game that employs it--is frustrating, and will constantly have you replacing your arsenal. Having to babysit weapon durability is only irritating, especially when items in Dying Light can only be repaired a certain number of times, and you'll hesitate to use your favorite weapons as it means they're one swing closer to becoming defunct.
While I still have the vast majority of the game left to play, I've sunk enough hours into the campaign to get a feel for how it works alone and in co-op. The game is good when playing on your own, allowing you to hack through zombies and upgrade your character as you progress through the story but is definitely made even better when playing with a friend (it supports up to four players). You can set your game to public, private, and friends only as you play, and someone who fits the filter can pop in at any time. The same campaign instance you were playing continues on if someone joins, and your progress is saved for singleplayer continuation.
In Co-op mode, you can take missions or start cutscenes when both players are close enough (it's not very forgiving about the distance, and does make it a bit annoying to pick up quests since you have to be together), and then travel out into the bigger world at whatever proximity you'd like. You can move through the streets as a unit and watch one another's backs, fighting off clustered zombie groups and shouting out the locations of hidden loot and supplies. Dying Light actively encourages friendly competition though your travels, as well--it's fun to race to your objective by creating your own route, and the game actually creates a mini-game for this scenario. You can join in on a prompt, and it turns your objective marker into a finish line and sends you and your friend(s) off on open world race. There are other variations of this as well, such as collecting the most loot or killing the most zombies within a time limit, and they're entirely optional.
The story in Dying Light isn't anything special--zombie plague, some government involvement, opportunistic villains--but it's not particularly bad. The dialogue is pretty generic and the characters are not overly memorable other than for fulfilling their purposes as talking heads that give you missions. There are some pretty cliché archetypes, and it's a bit disappointing (but not altogether surprising) that Dying Light will not be helping to push the narrative envelope.
So far, a game that's clearly focused on purely fun, multiplayer gameplay shines in that regard. I should stress that it's still worth playing by yourself as far as I've played, but the whole survival experience is more fun when shared with a friend. There's plenty left of Dying Light to explore, but the overall concept and general gameplay mechanics seem to have succeeded so far, and the opening hours have been very enjoyable.
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For more on Dying Light read our impressions of the Be The Zombie multiplayer mode and stay tuned for a full review as soon as possible.