Dying Light
Considering that Techland had originally worked on the Dead Island franchise, Dying Light was something completely out of their comfort zone. It was a first person title with hack and slash combat but also featured parkour and a large open world to explore. Development began in 2012 with PS3 and Xbox 360 versions planned – these would eventually be canceled and in 2015, Dying Light would release for PS4, Xbox One and PC. With a Metacritic average of 74 based on 58 reviews, it did receive some praise for its parkour and overall world design along with the risk vs. reward mechanics of venturing out at night. But the story was panned along with the side quests while the combat was considered by some to be clunky.
Nevertheless, it was a commercial success and Techland kept updating and improving the game, first with bug fixes and improvements, then with new content like new difficulties, new weapons, a new rarity level for weapons (including crazy new Fantasy weapons) and numerous new outfits. Quarantine Zones were revamped, parkour challenges were added and the game began to lean more into being an action RPG. This culminated in the release of the Enhanced Edition and The Following expansion, the latter adding some great new story missions and mechanics (like the buggy) while the former introduced Bounties and a Legend-system for post-game progression.
By the end of 2019, the title had over 17 million players with numerous cosmetic DLC, events and paid modes like Hellraid. Techland is currently working on Dying Light 2 which, despite reports of troubled development, is out in December and seems to have a positive buzz thus far among fans.
