Following the launch of Dying Light: The Beast, we got some insight into the game’s development from Tymon Smektala, Franchise Director at Techland, including how the team applied the lessons that they’ve learned from Dying Light 2: Stay Human.
To be exact, a Dying Light: The Beast media briefing happened in Bangkok a few days ago, and there, Smektala talked about what’s in store for the game and the series in the coming weeks. Plus, Smektala also shared some interesting details about the game’s development in a roundtable Q&A.
Before that, Smektala first talked about how happy they are that The Beast got a “very phenomenal” response. Thanks to The Beast’s success, the Dying Light series has now reached more than 50 million players. Given this success, players can expect more content in the coming weeks, including the rollout of features such as New Game +, Legend Levels, and the Nightmare Difficulty Mode. Other smaller features are also in the pipeline, including a set of very brutal finishers, a number of new variable animations, and more.
Smektala also highlighted the new PUBG Mobile x Dying Light collab. This crossover started on October 15, and it added the World of Wonder Mode, featuring elements from Dying Light. With this collab, PUBG players can fight zombies from Dying Light, as well as get cosmetics and other weapons. By the end of the month, Dying Light players can also expect to see PUBG Mobile goodies get added into The Beast, including the iconic frying pan and other weapons/cosmetics.
After sharing the upcoming features and the new collab, Smektala answered some of the Asian media’s questions. Many asked about The Beast’s development, especially given that it was originally a DLC pack for Dying Light 2: Stay Human, a game that drew mixed responses from fans of the first game. In light of this, the team took community feedback to heart during The Beast’s development.
Smektala explained:
“[Dying Light the Beast] is the culmination of the 10 years of our adventure in the series. And why we decided to basically look at everything we have done so far and put the best of everything. We took some risks, we took some steps that took us away from the Dying Light formula with Dying Light to Stay Human.
What we realized we wanted to change too much and too early, and were not being prepared for that. We realized (unfortunately, after launch) why those weren’t the best steps because of how the community reacted. We took every lesson from the first two games and took the best ones and listened to our community about the not so good ones – where players were telling us: this doesn’t work, we don’t want that in a Dying Light Series.
It’s very important for us as a studio to approach this community-driven process. For us, we don’t think it’s our game. When it’s released, we share the game with millions of players, and they have the same stake in the game as we do, so that’s why we try to listen to our community.”
As we noted in our review, The Beast had some notable improvements compared to Dying Light 2. The most apparent change is the fact that nighttime feels much harder, at least compared to the state of nighttime gampelay during the launch period of Stay Human.
While Dying Light 2 eventually got updates that made nighttime more difficult, the initial experience turned off a sizeable number of players. As such, the team’s focus on The Beast was to make Night scary and difficult again.
Smektala shared their approach as:
“I think we also understood that the Night is (one of the) most important things of Dying Light. If you remove the night part and how it changes the rules of the game, you just have another zombie game. Then it’s not that much different from any other zombie game, but if you add the night experience that we have, which, again, changes the way you play the game–which is the most scary, most tense, most exciting experience of the game — this makes Dying Light, Dying Light.”
We looked at the player data of the first game, and we realized that more than half the players are skipping the night part because they’re saying, ‘it’s too scary, I cannot play [it]’, so for Dying Light 2, we had to make it…a bit, maybe not easier, but a bit more accessible. That means changing the rules of the Night.
It wasn’t exactly the same as the first game, and what we realized is our players are telling us, ‘hey, this isn’t as scary, this is not as tense as the one that we remember. We don’t want this easy Night, we want a hard Night.’ And what we realize is that even if players don’t play the [harder] Night, they want to know it’s there. They want to have that feeling that maybe one day I will be brave enough, and strong enough, and develop my character to face the Night. That’s why we decided to make the Night again super scary, super dark, super challenging in Dying Light: The Beast.”
This is an interesting thing that Smektala said, as it’s always challenging for any developer to interpret data and feedback. In this case, while it made sense to make Night easier because not a lot of people are playing it, it turns out that isn’t the case, as a difficult and scary nighttime has a sort of psychological effect that enhances the experience.
In this regard, the team over at Techland definitely succeeded when it came to The Beast. The game went back to the scarier night part that fans of the first Dying Light game love. On top of that, they even brought back the previous protagonist, Kyle Crane.
When asked about why they brought back Crane, Smektala answered:
“Bringing back Kyle Crane is an emotional challenge, almost like a personal challenge. Because we know that we’re offering our players the return of a character that they loved 10 years ago.” In the first Dying Light game, there were multiple endings that you could choose from. Kyle’s return in the 3rd game cements a specific ending as canon. But to decide on that placed such a huge risk on the studio. To help reach that decision, the community was invited to have a proper discussion on what makes Kyle so special so that the devs can have an informed decision with the character’s revival in the 3rd game. This is crucial, not just from a narrative perspective, but how Kyle returns also changes the game mechanics of Dying Light: The Beast.
Again, community feedback was a key factor when it came to Crane’s return. Given this, coupled with the fact that The Beast is a nice return to form for the series in a way, we’re sure many fans are excited about future series entries.
Speaking of the series’ future, Smektala also confirmed that a continuation of The Beast is coming in the future. He stated:
“When it comes to the next game, [the] continuation of the Dying Light: The Beast’s story, I think what we have discovered is how important the building of a consistent and continuous game world is as a studio and a series. So for sure, in the future, there would be a continuation of Dying Light: The Beast. I don’t know what form that will it will take, or when it will happen. I’m not revealing that this is the next Dying Light Game, because we don’t know that to be honest, but at some point, definitely we will get back to those characters and this universe, and we will continue it. So if you like what we have right now, expect more of the good things in the future.”
Dying Light: The Beast is out now on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.