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Dying Light 2 ‘guarantees’ 5 years of DLC post-launch

The dead don’t sleep, and neither will you...

Updated: Jan 18, 2022 2:07 pm
Dying Light 2 ‘guarantees’ 5 years of DLC post-launch

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Dying Light 2: Stay Human developer Techland has high hopes for its Action RPG zombie-parkour sequel. As the studio has revealed that they intend to continue producing content for the game for the next 5 years.

Rage against the Dying Light

Coming shortly after the reveal that Dying Light 2 will supposedly include over 500 hours of playtime at launch – which was itself poorly received – you would be forgiven for feeling a little nervous staring down the barrel of a game that demands your attention for 5 years or more.

The developers having a plan to produce content over this timeframe shouldn’t necessarily be cause for alarm, however. Industry giants Bungie started with similar long-term goals for Destiny, and managed to turn the game’s shaky launch into steady success and a sequel to boot, proving that Dying Light 2’s half-decade plan can be done well. In addition, the overwhelmingly popular launch of Final Fantasy 14 Endwalker has shown that a game can even grow its player base exponentially over such a span of time.

(Living) dead on arrival

On the other hand, not all games have been as successful in this arena. In fact, story-focused live service games with RPG elements – intended to keep producing content over a long period of time – have fared significantly less well recently, which could be a bad omen for Dying Light 2. Marvel’s Avengers, initially expected to coast to success on the back of the MCU’s cinematic dominance, was instead a significant disappointment that cost publisher Square Enix a great deal of money. Time will tell if their own long-term plans will get to play out. But given the much more positive response to the shorter, self-contained single-player Guardians of the Galaxyincluding here at WePC – it feels more likely that Square Enix will simply cut their losses and focus more on that style of content.

Bioware’s Anthem is another live service game that was intended for a long lifespan. But it was ultimately unable to be salvaged through a proposed reboot and ultimately cancelled. The fallout from this was so bad that the developers of the upcoming Dragon Age 4 have had to clarify on multiple occasions that the game will be singleplayer only (though that may not always have been the case.) It seems that for the moment, gamers are tending to favour experiences that are tailored towards their limited time. Which is at odds with publishers attempting to recoup increasing development costs for big-budget games through retaining player engagement long-term.

A Dying Light in the darkness

Techland are setting admirably lofty goals for themselves with Dying Light 2. If the initial 500 hours really does just turn out to be the tip of the zombie-berg,; and the game manages to hold players’ attention for half a decade after that. Then Dying Light 2 could go down as one of the great epics of its medium. If it falls short and the content is spread too thin however. Surviving those 5 years may leave its most dedicated players as weary as a rooftop runner with a horde of undead in pursuit.


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