Dying Light: The Mother

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

A radio call comes in giving us a sighting of a whole group of Rais' guys at the granary so we head on down clearing a warehouse of zombies before taking on the bandits whom DL kills the most of while I find the hostage with nails in his face. Before he dies, he tells us to go to the lighthouse and there we find the boss of these thugs... Kaan!?

At this point its the single player finale mode once more, so we individually deal with the sudden influx of bandits that show up - none of whom are really a threat. They do let on that they are going after the Mother at the dam though, so we race there (timed) through enemy gunfire and the usual zombies. For DL and I that is pretty bad. He had to drive at night while I'm just a bad driver.

Eventually we reach the dam to find the Mother didn't need any help. She removes her mask to reveal that she is a sentient volatile, which is what happens when you ingest or inhale the blue stuff. She offers a choice, detonate a nuke to purge the disease or resist. Not sure why she doesn't nuke the place herself, but we all chose to resist which leads to an awesome boss battle against her! I use up all my ammo and eventually resort to fists to beat the monster down.

This was a fun boss fight!

Despite her defeat, she did manage to force the blue liquid down some poor saps throat before hand and that person somehow escapes the quarantine to spread the disease anew... but that's a story for another game!

Insight: The Mother isn't affected by flares but I still used them just for visibility purposes. Also, remember you can re-assign your legendary skill points into bonus hand to hand damage.

Dying Light: Desperate Measures

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

After updating Jasir and resupplying, we go out to save Tolga and Fatin from some bandits and then assist the brothers with fuel and supplies for their next crazy escape plan: a rocket train through a collapsed tunnel. It goes just about how you'd expect.

And you thought you were a good crafter?

During this we also find a number of dead faceless and a convoy of Rais' thugs who have taken an interest in the blue incense. Despite clearing the enemies, apparently one of the faceless is still missing. With no leads we are instead sent to help an elderly researcher who is focused on finding a red mask.

His cancer prevents him from doing much though so we end up doing all the leg work - finding three monoliths in beautiful locations and finally an ancient ritual sacrifice site at the top of a mountain. Jim locates the red mask on a skeleton and we return it to the researcher, then turn our backs on him for just 10 minutes and find the old fool has killed himself - believing that dying while wearing the mask would cure him.

Insight: Mines are near useless and will more likely kill you or your companions instead of zombies.

Dying Light: Dirty Water

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Bilal says turning on the power will take some doing, and we are quickly side tracked in the process back to Jasir's farm where people have started getting sick? Something is wrong with the water so we have to go check it out - again.

Before leaving a "Faceless" (dude in a mask) who serves as a priest to the Mother, gives us a crossbow for all our help thus far and with a small upgrade it is stronger than the ranger bow! It also reloads faster and can be fired from the passenger position of the car. We all switch to it.

The pump station is locked up tight when we arrive, requiring us to lockpick an underwater grate to gain access - and being the best "thief" dude in the party, that's my job. I open locks the fastest in the team. :)

Once inside we find new bandits, these being leftovers from Rais' crew, have taken over and have contaminated the supply with corpses. After killing them, we shut off the water until NPCs can clean up the mess.

I'm quite pleased I nailed this guy right in the eye!

Insight: Lockpicking is easier with a steady hand and using a mouse is possibly more accurate than a game controller but otherwise it is just practice and patience. Remember that even if your pick breaks, the "success" area remains in the same spot and the "wrong" areas remain wrong.

My approach is I pretend it's a clock, and hit the "hours" positions first. On any but the "very hard" locks, you'll already find the success zone doing this. If all the hour positions fail, I then try the half-hour positions and so forth until it opens.

Dying Light: The Way Out

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

With Rais gone we do some tidy up in Harran of outstanding fetch quests, and to visit Tolga and Fatin who have somehow built a submarine to escape the city. It hilariously sinks upon launch.

The one day a dying stranger reaches the tower, muttering about a cult of people immune to the virus. With the stockpiled antizin running low, we are sent to investigate. Lucky this stranger brought a map with him of how to exit the city.

So pretty!

Sewers lead into caves which opens up into... the countryside! It is beautiful. Until we see the zombie hordes milling about out here too. So much for the quarantine. Thus begins "the Following".

Insight: Gear up before starting the DLC as you bring your equipment with you. Your stashed stuff is still there too, but reaching the first accessible stash is a bit of a hike.

Dying Light: Raishole

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

The detour isn't so bad as the next building is just full of zombies, which pretty much every place has been so it's nothing new. There aren't even any volatiles, so a quick kill followed by blood disguise lets me run past everything easily.

Running back to Rais' tower atop a crane which is hit by an RPG is pretty cool, but doing the final climb I get stuck in a part where you need to make a pretty big jump and for some reason cannot use the grapple.

Fortunately I can unlock an agility skill that lets you wall run and this gets me across the gap and up to the final QTE fight against Rais, which obviously results in his death. A GRE chopper comes to try pick us (and the cure research) up but we refuse.

Still better than the Shadow of Mordor final QTE battle.

