Dying Light 2 Dev: Community feedback has always been a core part of how we develop and improve our games - community-driven development is definitely an idea that makes a lot of sense for us. If your game is played by millions of players worldwide you have to accept the fact that it’s no longer yours and yours only.
Internally we’ve actually built a simple, but quite effective methodology of choosing which features to focus on. Our model analyzes feedback from multiple sources - social media, forums, direct player surveys, and in-game data tracking - to identify the most pressing issues and requested features. We then prioritize based on three key factors: impact on gameplay experience, feasibility of implementation, and alignment with our long-term vision for the game.
The community feedback is super important in the works of the upcoming Dying Light: The Beast as well. We treat this project as a culmination of Dying Light and Dying Light 2:Stay Human, we want to benefit from all of our learnings and advancements in tech and gameplay.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Yes, but nothing that I could call really serious - meaning none of these ideas made it much further than ideation or early prototypes, and usually the reasons weren’t actually a technical limitation. One of our most ambitious ideas was an even more reactive world - where factions would take over entire sections of the map in real time, affecting the infected population or how parkour routes evolved but it proved too complex and too similar to real time strategy games for our needs.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Like any large-scale AAA game, Dying Light 2: Stay Human had its share of challenges during development. Our goal was always to create a game that delivered on the core Dying Light experience - freedom of movement, intense melee combat, and an engaging open world. We’re obviously very proud of what we achieved, but at the same time we quickly realized that there were areas that needed improvement.
The initial release was successful in many ways - sales were very strong, and the game found its dedicated player base. However, we also recognized the valid concerns from both players and critics, particularly regarding some technical issues and elements of game design that felt too adventurous for our most hardcore community. Thankfully we responded to that in a meaningful, organized way improving the game in most key areas important to our players.
Dying Light 2: Stay Human gave us a lot of learnings - we gained a deeper understanding of what Dying Light is as a game series and how delicate is the balance of its parts. These insights have proven invaluable during the production of Dying Light: The Beast.
Dying Light 2 Dev: While working on Dying Light 2: Stay Human we discovered that balancing branching storylines is one of the most complex challenges in narrative design. From the beginning, we wanted choices to feel impactful, but we also had to ensure they didn’t fragment the experience too much.
We approached this by structuring choices in 3 tiers. First there were major world-changing decisions - like siding with a faction - that affect entire districts and gameplay systems. Second we had personal story choices which shape Aiden’s relationships with key characters. Then there were quicker moment-to-moment dialogue choices that offered some depth without drastically altering the narrative and gave players opportunity to self-express and role play a little. By structuring choices this way, we ensure that we have a quick way of checking if every narrative branch has enough “weight” behind it and offers a similarly deep experience.
This approach also made it easier for us to manage the work on the story and its implementation.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Definitely! Our parkour system was heavily inspired by real-world freerunners and stunt performers. We worked with professional athletes who helped us refine movement mechanics to ensure they felt fluid and natural.
One of our biggest inspirations was David Belle, the founder of parkour, whose movements and philosophy influenced the game’s traversal system and we were lucky enough to have him working with us in mo-cap and animation sessions. We also analyzed freerunning videos, obstacle course competitions, and even military training exercises to create a sense of momentum and flow that feels rewarding to master.
Dying Light 2 Dev: The Dying Light series has come a long way, evolving into a fully realized open-world survival horror action game encrusted with a number of deep systems. Over the past decade, we’ve learned a lot of lessons, big and small, too numerous to be called here. We realized that we’ve hit the bullseye with our initial assumptions - like choosing natural parkour movement, savage, visceral combat, and dual night & day gameplay experience as the pillars of the series, or with putting a lot of focus on player freedom and game world emergence.
We understood that the unique combination that makes Dying Light is actually quite delicate and we have to be very careful when tweaking the formula. We learned to know our players better and we’re more confident as developers. Those 10 years were a great evolution for Dying Light and I think it’s very much visible in Dying Light: The Beast, our upcoming, next game in the series.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Looking back, I think the night-time experience in the initial release of Dying Light 2: Stay Human could have been scarier. We made the decision to make the nights more accessible, mostly based on in-game data from Dying Light 1 that showed that a huge number of players were skipping the night part altogether. But when we released that “night-like” a number of our dedicated players felt that the fear and intensity of the first game’s night cycle were somewhat diminished.
