Dying Light 2: Stay Human
Techland · RPG, Survival, Horror, Action
Overview
Humanity is fighting a losing battle against the virus. Experience a post-apocalyptic open world overrun by hordes of zombies, where your parkour and combat skills are key to survival. Traverse the City freely during the day, but watch the monsters take over during the night.
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It’s been 20 years since the events of the original game. The virus won, and humanity is slowly dying. You play as Aiden Caldwell, a wandering Pilgrim who delivers goods, brings news, and connects the few remaining survivor settlements in barren lands devastated by the zombie virus. However, your true goal is to find your little sister Mia, who you left behind as a kid to escape Dr. Waltz's torturous experiments. Haunted by the past, you eventually make the decision to confront it when you learn that Mia may still be alive in Villedor — the last city standing on Earth.
You quickly find yourself in a settlement torn by conflict. You’ll need to engage in creative and gory combat, so hone your skills to defeat hordes of zombies and make allies. Roam the city, free run across Villedor’s buildings and rooftops in search of loot in remote areas, and be wary of the night. With every sunset, monsters take control of the streets.
Fifteen years ago, humanity was devastated by the Fall — a catastrophic event that would change the world forever. With the Harran virus spreading around the globe, people quickly found out that all hope for tomorrow is lost. By 2036, only a few settlements remain, and humanity is slowly dying, making way for the new species out there — a horde of relentless zombies.
Welcome to Villedor, one of the last bastions of humanity. During the day, survivors still try to have a life here and find a false sense of normalcy. Relationships are formed, dreams are dreamed, and life carries on. On the surface, everything seems… fine. Until sunset, that is. With the last ray of light dying out, other, more dreadful, dwellers of The City crawl out of their gloomy interiors, taking over the streets. If you are not vigilant and stay out too long in the dark, you may never return.
Not all fights can be won. Sometimes it’s best to run and, thankfully, you have the skills for it. Parkour lets you escape when odds are not in your favor. Jump from rooftop to rooftop, swing across the cityscape, ride ziplines, and much more. Whatever you do, experience a unique sense of freedom as you freerun across Villedor’s buildings and rooftops in search of loot or while running away from the dangers of the night.
In a world as dangerous as this one, only the strongest survive. Whether you prefer to smash, slice or dismember those who stand in your way, you have to be creative about it to make it through. And who says you need weapons? Utilize the entirety of your parkour moveset to get the jump on your enemies. Learn the ways of combat and parkour to feel the crunch of skulls and slices of flesh as you swing weapons or use your moves to fend off any forms of danger. And let’s not forget that Villedor has weapons that put the most advanced post-apocalyptic armories to shame.
Surviving in Villedor is easier with friends. Team up with up to 3 other players and increase your chances out there. Unravel the story together, take on Pilgrim Outpost challenges, or simply wreak havoc on the city streets.
From the game's Steam store page.
THE GAMEQ VERDICT9,999 reviews analyzed
What players are actually saying
1. Summary
Players love moving through this city and are much less happy with nearly everything around it. Rooftop running, wall runs, the paraglider and the dropkick get more praise than any other part of the game, and dozens of negative reviews still say the parkour is good. The story, the characters and the frequent cutscenes come up in more of the longer reviews than any other theme, mostly in negative terms. Bugs appear in 28% of the longer reviews, and more than half of the co-op reviews mention them too. Half of the longer reviews measure the game against the first Dying Light, and those that pick a side call this one worse about four times as often as they call it better. One reviewer put the common position in one line: "Story is average but the gameplay is top notch".
A smaller group of players came back after years of patches and found a better game, some of them around the release of Dying Light: The Beast. Then, in June 2026, reviewers say update 1.28 cut most of the prologue, including the opening with Spike, and the reviews that week turned sharply negative. Beyond the parkour, players disagree. Fans of the movement call it the high point of the series, while players who came for Dying Light 1's tension, physics and story feel the sequel lost what made the original work.