One time skip later and, Dr. Camden reports that a cure is within reach, and basically that's the end of Dying Light! Next time it's onto "The Following" DLC. :)

Insight: Rais' pistol which is found in an Old Town side quest and not on Rais himself, is the best pistol I've come across so far. Try not to miss it! If he was wielding that instead of a machete, this boss fight would have been much harder.

Dying Light: Solo Finale

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Safe from the bombs for now, we visit Dr. Camden and clear his lab of hostiles for him before finally chasing after Rais. At the door to his tower the game warns us that this is the finale and is only meant for single player, so we wish each other luck and enter our own instance of the event.

The first yard itself is home to demolishers and runners and I immediately choose to run past, mainly because I find killing demolishers unrewarding. In Jim's instance, he decided to kill everything! Which is impossible because they respawn. Lol.

I then found myself in a tunnel full of volatiles. GREAT. Not fighting this time! Fortunately I still have UV flares to spare here to run past these scum in a mad parkour sequence. Failure restarts you at the top of the tunnel, but doesn't replenish your flares. Somehow DL managed to do this in his run without taking damage and without flares, so I guess I'm just terrible?

Not a good time to go slow.

Finally it is into the tower proper where a dying Karim, shot by Rais, warns us of the mines upstairs. We would need to take a detour to the next building.

Insight: Bring a LOT of flares and medkits into the finale with you. :P

Dying Light: Aldemir

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Apart from the Sad Face plan not working, we get news that Jade and the cure research have been taken by Rais at the museum so we sneak and ambush his dudes, easily taking them down.

His second line of defense is an undead horde you are supposed to jump over, but DL stacks it so we all drop down and cleanse the area of zombies completely. Looting them all afterwards takes quite awhile.

Look at all those loot pinatas!

Finally we get to Jade but she too has been bit. Rais gives us one shot of antizin for torment's sake, and after tripping balls for a bit, Jade uses the antizin on us before going ape on Rais' next bunch of goons as she turns. I then snap Ms. Aldemir's neck while DL and Jim take care of Rais' last lieutenant.

Of course, Rais manages to get away.

Insight: Fire crackers are super handy if you get into a horde and have no time to bathe in their guts for a disguise. Apparently the noise and light is always more attractive to them than people are.

Dying Light: Sad Face

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Since we're helping out in her neck of the woods, Troy gives us news that the bombing of Harran is imminent and that the government is using the excuse that there are "no survivors anyway" to justify their actions.

Since we can't radio out (as Rais took our Sat phone), we are tasked to deliver a sign in a more old school way - setting up explosives in a tall building. Filled with zombies. Really? Why is everything filled with zombies?

We clear it with ammo to spare and detonate the charges which form a huge sad face on the building facade. It doesn't last long as a squad of military jets missiles the whole structure into ruin in a stroke of heavy handed cover up. Time for plan B.

That's one unhappy building.

Insight: Piles of blue garbage bags are your Assassin Creed haystacks. It doesn't matter how far you fall, you will take no damage if you manage to land on them. It's absurd, but it does save time. I've even used it to escape from volatiles.

Dying Light: Oh Baby

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Hoping to catch up with Jade, we go talk to a group who help smuggle people into the next sector: Old Town. This involves a trip through the sewers and a betrayal as said people also work for Rais. They have no chance against us.

On the other side a new map awaits, and find "the Loft" a safe zone run by Troy who has a bad habit of sending us to where Jade is not. We also run a side quest of getting the water running again, and since there are three separate places to do this, we split up and hit one each - followed by the main valve which is guarded by a sole volatile.

Having fought a mob of them previously, this isn't very dangerous. We also hit some quarantine zones including the Striped Dragon Hotel where we meet a new type of zombie: the baby. Its cries drain health AND summon runners. Not a good combo which puts it on the "kill on sight" list.

Never hesitate if you have the shot.

Insight: The skill to cover yourself in zombie guts which makes you undetectable to zombies (other than volatiles) combined with the neck snap skill previously mentioned makes many horde encounters a cake walk. It also saves ammo and weapon durability.

Dying Light: Gladiator

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Returning to the tower we meet an even more upset Brecken. There's no time to sort out feelings though as Dr. Zere's lab comes under attack! We rush to the scene and kill some of Rais' goons but find the good doctor has been kidnapped.

We tail them back to Rais compound and find it suspiciously empty, until we all get knocked out via cut scene ambush. We awake in a pit arena with no gear. Rais is there gloating with Dr. Zere at his side. After monologing he unleashes zombies on us, because they collect zombies in containers for fun apparently.

The "real" Harran virus.

The litter makes decent weaponry and we manage to fight the waves off. As a finale he even drops in a demolisher, but given we just fought three of them at the prison this guy is a piece of cake. Especially after I knocked off his helmet via a thrown table leg. Rais is not pleased, and when he comes down to gloat we take the opportunity to disarm him and kill a few of his dudes.

Dr. Zere is hit in the commotion and says that all hope now lies with Jade who is taking his research to a Dr. Camden in the next sector. A massive parkour escape sequence follows, though not so much escaping from DL who specifically goes back to kill some snipers. Scott free, we get out on the road and promptly collapse from our injuries, only to be saved by Brecken and surprisingly, Karim who delivers bags full of our confiscated gear.

