Dying Light
Review
I'm in love with an Al... Zombie
by Johnathan Irwin
reviewed on PC
Harran: Bloodied Jewel of the Middle East (cntd.)
My personal approach was often to stick to the ground. As such, my Power level went up much quicker than my Agility level. It’s not too hard to level up either of them, though it can be time consuming. There is a third stat tree to level up, called Survivor, which increases based on your actions in the story, side quests, and random events. It also levels up based on how long you survive without dying. During the night, the speed at which you gain experience for power and agility doubles as an incentive not to just run to a safezone and sleep until morning.
The way I played changed quite a bit when I found myself entering the game's second zone. I will check spoilers at the door but I can say that it caused me to rethink my strategy. It's a vastly more infected-populated area, it has many more interior environments and more heights to scale. My Agility level quickly caught up to my Power level. Utilizing the experience boosts during the night, I found myself using my wits and skills to not only outsmart the Volatiles but to pick off quite a few of them to boot. All the danger that accompanies the night was still there, but I had acquired the tools and abilities necessary to evolve the evening survival sessions into something far beyond hiding or running.
Infected
As exciting as that is, the day/night cycle does leave something to desire. Day lasts for a good amount of time, but night time is over in mere minutes. I would have preferred a more balanced approach, something more proportionate to our actual cycles. In the heat of the moment, it almost feels like the developers didn’t want us to play too much at night despite the game being called Dying Light.
A more pressing issue is weapon deterioration, which is far too rapid, even on high end weapons after applying durability upgrades. This wouldn’t be a problem if you were able to repair your weapon an infinite amount of times, but that’s not the case. It’s really frustrating when you consider most of the best weapons are bought from merchants for extortionate amounts. You could argue that it is a way to keep you from falling into the rut of using the same exact weapon forever but I’m just really going to miss my upgraded hatchet and katana when the time comes for them to go. Other, smaller issues exist like the few times where I have been pushed through the map due to a nearby explosion or when looting was impossible.
During the first few days, the game was plagued by numerous performance issues. A much needed first patch cleaned up almost all of them and the game runs smoothly ever since.
31 Hours Later
Despite those issues Dying Light holds up so well that I fell in love with it. Small wonder, as it blew away my expectations. I was walking into Harran expecting a slightly better Dead Island - at best. Yet what I found was what Dead Island should have been and what other zombie games should aspire to be. Dying Light is a meaty (pardon the pun) and infinitely playable game that will keep you coming back again and again. After committing 31 hours to my first playthrough, I'm now into "New Game +" and though it doesn't really add to the difficulty, the game is still as much fun as when I first started.
Dying Light just stepped up the game in a genre that has gone stale. Color me impressed. If you find yourself taking your own adventures in Harran, goodnight and good luck.
9.0
fun score
Pros
Fantastic setting, beautiful visuals, great blend of combat, stealth, and parkour FPS elements.
Cons
Story is too generic, night time should last longer, weapon durability is far too rapid.
