Burning The Midnight Flesh

By Brian Koenig, Reviewed on PlayStation 4

The door swung open as I walked out onto the roof of a half-built skyscraper harboring the last group of survivors in the city. I looked up to the full moon and then gazed over to see my new-found friend sitting on the edge of the building — drowning his sorrows in cheap, warm beer. In the distance, beyond the walls of the quarantine zone, I could see the yellow lights from the nearest city twinkle. It was a breathtaking view, yet I all could think of is how warm and safe those people must feel. Sitting on their couches watching TV, eating a nice dinner with their families. They didn’t have to run from horrors that lurked in the night. They didn’t have to know the despair and pain that was growing inside of me. For that brief moment I was transported to a different life, and once I came back, I realized that I was in awe.

Dying Light takes place in the fictional country of Harran, a middle-eastern setting overtaken by a mysterious zombie plague. In this respect, Dying Light takes the zombie apocalypse scenario long since driven into the ground by both film and video game alike and leads it into some less-traveled areas. The game mechanics take the running from Mirror’s Edge, the climbing from Assassins Creed, the crafting from The Last of Us, the cutscene style from Far Cry 4, and the melee from Left 4 Dead. Put them all together into their own brew and tweak it just a little, and you have Dying Light.

To be honest, I had little interest in this Frankenstein concoction of a game when it was first announced. I wasn’t a fan of Techland’s previous game, Dead Island, and I simply saw this as it’s next-gen clone. However, my curiosity really got scratched when I saw Greg Millers Twitch stream of the game, and my excitement started to build. I’m happy to report that I am pleasantly surprised with how satisfying this game is.

You assume the role of GRE contractor Kyle Crane. He is sent into Harran to find one of the agency’s other assets and a file in his possession. Crane is attacked by thugs as he reaches the ground, and their fight attracts the zombie horde. Crane is rescued by residents of the Tower I mentioned in the beginning, and must aid them in order to gain their trust and complete his mission. The story itself is often aimless, and filed with clichés, but the expressive faces and decent voice acting make the story beats and cutscenes worth paying attention to. However, there are a few somewhat interesting characters, such as the siblings Jade and Rahim, to the sociopathic, murderous villain, Rais. I would have like to have seen more development with everyone but it’s forgivable.

The real highlight here is its parkour navigation. The controls do take some getting used to. These are oddly mapped to the shoulder buttons, and I couldn’t help but keep hitting the x button out of sheer habit. After a while, you’ll understand why they put the controls there and eventually running and jumping become as smooth as butter. You’ll spend a lot of time climbing low structures, two and three story buildings too, but there are specific places within Harran that tower above the city. And sometimes, when you’re lucky, you’ll need to get to the top of them. It gets even better when you unlock the grappling hook. Unfortunately, you don’t get it until you’re dozens of hours in.

The other notable addition is a day and night cycle which dramatically alters your chances of survival. Once the sun goes down, deadlier mutated creatures called volatiles are on the prowl, and they are both more tenacious and agile than the basic shambling ghouls. It’s best to avoid direct confrontation with their vision cones and slink around them. If you do find yourself in a purist, the best option is to RUN. You can hold a button to look behind you, see how close they are, and doing so can be startling when you see the incoming horde. You’re advised to take shelter in one of the many unlockable safe houses, but staying out doubles your XP, so you must pick your battles. Nighttime can be a harrowing experience, but there’s something deeply soothing about surviving a chase, then and enjoying an XP bonus for surviving the night.

The combat controls remain a little clunky throughout. As you progress the combat improves as you gain more stamina and better weapons. I advise you avoid combat when first out in the world as the zombies are resilient damage sponges, and you can easily become encumbered by a large group if you’re not careful. Worse yet, when you’re forced to fight men armed with assault rifles while you’re packing nothing more threatening than a table leg. It feels like you should be avoiding combat, but the linear missions force you into conflict. My solution to this. Herd enemies into tight corridors and chuck a few molotovs. Dying has it’s penalties, as you’ll loose a chunk of survivor points depending on how you perish.

Crafting is immensely statistically. The world is littered with materials ripe for the plucking. From these items you can make firecrackers, grenades, elemental throwing stars, night vision potions, stamina boosters, plus an assortment of damage and handling enhancements for firearms, and melee weapons. There are plenty of options for how you want to carry out or avoid combat.

With equipment being so important and so breakable, I had to make real choices about what to carry with me into the world. I also had to decide whether or not to prepare for the night or plan to always make it back to a safehouse before the truly bad things came out to hunt.

There are three upgrade trees — one for general survival skills, one for agility, and one for attack power. XP for each is earned inherently— so for every leap and climb, you add a few points to the Agility total, while the same is true of Power and every point of damage dealt. When you complete main and side quests, you level up your survival skills. It’s a nice way to handle progression ensuring even the most aimless jaunt serves a purpose.

In its best moments Dying Light rewards players for thoughtfulness, patience, and exploration, and they tend to manifest most in side quests that come with vague objectives attached. It feels great to not have your hand held by an objective marker, and Dying Light lets you simply do your own thing often enough. The city of Harran is dense and beautiful. Right when you think you’ve seen everything, an entirely new district unlocks. Thankfully these districts aren’t overwhelmingly large.

There is full cooperative support for up to four players throughout the game. While playing with others, the game will serve up miniature challenges which both encourage co-operation and competition. There may be a survivor in need of rescue, and the player who deals the most damage to the zombies threatening them will earn bonuses. It may be a race to the next objective, or a fight to take down one of the larger club-wielding brutes.

Similarly, there’s also Be The Zombie, a free bonus DLC mode which allows you to invade other player’s games as an advanced hunter mutant. In this form you can use tentacles to propel you through the air, as well as using your blood-curdling scream to reveal the locations of human players. They, meanwhile, can use UV flashlights to sap your powers, leaving you vulnerable to retaliation.

The Wrap Up

Don’t let concerns with Techland’s previous Dead Island games stop you from taking a chance on Dying Light. It’s got some great ideas and a great setting that bring new life to overplayed subject matter. The climbing and vertical navigation are in a class of their own. Best of all it did something a game hasn’t done for a while, it surprised me.

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