How do you know when a DLC is no longer DLC? This was the problem faced at that time dying light Developer Techland is working on the next entry in the long-running zombie combat parkour series. Expected to be the second major DLC in 2022 dying light 2now announced as a standalone version “Dying Light: Beast” This transformation was achieved through a process of disaster and inspiration.
When I asked Tymon Smektala his opening question; dying light”, he replied: “When it explodes. The word came up again and again in my conversations with Smektala, artistic director Katarzyna Tarnacka-Polito, and Roger Craig Smith, the voice actor behind the scenes. dying lightReturning original hero Kyle Crane.
This explosion started with a whimper. In the process of developing the next DLC, the game’s community may have been overly enthusiastic in discovering and leaking details about the narrative plans, undermining the developers’ intentions and triggering internal rethinking. Along the way, people fell in love with the idea of completely changing direction and bringing back the original heroes from 2015 dying lightKyle Crane ended the game in some unfortunate circumstances. “It’s an adrenaline boost, an injection of something powerful into our arms,” Smektala said. [and] Almost overnight, everyone had a lot of ideas for things we could do, things they really wanted to do as a tribute. Then it exploded.
While this all reads like pretty standard chit-chat that developers would say to the press when doing PR for a game (you’ll see the same story on a dozen other sites this week), it doesn’t come through in the text. Passion to deliver everything in depth. As I chatted with the team, shortly after watching the game for about 20 minutes, both Smektala and Tanaka-Polito were in tears, pausing to catch their breath, their enthusiasm palpable.
With the team moving away from leaked and spoiled releases of new content in favor of new Crane-centric projects, it was finally agreed that the content they were producing was no longer DLC. beastKline returns as a complete game after ten years of being imprisoned and experimented on by mad scientists. Over 18 hours, it’s hard to argue.

Crane has been through a lot in the ten years he’s been absent. Exactly, he’s being kept secret on purpose and appears to be a large part of the game’s plot, but what we know for sure is that he was the victim of horrific experiments in which scientists tried to splice him with zombie DNA. In light of events at the end of the year the followingwe can safely assume that one possible ending involving a nuclear warhead is no longer canon, but the other, more tantalizing, is that the Crane has reason to be compatible with this destroyed gene.
As a result, he is now able to enter Beast Mode, where his abilities and skills are greatly suppressed. This was demonstrated in a boss fight that started with dark soulsand ended with an unfair game street fighter. At first, Crane is removing debris from the behemoth Infected, dashing around and avoiding its massive, bashing arms, chipping away at its health. As it summons other zombies to help, the fight begins to become overwhelming, at which point the Tech Park demonstrators choose to use Crane’s (limited) beastly powers. At this point, the fight takes a completely different turn, with Crane taking chunks out of his enemy, picking up giant chunks of concrete and throwing them at his enemy’s head, quickly dispatching him. This will definitely change players’ approach.
It is worth adding that the displayed beast It also doesn’t look like an overly bulky DLC at all, in large part because of the huge strides made in fidelity. dying light 2 is a beautiful game, but beast It’s on a completely different level. This is largely due to the extraordinary new weather effects shown off in my hands-off demo, with a downpour making me feel more a part of the world than I’ve ever seen in a game before. Then, what surprised me even more was that the rain did not stop like the traditional game way, God pressed the switch, instead, the rain started to slow down, some blue fragments appeared between the clouds, and then everything slowly cleared up . The team told me it’s a dynamic game, capable of introducing weather outside of scripted moments at will.
It’s all about giving the new valley location a unique feel, following the sunny weather of the previous games. It has a Pacific Northwest feel, a misty autumn world still brightly lit by the sun but prone to storms, which adds a gloomy feel that feels appropriate given the dark nature of our characters. “The same goes for sound,” adds artistic director Katarzyna Tarnacka-Polito. “I think the sound of rain will add a lot to the experience.” Again, when I convey this to you, I hear this sound like a detail that fascinates developers but rarely troubles players, but Tana Ca-Polito certainly underestimated the impact. When it rains, it affects all sounds in the game, muting the impact and everything is re-recorded appropriately. It’s a detail that gamers are unlikely to consciously notice, but, in the same way that David Fincher’s film feels more sombre when shot through silver gelatin, it has a significant aesthetic impact.
“Our audio department is crazy,” Smektala said. “When they were recording battle sounds, they would take chunks of meat that were hit with many objects. While we were working the following [the expansion for the first game]set in a more open area, they were recording what they call “sounds of silence” in a field, so absolutely crazy guys. Every aspect has changed and evolved.
“I don’t know if you noticed in the demo,” Tarnacka-Polito added, “but the rain sounds different depending on where you are. If you’re standing knee-deep in water, or if you’re In the woods, it sounded completely different. I wasn’t expecting it!