Dying Light 2 Dev: To be honest it’s hard to point to any particular game tech. It’s true that the industry is constantly growing but there was nothing really groundbreaking in the last few years, mostly incremental progress and improvements. Of course you could point to AI, but, in my opinion, it’s not ready yet to support AAA game development in any other way as just a productivity tool that speeds up some of the processes.
Dying Light 2 Dev: It’s always a balancing act. It’s about evolving the game without losing what makes it special - we believe in listening to our players, but we also have to ensure that any additions align with the core Dying Light experience.
Firearms in Dying Light 2: Stay Human are a perfect example of this balance and back and forth between community feedback and our original vision. From the beginning, we wanted Dying Light 2: Stay Human to emphasize melee combat and resourcefulness, reflecting the scarcity of firearms in a post-apocalyptic world. However, many players - especially those who loved how guns worked in Dying Light 1 - kept asking for them to return.
At first, we were hesitant because introducing firearms risked shifting the gameplay away from intense, up-close encounters and parkour-driven combat. But as we listened to feedback, we challenged ourselves and realized there was a way to bring firearms back while still staying true to the Dying Light 2: Stay Human experience. This is a great example of how we balance player requests with our creative direction. We don’t just implement feedback blindly - we take the time to ensure that any additions feel natural within the world and gameplay systems we’ve built.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Zombie games aren’t as dominant as they once were, but I would not call the genre dwindling - they’re still there and they keep evolving. The genre has moved beyond classic survival horror experiences, dives into deeper forms of storytelling, experiments with various gameplay systems, tests boundaries with multiplayer aspects. But even if the pace of the genre slowed down a little bit I personally think this is a calm before the storm and we’ll see a lot of great games in it in the upcoming months and years. I hope the Dying Light franchise will remain unique in the field thanks to its blend of fast-paced movement, brutal combat, and a dual, night & day open-world sandbox. We see our series as a definitive, ultimate zombie experience - one that keeps evolving and growing while staying true to its roots.
Dying Light 2 Dev: We always welcome player feedback, whether it's praise or criticism, because it helps us grow as developers. We understand that some fans of Dying Light had certain expectations, and while Dying Light 2: Stay Human did expand on choice-driven gameplay, not every player felt that those choices carried the weight they expected.
Some of these criticisms are fair, and we acknowledge that there were areas where we could have pushed the narrative consequences further. At the same time, we also believe that Dying Light 2: Stay Human offers a unique and engaging world with a strong core experience. It’s all about balance - some players loved the story, while others wanted deeper consequences. But there’s no denying - and I think I have already touched on that a couple of times in my answers - we take all of the player's feedback seriously as we move forward with updates and future projects.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Yes, absolutely. Since the launch of Dying Light 2: Stay Human, we've worked on refining certain elements of the game, covering both gameplay and the narrative. While we can’t completely overhaul the game’s core story, we are always looking for ways to improve narrative immersion in Dying Light 2: Stay Human. We take these lessons into Dying Light: The Beast as well, making sure that the story feels personal, engaging, and impactful from the start.
Dying Light 2 Dev: We are fully committed to supporting Dying Light 2: Stay Human for 5 years since launch, and that includes continuous performance optimizations and bug fixes. We understand that some players still experience issues, and we are actively working to improve the experience across all platforms. Thankfully our post-launch updates have already addressed many technical concerns, but we know there is always more to do and performance improvements remain a high priority.
I’d like to use that opportunity to express our appreciation for the support, insights, patience and dedication of our community, we truly believe that Dying Light community is special.
Dying Light 2 Dev: There were definitely features that we were excited about during the production yet they didn’t make it into the game - but this is a natural part of the game development process which always incorporates elements of experimentation and testing. I don’t think we have anything really major left in the fridge to be brought back - even if the final release of Dying Light 2: Stay Human differs from some of our early presentations, the game stayed true to its core, initial assumptions and is very close to the vision we started the project with.
Dying Light 2 Dev: Co-op has always been a huge part of the Dying Light experience, and while we had some issues at launch, we've been working hard to improve stability and connectivity. Many of those initial problems have been resolved, and we've added features that enhance co-op gameplay, like new challenges, better sync between players, etc.
As for the second part of the question, our design philosophy for parkour was always about fluidity and freedom. We studied real-life freerunning techniques and collaborated with experts to ensure every movement felt intuitive and satisfying. Our goal was to create an experience where traversal isn’t just a means to an end but a core part of gameplay. Whether you’re scaling buildings, vaulting over obstacles, or chaining parkour moves and attacks together, we wanted it to feel seamless and exhilarating. That’s something we continue to refine and expand on in Dying Light: The Beast.