Dying Light 2: Stay Human Hands-on Previews

Whether Dying Light 2: Stay Human launches in February 2022 or gets delayed again, Techland’s zombie survival RPG is already in a more or less playable state. And as a result, we can now check out a number of hands-on previews and learn what to expect from this project. Let’s start with IGN’s video preview:

Then watch the one from Game Informer:

Moving on to text previews, let’s once again start with IGN:

The fluidity of movement is just one piece of the puzzle. Dying Light also stands out among other similar zombie survival games thanks to its brutal melee combat, which feels mostly the same here in the sequel. Speaking with Tymon Smektala, lead designer on Dying Light 2, he told me that one of the goals this time around was to combine parkour and combat so that players wouldn’t just run to an encounter, stop, kill all the enemies, and then continue on their way. To that end, one of the earliest abilities you get in Dying Light 2 is the ability to vault off an enemy and drop kick another in the face, sending them flying. Unfortunately, I didn’t get deep enough in the combat skill tree to really say how successful Dying Light 2 will be at accomplishing this specific goal, but nevertheless, combat seems impactful, action packed, and loaded with a ton of creative options thanks to an expansive arsenal of moddable melee weapons, craftable tools, and upgradeable skills.

Followed by Game Informer:

With relatable characters, all of whom are convinced their way is the way to do things, navigating the decisions and aligning with the characters of Dying Light 2 can feel all the more gut-wrenching. However, the most striking part of the narrative is how much more personal protagonist Aiden Caldwell’s story is in Dying Light 2.

“The central question of the whole game is about who Aiden really is,” narrative director Piotr Szymanek says. “That’s the question that he asked himself: Why is he so skilled? Why is he stronger than other people? Why can he do what no one else can? He thinks that the answer to this question is his sister, whom he remembers from the past. During the past years, he was looking for her and suddenly he finds the trace of her in this village in The City where Dying Light 2 Stay Human takes place.”

Then, there’s also PC Gamer:

It’s possible those choices add up to something bigger, and they certainly can affect who lives and dies as the results of some quests. In the few hours I played I really only got to see one area of Dying Light 2’s massive city, and thus only a small part of its overarching story, so it’s possible there’s some genuinely compelling character stuff later on. But I doubt it—every conversation I had was overwrought and amusingly melodramatic, and my decisions often led to jarring changes in the tone of a conversation. At one point I swear I was trying to convince someone we needed to stick together and help each other, and two lines later they were trying to convince me that we should work together. O…kay?

Eurogamer:

What’s really impressive about our time with Dying Light 2, though, is how Techland’s made a world that’s really rewarding to explore. The deeper story options make for a richer world, and a better sense of the catastrophe that unfolded beneath the rubble as well as the struggles of those still trying to piece that world together. It’s got back some of that rough charm of Dead Island that wasn’t such a big part of the original Dying Light, and it takes it to some interesting places too. It might be coming up to seven years since the original for Techland’s follow-up to finally release, but if our hours with Dying Light 2 are any indication it’s going to have been well worth the wait.

And WCCFTech:

Much like the first game, Dying Light 2: Stay Human’s parkour is the main way to stay alive among the landscape of zombies, volatiles, and human antagonists alike. Melee weapons make up the majority of Aiden’s arsenal, from makeshift weapons of both one-handed and two-handed varieties as well as a bow, the sole ranged weapon I could discover in my brief hands-on session. Numerous thrown weapons also rounded out the abilities to include throwing knives and molotov cocktails, which were perhaps tuned to be a bit too effective in the demo. Environmental objects such as spiked traps and thrown improvised javelins give some extra fighting power but only pop up from time to time throughout the densely populated open world. While Aiden’s skill tree was much a work in progress, some additional powers such as a beefy jump kick to launch zeds off rooftops or straight into those spike traps.