How Dying Light 2's day/night system completely transforms the city

Dying Light 2
(Image credit: Techland)

At the PC Gaming Show we learned a little about the world of Dying Light 2, which is set for release on December 7. One of the most interesting things about the city is how it completely transforms at night, and I sat down with a developer from Techland to tell me more about that.

"The night is the common enemy for everyone in Dying Light 2," says creative director Adrian Ciszewski. "During the day, everyone has their own agenda. You might hate one of the factions. But when night falls, everyone has one enemy: the Infected."

"When the night comes, the world changes completely. Humans rule the city during the day, but the streets are overrun with Infected at night. The floor is lava, basically. You should stay on the rooftops. If you jump to ground level, it's gonna be painful. You'll be pursued and encounter Screamers."

Screamers, if you haven't had the pleasure, are a creepy child-like form of the Infected, returning from the original game. Their screams disorient you and alert other enemies to your location. You can imagine how terrifying being spotted by one of these will be at night when the streets are crawling with Infected and you're at your most vulnerable.

"Night also brings interesting gameplay opportunities," says Ciszewski. "If you travel the world during the day, you're gonna see a lot of Infected in buildings—almost like I Am Legend—who are asleep. They're waiting for night to go hunting. So when they go out at night, they leave those interiors almost empty. And that's an opportunity for you to visit these places."

"The metro system is usually very populated with Infected during the day, but at night you can go there and explore more easily. You might find military containers down there. So the day/night system isn't just a gimmick, it's a part of the world. If a quest involves you going through an underground tunnel, waiting for night will make your life much easier." 

"Exploring at night is made even more complicated by the fact that you have this biomarker measuring your level of infection," he says. "Everyone in this world is infected. The more time you spend in darkness, the more the infection bar rises up. So you're not only managing time, but your infection level. But you can give yourself more time with food items or injections."

In a gameplay trailer released in May (see above) we get a brief glimpse of how things will play out at night. We see the dev playing the demo creeping through a dark subway tunnel, dodging the handful of zombies still lurking down there. You'll have to use stealth here to avoid being seen. Then they find a crate stuffed with high quality loot, which is your reward for braving the city's lower levels after hours. It looks incredibly tense.

Andy Kelly

If it’s set in space, Andy will probably write about it. He loves sci-fi, adventure games, taking screenshots, Twin Peaks, weird sims, Alien: Isolation, and anything with a good story.

Read more
The new action-RPG The Blood of Dawnwalker's protagonist, Coen, holding a sword and staring directly at the reader.
The Blood of Dawnwalker's design director explains the ARPG's time-as-resource mechanic, and how 'both action and inaction have consequences’
Atomfall Gamescom screenshots
Atomfall dev says Rebellion's open world shooter has 'some experimental stuff' that can have a 'huge influence' on the game world: 'It might work out. It might not'
Elden Ring: Nightreign
What the heck is Elden Ring: Nightreign? Our big explainer covering new characters, loot, roguelike mechanics and more
The Blood of Dawnwalker's antagonist vampire, Brencis, looking at the game's protagonist, Coen.
The Blood of Dawnwalker's creative director explains how the RPG's narrative sandbox works: 'the core of it is maximising players' freedom'
Zombies attacking
The OG Dying Light is giving away its first DLC in more than 4 years for free, and it's very shiny
A ferocious fish-man
Frogwares shows off The Sinking City 2's first in-game footage and launches a Kickstarter safety net: 'After 3 years of this horrid war hanging over our daily lives, we've learned to adapt'
Latest in RPG
KOTOR remake returns for annual tradition of reminding you it's still alive, but no you can't hear anything more about it until it comes back next year to say it again
Alligator skull with glowing eyes on human body and cords coming out sitting at piano with "The Norwood Etudes" ready to play
My new most anticipated RPG let me be a kleptomaniac gourmand set loose in a noir city on a quest to make 'the perfect sandwich'
Rise of the Ronin review
Rise of the Ronin review
Wyrdsong concept art
Wyrdsong, the RPG from ex-Bethesda talent, isn't dead—but it's no longer an open world: 'We're down to a skeleton crew'
A lolporrit squeals in excitement while being driven in a moon buggie in Final Fantasy 14: Dawntrail, patch 7.2.
Final Fantasy 14 patch 7.2's trailer has me finally hyped to get stuck back in—and to go to the moon and pilot some mechs, because why not
Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 barbers change hairstyle - Henry sitting on a horse wearing armour.
How to find a barber and change hairstyle in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2
Latest in News
KOTOR remake returns for annual tradition of reminding you it's still alive, but no you can't hear anything more about it until it comes back next year to say it again
Official artwork of Valorant showing the game's characters in a row
Valorant dev accepts there's too much random crap cluttering up the screen: 'The balance team generally agrees with this take'
Microsoft Copilot
A rather pleasing Windows 11 update bug automatically uninstalls Copilot and unpins it from the taskbar, which is jolly nice of it
Cognixion’s AI powered headset
New headset reads minds and uses AR, AI and machine learning to help people with locked-in-syndrome communicate with loved ones again
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang holding an RTX 50-series card.
92% of Nvidia users turn on DLSS... if they've been lucky enough to bag an RTX 50-series card at launch AND have the Nvidia App installed
A woman with an arcane slingshot uses it to light a distant fire
Deconstructeam's next game is about training to shoot a single fireball at an impossible target