Getting into the military-controlled ‘dark zone’ to rob some high-end electrical equipment sounds like an easy job. In theory, you could be in and out in minutes, gliding through a locked multi-level car park with a series of beautiful slides and slides to grab your treasure before breaking through the fence and running away. But there was a problem: the lights were off, at this particular depth. The zombies are very strong here. Special banshee-like cries are designed to alert their brethren to the presence of any intruders, sending a relentless wave of rotting flesh plunging at you, all teeth and claws. claw.
So this task requires more dexterity. You need to use all the agility and poise you have mastered Dying Light 2The parkour’s impressive ‘n’ open world city, sure, but you’ll also need to gear up skills on it, picked from the new toolkit Techland has to offer.
Lead Game Designers Tymon Smekta & lstrok; a explains: “We were intentionally working on stealth quite a bit. “In Dying Light, we aimed to make a game where we could put a challenge or a problem in front of you and you could solve it with the environment. Stealth isn’t one of the options you can use to deal with that, really, in the first game. ”
Smekta & lstrok; a is correct. Dying Light gives you a range of creative ways to problem-solve your way out of tough encounters – parkour, ranged weapons, melee, or an outrageously overpowered grappling spring lol – but both being deadly and stealthy never seemed possible. If you try to get past some squirming undead, you might hit your head against a wall. For players like me, that’s not ideal. “We really wanted to add another module, another set of options, for you to consider when thinking about how to fix what we’re throwing at you,” Smekta & lstrok; a continued. And that’s evident when you get to grips with stealth in Dying Light 2.
“We really wanted to add another module, another set of options, for you to consider when thinking about how to fix what we’re throwing at you.”
Probably the best measure of success for how stealth works in the game is when you’re trying to sneak against an infected versus trying to fight a human. Trembling zombies help with good aim practice if you’re a barefoot archer, thanks to their habit of standing around (even if some of them like to tuck their little heads between their legs when they’re resting, perform an impossible killing blow). It’s not too difficult to sneak into a zombie’s lair – but mess up your route and you’ll be in their horde, easy and extremely vulnerable prey.
“The entire mechanic goes into the ‘dark zone’ and tries not to wake up [the infected] up… it’s a little bit different, and that’s what we’ve had in Dying Light 2 from the beginning,” said Smekta & lstrok; a explain. “But we also knew that we wanted to give you the opportunity to interact more with humans, both in combat and in dialogue, so that’s a big part of our development schedule – in animation. , programming, everything – is devoted to making the operation stealthy against human AI as well as the undead. ”
Humans, on the other hand, are smarter, tend to have better eyesight, and in the preview build I played, the AI was a bit smarter (though that element of the game in general leaves a lot to be desired). desire). However, thanks to some distraction techniques you can use that appear to be very ‘inspired’ by The Last of Us II, you can distract your human enemies and steer them away from humans. your intended path – or into a trap. Smekta & lstrok; a doesn’t try to hide that inspiration. “Hearing you mention the similarities to The Last of Us II,” he says, “is like “poured honey in my ears,” as we say in Poland. We have intentionally worked to create [the stealth] feel like that.”
The game’s (much improved, more detailed) sound design also focuses on this renewed stealth feature. Smekta & lstrok; a explains that the first game’s approach to noise is extremely simple: “make noise, attract propagation”. In Dying Light 2, it’s less primitive. “There’s a whole system involved in noise, which governs how different enemies react to them, how powerful those responses are, and how they’re prioritized when they overlap,” he explains. It’s hard to script, he said, but hopes that stealth becomes more useful and possible.
To test the responsiveness of this new sound system, I played through a dark area full of zombies in two separate ways. First, I did it the ‘right’ way, all hidden and quiet, looking for specially infected headshots and spawning in range before using the kills in the close range. silent war against the undead chain; a method of cleaning each area. It’s all very steamy work, very clinical, and the highlight of my practice with the game. On my second run, I ran in, picking up my torch, seeing flashes of claws and fangs darting at me amid heavy swings of my impromptu mace (mostly crafted from a road sign). ). I was dead within minutes.
You could say Techland wanted to make this game, at least in part, a stealth lover’s dream. While it doesn’t have the same tactical focus as Metal Gear Solid, or Thief’s particularly complicated hide/hide mechanics, it still stealths better than most open-world FPS games of its time (here’s how I’ve seen it). you, Far Cry). A lot of the satisfaction in taking out or taking out enemies lurking by a slew of unseen enemies comes from Dying Light 2’s more nimble skill trees, which Smekta & lstrok; a – the creator of the first game’s impressive RPG cum action interpretation system – is keen to address in the sequel. He wasn’t satisfied with some skills that were multipliers based on stats. “For the second game, we wanted every skill to be almost game-changing,” he said, “to give you a new opportunity that you can love and play with and experiment with.”
Smekta & lstrok; note that Dying Light 2 has been very purposefully designed with systems, skills and techniques in mind. The game builds on a multitude of moving parts designed to interact and compliment each other. “It is a game that rewards players who are creative and experiment, find their own solutions, and can make connections between different game systems,” he explains.
Maybe my loud, hard-hitting attempt at clearing that damned parking lot would have been a little more successful if I had quietly gone in first, using the precision shooting I’d unlocked with my bow to picks out higher priority targets, then shouts towards the end of the skirmish, jumps off the back of a stunned zombie and slams my impromptu mace at a group, before sprinting to Preserve what little of my life is left of me.
When the full game comes out on February 4, 2022 (that will happen, Smekta ła assures me), maybe I’ll get a chance to fix my bugs and play the Smekta & lstrok; a vision: using stealth as just an arsenal tool, and weaving it into everything else the unforgiving city of Villedor taught me. Finally, clearing out a car park can be as easy in practice as it is in theory.