Insight: There is an skill unlock to throw melee weapons. I found that it's not really useful (especially if you want the weapon back) outside of this particular fight.

Dying Light: Junk Collectors

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Side quests continue, as we clear a motel, unlock caches and pawn shop supplies, fetch chocolates and movies for Gazi the hilarious retard and help General Jeff at the makeshift Fort Jefferson to turn on the gas for his "firewall" defense (which results in his entire safe zone exploding).

Shields keep you alive against explosions. And bullets.

Their usefulness drops as you level up though.

We also climb a freaking high bridge to collect the bridge lights which doesn't result in fun times for Jim, but we certainly all have fun with a gun challenge provided by a zombie movie producer who gives free temporary firearms and unlimited ammo to kill zombies in a time limit.

Eventually we make it back to the Tower where Brecken is losing his people and his morale. Jade suggests we go raid one of Rais supply dumps at a nearby school so we do, arrowing the thugs inside and find a supply of dynamite. Almost as good as antizin I suppose?

We are rewarded with a grapling hook which makes travel faster exponentially, though not so much for DL who likes to loot every single corpse. On the flip side, this means we have an over supply of junk that clears some of the lesser fetch quests. What Dr. Zere asks for next though is something we don't have... the insides of a "bolter" zombie.

Insight: The grappling hook trivializes escaping from volatiles, as long as you remember to have it equipped and aren't caught in an open field.

Dying Light: That's not Rais

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

Turning on the comms is not enough to satisfy Karim, so we are next sent to get protection money from a bunch of local outposts which is easy enough as no one really wants to get Rais' ire. In between we are collecting air drops, even killing Rais' dudes for it, and sneaking around at night past the volatiles.

We also came across the Sunny Apartment quarantine zone and cleared it room to room. Having a pistol from a police car certainly helped a little. The Underground Parking quarantine was much harder as it had patrolling volatiles who needed to be dodged while looking for supply crates amid the alarmed cars.

Survivor sense somehow gives you x-ray vision when it comes to volatiles.

DL took up distraction duty with his favorite firecracker / molotov combo while Jim and I did the searching. At the end I think there was only one volatile left as the rest had burned from DLs efforts.

Despite all our hoop jumping, Rais decided to only pay with a handful of antizin instead of the original two crates worth. His next task involves some sort of perversion with Jade so we tell him "We'll think about it," when in reality we were thinking "Can't we kill this guy now?". Our loyalty to the GRE also wavers more when they advise we -should- just hand Jade over.

Insight: While firearms are bad outdoors in that the sound attracts everything, you should definitely make use of them indoors - unless trying to sneak of course!

Dying Light: Slip and Slide

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

The tunnel is home to abandoned trains... and a seemingly endless army or "runner" type zombies. Fortunately DL has taught his FEAR slide kick maneuver to us, and it proves very handy for dealing with them in tight quarters.

We ultimately need to run past them though and loot the large supply drops still in the train cars - as well as one annoying one on the side which requires Jim to watch my back as I pick a lock through the access gate. When we finally get out we're covered in so much zombie guck it's disgusting. Little did we know this would be a valid zombie evasion tactic later on.

Finally, smelling like intestine contents, we arrive at Rais' compound and discover he's the target that has the GRE file we came to get in the first place. Unfortunately his gun toting guards don't give us an opportunity to do anything about it. Instead we are sent to his aide, Karim, to work for antizin.

High places usually have wires you can use to zipline down.

Our first task is to climb up radio towers to try get the comms back on, much to Jim's dismay. I should point out that Jim likes to drink while playing and as the night goes on, these climbing puzzles become more challenging for him. It does become more amusing for DL and I to watch him attempt though. ;)

Insight: In co-op, someone can stay downstairs to revive people who fall.

Dying Light: Nightmare Scenario

[Part of the Dying Light diary - spoilers ahead!]

We don't get to watch the medicine burn for long since horrible screams pierce the air and announce that night has come. And so have the nightmares. These beasts are fast, agile, good climbers, strong and pretty damn tough as I quickly find out when trying to fight one which does not go well at all.

My brothers scatter, splitting up the horrid monsters and leading Jim to find that for all their strengths, they can't swim - much like regular zombies. It takes some effort but we all make it back to the Tower where Brecken is shattered at the "no antizin" news.

There is a lot of crouch walking involved.

This forces his hand into trying to deal with the brigand group and its leader Rais. Naturally, we are sent as emissaries (as planned), and begin the long hike to their base. On the way we scavenge through cars on the street, save other random survivors and secure more safe zones - some of which involve intense climbing of radio towers because apparently zero ladders survived the zombie outbreak.

Then we come across an old tunnel called the Bright Mountain Quarantine zone. Apparently its one of the original places the outbreak spawned from and is crawling with infected, but by the same token all the supplies inside would still be there. We decide to go in.

Insight: The night time monsters can out run you, but you can out climb and out parkour them so get to the rooftops.