2. What keeps coming up
What players praise
Parkour and movement across a vertical cityHigh
Movement comes up in 44% of the longer reviews, and praise for it (20%) outnumbers complaints (7%) by roughly three to one. Players single out the flow of chaining wall runs, vaults and slides, the height of the Central Loop skyscrapers, and the parkour music that swells as you speed up. Even among negative reviews, dozens name the parkour as the part that works. "This is a parkour game with zombies, not a zombie game with parkour," as one reviewer put it, and another summed up their whole verdict with "the best part of the game is travelling to the objective, not doing the objective."
Players coming straight from Dying Light 1 are the main critics. They call the jumps floaty, complain that Aiden grabs the wrong ledge or ignores inputs, and say the parkour only feels good after hours of unlocks. Several of them mention the "physical" parkour setting that reviewers say arrived in an update, say it feels closer to the first game, and recommend switching to it.
Graphics, lighting and soundtrackMedium
Visuals come up in 16% of the longer reviews, mostly as praise: sunsets over the ruined city, ray-traced lighting, and a gore system that reviewers say came with later updates. "The graphics are stunning, parkour feels just as smooth, and the zombies are still nightmarish." The soundtrack has a smaller following, with players naming the parkour tracks that react to your speed and falls ("Love the parkour soundtrack"). Critics of the look call the palette too bright and green next to Harran, and some find interiors repetitive (see the copy-paste complaint below).
Much better than at launchMedium
In 9% of the longer reviews, players describe bouncing off the game in 2022 and coming back to find it much improved. The changes they credit include guns, gore updates, the Reloaded Edition and the Tower Raid mode. "This game has come A LONG WAY in 3 years". Some of them changed an old negative review to positive. Reviewers in the same group often add that the story could not be patched, and some note that later updates broke things that used to work.
Lots to doLow
Players who enjoy the loop praise the amount of side content: GRE anomalies, bandit camps, Tower Raid, New Game Plus, events and community maps. One returning player calls it "the most content" in the series. Players who call the world repetitive are reacting to the same volume.
Where players are split
Measured against Dying Light 1 (and The Beast)High
Half of the longer reviews bring up the first game, Kyle Crane or Harran. 10% of the longer reviews say outright that it is worse than the original or tell readers to play the first game instead, against 2.5% who say this one is better. Their complaints are specific: nights that are less frightening, weaker physics and ragdolls, a grappling hook that swings instead of pulling you up, and a less memorable cast. "It's a 7/10 game but a 5/10 sequel" is a typical framing, as is "is it a good sequel? no, is it a good game? yes".
Defenders argue that DL2 is a different game that does movement and fights against human enemies better, and that nostalgia drives much of the criticism. The Beast shows up in 13% of the longer reviews, often from players who replayed DL2 before or after it. Some came away appreciating DL2's parkour more, and others took The Beast as proof that the series works better without DL2's changes.
CombatHigh
Combat comes up in 29% of the longer reviews. Praise (10%) runs ahead of complaints (4%): players like the weight of two-handed weapons, the parry, finishers, dismemberment and above all the dropkick. "Melee feels CHUNKY in the best way." Several reviewers say fighting human enemies is better than in the first game.
Critics describe a very different game: "combat feels like whacking zombies with a pool noodle," enemies that soak up damage on higher difficulties, stunlocks from grabbing zombies, and hits that land from too far away. Several also say balance falls apart once throwing knives are maxed out, with some describing Volatiles dying in two or three hits.
Nights and VolatilesMedium
Nights come up in 18% of the longer reviews, and players disagree on almost every point. Dying Light 1 veterans in particular say nights lost their terror ("nights are less scary"). Others say later updates went too far the other way: "There are Volatiles on nearly every other rooftop," chases restart constantly, and virals keep spawning from any fight, which makes night missions tedious. A third group enjoys the dark zones and the risky runs for better loot. A small number of reviewers complain about the immunity timer that limits time in the dark.
Paraglider and grappling hookMedium
The paraglider comes up in 8% of the longer reviews. Fans love flying over the Central Loop ("The glider is a lifesaver for crossing large distances"). Critics say it makes parkour pointless in the second map, that it sometimes fails to open, and that it drains stamina early on. The grappling hook (5%) gets a more one-sided reaction: players who liked Dying Light 1's pull-up hook say "they massacred my boy grappling hook", and a minority prefers the new swing.
