Dying Light 2: Stay Human

2022 has a lot in store for the gaming community.  Beginning in January the games start dropping with major titles such as God of War, Monster Hunter: Rise and Rainbow Six Extraction, but they keep dropping as if a collective breath has been held by the majority of game studios for the last two years, all in preparation for 2022.

Well, we are finally here and today we want to take a look at Dying Light 2: Stay Human.  A game that has sparked a lot of chatter across the internet here lately when they announced that the game would be over 500 hours long. 

The initial tweet claimed:  “-that to fully complete Dying Light 2: Stay Human you will need at least 500 hours.  Almost as long as you would need to walk from Warsaw to Madrid which would take 534 hours.”

They have since released a series clarifying tweets when that news was met with massive backlash of gamers unhappy about the daunting 500 hour estimate.  They explained that the 500 hours was referencing a 100% completion of all the game’s side quests and exploration.  They went further by saying that the game is designed for players with different gameplay styles and preferences to explore the world how they see fit. 

This answer neglected to satisfy the curiosity of the Twitter mob and another clarifying Tweet was released where an estimate of 20 hours was given as to the amount of time it would take to complete the main storyline.  They didn’t stop there.  They gave another estimate of 80 hours to complete the main storyline along with all of the game’s side quests. 

This leaves 320 hours of content that are neither related to the storyline or the side quests, which begs the question; 320 of what exactly?  There is a lot of speculation surrounding this question.  Many are worried it will be hundreds of hours of filler and fluff just so Dying Light could boast about their 500 hours of gameplay.

It’s a legitimate concern.  People are saying they would rather have a polished 20 hour game over something like this with, what would appear to be, an abundance of open-world fluff.

Now it doesn’t all sound bad.  By all accounts the designers of the game have been incredibly ambitious in the scope of their sequel.   The developers have stated that their focus will be centered around story and choice with branching paths that offer the potential for radically different outcomes and replayability. 

The distinguishing point here is that you can play any game for 500 hours, if it’s worthwhile.  I don’t think there’s a reason to believe this game won’t be worth it considering how long it’s been in production.  Although, I tend to be an optimist when it comes to video games. 

We shall see.