Dying Light: The Following Review

Embrace fun new ways to kill and die in the great outdoors of Dying Light: The Following. #dyinglight #thefollowing #dlc

The Following introduces a large new playable area and a new chapter to the main story of Dying Light. The new adventure takes place in the zombie-infested rural outskirts of the city of Harran familiar from the main game, and the map covers an area way too big to traverse on foot. To speed things up, you are given a customizable buggy to drive around and kill zombies with.

The introduction to the new surroundings is quick, and you will learn more about the exciting circumstances as you make progress in the mysterious main storyline. The quests are usually more or less similar to the fetch quests you would find in the main game, but this time the story involves a strange cult seemingly immune to the zombie infection. The new twist adds quite a bit of depth to the otherwise familiar-feeling tasks.

The expansion adds boss fights into the game, pitting you against unique super-zombies in optional missions. You can also clear out nests of the dangerous volatile infected to reduce the risk of running into them at night. These optional activities reward you with plenty of experience, loot and respect among the locals.

The various volatile nests can be extremely tricky to clear out, as they require quick reactions in difficult environments. Often you will fall to your death or get swarmed by enemies because you fail to grab a ledge or jump to safety in a chaotic situation. Indeed, the controls can feel clumsy or unresponsive at times at least on the PS4 version, especially combined with the occasional frame-rate issues.

However, since you will spend a lot of your time driving the buggy, free-running is not as central in the expansion as in the main game. The rural environment offers little in the way of new obstacles and paths for free-running, but you will have plenty of fun driving over zombies on country roads. Your buggy needs constant maintenance, and you will have to scavenge abandoned vehicles for parts and fuel. While the vehicle may feel a bit fragile at first, it can be improved with upgrades.

The expansion gives you new weapons, as well. The crossbow is an amazingly fun and accurate zombie-killing tool with an impressive range, and gunning down enemies with an antique six-shooter is great fun. The game also encourages weaponizing the buggy, as you can lay down mine fields while driving or lure enemies by remotely triggering the car alarm.

The Following is an interesting expansion with plenty of content. It feels refreshingly different from the urban districts of Harran with an entirely new story chapter and gameplay mechanics, and it is definitely worth your time if you enjoyed the main game.

 

Developer: Techland
Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Platform: PlayStation 4, Xbox one, Microsoft Windows, Linux
Release date: February 9, 2016
Rating: PEGI 18

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