There’s been a lot of excitement surrounding Days Gone ever since it was first unveiled at Sony’s 2016 E3 press conference, and while the footage we saw a year ago definitely caught our attention, the game was still very much an unknown quantity. That changed this year, when Sony recently showed off a good chunk of gameplay for the upcoming open world game. We now know a great deal more about Days Gone than we did before, and it’s safe to say that we’re very, very excited.
So here’s ten details about the game we feel like you should know about, ten details that are sure to make you more hyped for the game.
SWARMS
When Days Gone was first unveiled, we got a glimpse at what the main threat in the game’s world will be- entire hordes of zombies (which are known as freakers in the game), all coming at you with terrifying ferocity and speed. And when we say hordes, we mean hundreds and thousands. However, in the open world of the game, there will also be smaller hordes that players will come across, which will be known as swarms, and these will be much more common, and apparently, much easier to deal with.
ENEMY ECOSYSTEM
Days Gone will give players a lot of options in terms of how to deal with enemies you run into. Other than your typical stealthy and all-out action approaches, you will also be able to use what’s in the environment to your benefit- more specifically, and most notable, you will be able to use your enemies against each other. For instance, in the demo Sony showed recently, we saw that players will be able use elements such as sound to lure swarms and hordes of freakers into attacking human enemies.
WILDLIFE
What’s most interesting about the infection in the world of Days Gone, perhaps, is that it doesn’t just affect the humans. It infects the animals too. So while we’re playing the game, we’ll be able to face off against everything from infected wolves to raging bears, as we saw in the gameplay demonstration itself. Hopefully, this should add significantly to the survival atmosphere of the game.
DETECTIVE VISION
Detective vision is a feature that is used so commonly in games that it has now almost become a cliché. We’ve seen it in the Batman: Arkham games, in The Witcher 3, Horizon: Zero Dawn, and so much more. Hell, we even saw it in Persona 5. And it looks like it will be included – at least to some extent – in Days Gone as well. In the gameplay demonstration from this year’s E3 event, we could see Deacon, the protagonist, using something that resembled detective vision to follow some tracks. It remains to be seen just in what capacity this will be included in the final game.
STEALTH ELEMENTS
In Days Gone, going up against every enemy you see won’t exactly be a good idea. Not only there’s wildlife and human enemies for you to deal with, but there’s also always the threat of a massive horde of freakers catching any loud noises you make and descending upon you with all their fury. As such, it looks like stealth will be a major, major part of the game’s moment-to-moment gameplay. It should be interesting to see just how in-depth those mechanics will be.
DRIVING
It looks like driving your bike to get around the game’s map will be an major part of Days Gone. We’ve seen plenty of footage of Deacon driving around on his bike, and apparently, that too will be an element that adds to the survival aspects of the game. Apparently, there will be obstacles on the roads for us to get around, while aspects like the weather and mechanics like drifting will also come into play. Which brings us to…
DYNAMIC WEATHER
Dynamic weather mechanics aren’t anything new in this genre anymore, but it looks like Days Gone will actually be handling its weather system very well. Other than simple stuff like how much sound you make or how your vehicle handles, weather will, for instance, also affect how many enemies you encounter out in the open. For example, the colder it is, the more freakers you will encounter, and obviously, more freakers out in the open will mean fewer humans.
DAY AND NIGHT CYCLE
It’s an open world game, so of course, there’s bound to be a day and night cycle. That’s not what’s notable about this aspect of Days Gone. What’s notable is that the time of day will actually have an impact on how you have to play the game. Other than the kinds of things we’ve all come to expect by now- such as affecting the stealth mechanics and what have you- you will also have to deal with the fact that the freakers become much more powerful and more difficult to deal with at nighttime, which obviously will also feed into how other NPC human characters behave at that time of the day too.
A DYNAMIC OPEN WORLD
Sony Bend Studios have promised that the world of Days Gone will be a large and varied one, but what’s interesting is that they also intend to make it an incredibly dynamic one. From what we’ve seen and heard of the game so far, it seems like there will be a lot of moving parts working together in unison in the game, meaning that the world and everything in it will exist separately from Deacon himself. This should mean that the world of Days Gone and its inhabitants won’t just react to you, but also to each other and everything around them as well.
DEACON WILL LOOK OUT FOR HIMSELF
We’ll be playing as Deacon in Days Gone, a character that has been described as a mercenary and a bounty hunter, and the developers have described him as someone who isn’t necessarily a bad guy, but first and foremost, looks out for himself. Seeing him and his progression through the story of Days Gone should be interesting, though the game will also need to be aware of the possibility of letting the character fall into a stereotype- we’ve seen a lot of similar characters in all forms of media over the years, and we hope that Deacon is able to carve out a niche for himself amidst the crowd.