Dying Light 2: Stay Human co-op impressions

Dying Light 2: Stay Human is Techland's latest installment in their open-world zombie-slaying repertoire. Launched on February 4, 2022, it was a success for the developer, selling over 2 million copies as of recently.

However, it's not all roses and sunshine. The game launched to several complaints about bugs. Console users in particular seem to be faring worse than PC. The studio has been busy churning out consecutive patches for the latter, with numerous optimizations and bug fixes to address any and all problems with the game.

We've already covered the review for Dying Light 2: Stay Human at launch, which can be read here. The series is dedicated to not just slaying zombies in style, but also doing it with your friends in co-op - however, how does it fare in that regard?

Just like the review, the co-op experience was also played on PC.

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Multiply the action with Dying Light 2: Stay Human's co-op feature

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Let's start with the good: Dying Light 2: Stay Human includes a full-campaign co-op for up to four players in a single session. Minus the prologue, which takes around half an hour, players can beat the entire game alongside friends. This includes the finale and epilogue as well, something the first Dying Light did not allow.

The co-op feature becomes available once Aiden (the protagonist) has access to the open world of Villador and gets the Binoculars - the game's key tool for scouting surroundings. This happens after completing the Markers of Plague quest, following which players can pause the game to access the Online Menu.

The Online Menu lets players invite friends (Screenshot from Dying Light 2: Stay Human)

This menu brings up a host of options to allow tinkering with the multiplayer experience. 'Quick Join' allows searching for instant sessions, while 'Find Games' brings up a list of public lobbies to drop in. The latter also showcases each player's Rank and their City Allignment.

The 'Friends' option brings up the user's friend list and allows the player to join their friend's game. However, the process seems needlessly cumbersome: why not feature only those profiles that own the game instead of every single friend added to the account?

Players can also sign in to and connect their Epic Games Store account - yes, Dying Light 2: Stay Human does feature crossplay between Steam and EGS. There is even a 'Call for Help' feature, which will let randoms join your game to help you out if you think a mission is too tough or spooky.

Techland also has plans to allow cross-platform play between PC, Xbox and PlayStation, but that will come later down the road.

Breaking down the experience

In a nutshell, the co-op is fun. Slogging through zombie hordes and scrounging through every backpack gets stale - and it will, given the length of the game. That's when playing with buddies livens up your experience.

Even when deep inside a Dark Zone with limited resources, a diminishing Immunity counter, and facing half a dozen blood-thirsty foes, it's good to know that co-op partners have your back (assuming they co-operate and don't run off).

Dying Light 2: Stay Human's parkour traversal and combat is made even more fun with friends. However, since players can import saves from any point of the game, those who have already beaten the game can easily leave newbies in the dust due to already having all mandatory upgrades (like the paraglider and grappling hook).

How does looting work in co-op?

Anything players obtain in a co-op session can be taken back to their own save file. The world progression will only be exclusive to the host.

On that note, the host also has full control over the choices made throughout Dying Light 2: Stay Human's many decision-making moments. Other players can only vote to point out the choice they wish to pick.

Analysing the content of the game

Dying Light 2: Stay Human has a plethora of quests and activities to engage in around the map. Dark Zones like Forsaken Stores can be infiltrated for crafting materials, GRE Anomaly bosses can be taken down for good loot and GRE inhibitors, alongside a decent list of side quests.

There's a lot of stuff to cover, which will easily take upwards of 60 hours to complete.

It's essentially more or less the same experience as the original game. But there are moments when the co-op can take a nosedive, thanks to the game's buggy nature.

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These manifest in the form of frequent bouts of being unable to connect to a friend's session and random disconnects back to the menu screen when the session does load. At other times, players have experienced the in-game sound turning off as well.

While exploring for the purposes of this review, the Bazaar seemed especially susceptible to the glitch. At one point, the game had no audio; no footsteps, no background chatter, no NPC dialogue quips, no contextual audio cues, nothing.

Though restarting the game fixes the issue, it is a crucial problem that should not be overlooked. Any enjoyment that the game manages to conjure up at that point just vanishes into thin air.

Ultimately, while Dying Light 2: Stay Human is a good game, its technical issues really bog down the experience. For those of you wondering if the game is worth picking up for co-op, you might want to reconsider until the kinks have been ironed out. The game is out right now on PC, PS4, PS5, XB1 and XSX|S.