previous place dying light The game really focuses on the series’ signature parkour, seeing you jump from rooftop to rooftop before engaging in terrifying melee battles with infinite hordes of the undead, beast It also looks like there’s an attempt to mix it up, with the demo showing Kyle utilizing environmental elements (lighting oil blocks to burn them and then connecting them to generators to replenish power) while trying to capture a room full of zombies, as well as some commands Amazing FPS shootout. The developers are keen to suggest that this isn’t a huge change, but rather an extra element for fighting heavily armed human enemies that control large bases. They have firepower, so once you take it away from them you can use it with the joy of freedom, something that wasn’t possible in previous series that relied heavily on you improvising from the junk you found around you weapons. Despite these moments of bullet-like levity, Techland also stressed that this would mark a return to the original game’s more survival-focused nature rather than dying light 2A more generous, easier approach.
Oh, and now there are vehicles too! Given the studio’s experience in the racing genre, series prior to 2010 such as FIM racing circuit and extended rallyit’s an addition they feel comfortable with, but again to be clear this won’t drastically change the way you play. We were told that driving was a dangerous option, fuel was extremely scarce, cars were highly vulnerable, and the likelihood of breaking down in the worst possible place was very high.

But one thing hasn’t changed, and that’s Kyle Crane’s voice. Roger Craig Smith, who took on the title role in 2015, is a well-known voice. he is batman Arkham Originsmirage apex legendEzio is Assassin’s Creedand most importantly, he’s Sonic in almost every way Sonic (except movies) for the past ten years. His agreement to return to play a character he thought was gone forever was crucial to the entire project, considering how things ended a decade ago. To Techland’s relief, he was ready. In fact, he was happy to do so.
I’ve learned over the years that voice actors are unlikely to have played the games they’re playing, and asking questions can lead to awkward situations. But here, Smith soaks in memories of playing the original dying lightpassionately recalls the moment Crane climbed up the massive tower, the wind began to whistle around him, and how he experienced a sense of vertigo. “I actually felt sick to my stomach. I realized how high my status was at that moment. Even he was excited about making this game.
Kyle Crane we met beast As mentioned before, he is not the same person and it is important for everyone involved to demonstrate this through his voice. After some early recording sessions, Smith said Smektala gave him feedback that it wasn’t quite right yet. He didn’t name names, but said he’s worked with other studios whose direction was nothing more than, “Yeah, do it like you do!” “It’s not a service to the fans,” the actor said. So it’s always great to be a part of people who are passionate and committed to getting things done.”
Did he go into beast mode in the studio? He laughed and said yes, and talked about the joy of making the transition, adding, “You can only go there so many times before your voice is ruined. So we were very strategic in how we conducted the sessions, and we said “Hey, this is going to take a lot of effort. Are we being a beast? Well, we’ll save that for last.”
He’s not the only one happy to be back. Tanaka-Polito looked at Smith and said, “When we made the game and played it over and over again for hundreds of hours and heard your voice in my head for so long, when I first played it again When I heard your voice, after so long, it was [gulps] so powerful.
It’s fun to be in a room with developers who are sincerely promoting their games. At an event like Gamescom, you’ll meet a lot of developers who go through the motions, saying PR-approved statements until your allotted time slot is up, and then doing it over and over again throughout the day. Maybe I was lucky enough to meet them earlier in the week, but their enthusiasm was so obvious and contagious.
It’s too early to say whether this will translate into the gaming experience. It’s all very hands-off, and while it looks impressive, a lot will depend on whether the game maintains the key sense of flow and fear that made the previous games so worth playing, while adding so much more new elements.
But what’s impressive is that those who bought the Ultimate Edition dying light 2 Find the answers without paying. Even though the game is a variation of the DLC it once was, Techland still respected the original intent of the project and made it available to these customers for free, a move that wisely avoided a nasty disaster.