Full price or wait for a saleMedium
8% of the longer reviews give price advice, and it is almost always "buy it on sale". "worth buying it on sale than full price imo" is how one put it. Players who paid for the Ultimate Edition were glad The Beast came with it, while some standard-edition owners were annoyed they got no discount.
Removing parkour staminaLow
Reviewers tie an August 2025 update (they cite 1.24) to the removal of stamina drain while climbing. Since then, more stamina mentions object to the change (24) than welcome it (15). Supporters call it "THE RIGHT STEP!" Critics say it gutted progression and made stamina upgrades pointless: "Imagine removing the parkour stamina draining in a parkour oriented game." Several on both sides ask for a toggle.
What frustrates players
Story, writing and charactersHigh
The story comes up in 57% of the longer reviews, and negative descriptions clearly outnumber positive ones. The same complaints come back again and again: characters who are unlikable or act inconsistently (Lawan draws a lot of anger), choices that barely change the outcome, Aiden passing out at key moments, a rushed final act, and a final boss fight against Waltz that a few players call one of the worst they have played. "Gameplay is good but story and characters sux." Several players say they were skipping dialogue by the middle of the game.
A minority defends it, citing the branching faction choices, the emotional ending or Aiden's voice acting ("The story is actually pretty good nothing amazing but I liked it a lot."). Hakon gets singled out as the exception by several players: "Hakon is cool though, I'll probably see it out just for his sake." Some players also wish they could reload a save to try another ending without replaying the game.
Bugs, softlocks and crashesHigh
Bugs, glitches, crashes or softlocks appear in 28% of the longer reviews. Quests that will not trigger come up again and again (players name "Revolution" and DLC missions), along with NPCs stuck on "please wait", getting stuck in geometry or floating on ledges, map icons that have to be rediscovered after every load, rubber-banding elevators, and saves that reset or roll back after updates. "10 softlocks out of 10" is how one reviewer scored it. Crashes come up in 4% of the longer reviews, often tied to frame generation or newer GPUs, and some players describe memory leaks that drag the frame rate down over a session. Others report no issues at all.
Copy-paste world and fetch questsMedium
9% of the longer reviews call the world repetitive: identical metro stations and power-station puzzles, interiors where even loot bags sit in the same spots, and a steady supply of fetch quests. "Copy-paste locations. Copy-paste side missions. Copy-paste buildings." Several compare it to an Ubisoft or Far Cry checklist, with towers to climb and icons everywhere.
Co-op that breaks and only rewards the hostMedium
Co-op comes up in 15% of the longer reviews, and 54% of those also mention bugs, desync, disconnects or crashes. Groups describe falling through elevators ("Elevators are the bane of any coop player's existence"), black screens after cutscenes, invisible enemies, quests that only progress after the guest leaves, and a host who cannot force a respawn. Several reviews from late June and July 2025 say a patch broke co-op entirely for a while, and some players report that unlinking the Epic account fixed their desync. The design itself also frustrates people: only the host's story progress counts, and some guests say they could not upgrade the paraglider or hook. "Coop Clients are second class citizens to game developers." Players who got it working still call co-op the best way to play ("Fun to play solo, better with friends.").
Grind, bounties and the in-game storeMedium
8% of the longer reviews complain about grind and live-service systems. They list daily and weekly bounties, faction vendors with their own tokens, and upgrades locked behind infected trophies. Guns, which reviewers say arrived late, sit behind the Lost Armory quest and a bounty grind that some describe as balanced for groups ("you MUST play with a full team of players, doing annoying daily/weekly challenges"). The premium DL Points store comes up in 3% of the longer reviews. "If you love grinding battlepasses in singleplayer games, you'll love Dying Light 2."
Cutscenes and dialogue interrupt playMedium
8% of the longer reviews complain that cutscenes and talking break up the action. They describe cutscenes for opening doors, chases split by loading fades, and long conversations between short bursts of play: "Kill an enemy. CUTSCENE! Walk 2 feet. CUTSCENE!"
The prologue cut in update 1.28Medium
232 reviews mention content removed from the prologue. Reviewers tie it to update 1.28 in June 2026 and list what went: Spike's part, the hanging scene at the Bazaar (now a black screen, a few say), the early night chase, and parts of the lore. In the two weeks starting June 8, 2026, 126 of the 274 negative reviews in this slice mention the prologue, Spike or the update. The point they make most often is that the prologue could already be skipped, so cutting it took the choice away from players who wanted the full story: "Why did you remove the core of the prologue?" Some of these reviewers say they will stay negative until it comes back.
Controls and camera on PCLow
4% of the longer reviews complain about controls: interact, loot and throw sharing one key, hold-to-confirm on almost every action, input delay on jumps, and a dropkick that needs a jump plus a double press ("Why do we have to jump and press F twice instead of once to jump kick?"). A small group reports motion sickness from head bob and a limited field of view, and multi-monitor players say the cursor escapes the game window.
Bloody Ties is a thin expansionLow
2% of the longer reviews criticize the Bloody Ties DLC, an arena-focused add-on with a small map and timed challenges. "The DLC was lame, one small map with 90% of it being pointless". A few players enjoyed Carnage Hall, and a few others say they wanted an open-world expansion like the first game's The Following.
A slow start before co-op opens upLow
A small group says the opening takes two to three hours before free roam and co-op unlock, which pushes new players past Steam's refund window: "The 2 hrs of tutorial (w/ looting included) is good prank if you want to play co-op."
No manual savesLow
2% of the longer reviews ask for manual saves or more than one rollback point, usually after a softlock or a bad ending choice: "this game needs manual saves or an autosave system where you can go back more than 1 checkpoint". Completionists add that some collectibles are missable and that the Ultramarathon achievement, which reviewers put at 960 km on foot, is a slog.
3. The player conversation
Positive reviews are often short ("peak", "dropkick", "fun with friends"), while negative ones tend to be long, itemized lists, many of them from Dying Light 1 fans. Half of the detailed reviews judge the game against the first one, so the reviews read like two audiences talking past each other: players who want a fast parkour sandbox, and players who wanted Harran's tension and story again.
Different players raise different problems. Those who quit within a few hours mostly cite crashes, motion sickness, a long prologue that ran past the refund window, or co-op that would not connect. Co-op groups talk about desync, elevators and host-only progress. Completionists and long-haul players talk about grind, bounties, missable collectibles, the Ultramarathon achievement and balance changes such as the stamina removal. Returning players, some of whom came back around The Beast's release, write the "it's good now" reviews.
Updates move the mood in this slice. In summer 2025, reviewers describe a patch that broke co-op and an August update that removed climbing stamina, which split veterans. Through late 2025 and early 2026 the weekly positive share mostly sat between the high 60s and high 70s. In the week of June 8, 2026, it fell to 30%, from 76% the week before, and nearly half of the negative reviews from that fortnight cite the prologue cut. The share was back above 70% within two weeks, though complaints about the cut kept appearing through the summer.
4. What the developers could do
- Fix progression-breaking quest bugs and add a safety net for saves. Bugs appear in 28% of the longer reviews. Players single out quests that never trigger, NPCs stuck on "please wait" and saves rolled back by updates, which they say force full restarts.
- Make co-op stable and let guests keep their progress. More than half of co-op reviews mention desync, elevator falls, black screens or disconnects, and some co-op players ask for story and tool progress that carries over for guests instead of counting only for the host.
- Restore the cut prologue as an option and keep the skip button. Reviewers of the 1.28 cut keep pointing out that a skip option already existed, and some say they will not change their review until Spike's opening and the hanging scene come back.
- Address crashes with frame generation and newer GPUs, and the memory leak. Crash reports often name frame generation, RTX 50-series cards or frame rates that sink over a long session until a restart.
- Trim cutscene interruptions in quests. Players complain about door cutscenes, loading fades and long dialogue, and ask to get back to playing faster.
- Loosen the grind around guns, bounties and vendor tokens. Players resent that firearms and top gear sit behind dailies, weeklies and group-balanced missions in a single-player campaign, with the DL Points store on top of it.
- Tune night spawns. Players complain about Volatiles on every rooftop and viral waves that respawn after any fight, which they say turns night missions into a chore.
- Add toggles for divisive changes. The parkour stamina removal, the immunity timer and the choice between assisted and physical parkour each have vocal supporters and critics, and reviewers on both sides ask to choose for themselves.
