I Really Wish The Latest Dying Light Game Had Fast Travel

Ready for the next adventure within this zombie survival title? Meet you across the way of the landscape in about… Ten minutes? Or fifteen minutes? Truthfully, however long it takes to get there walking or driving, because this intense game apparently hates ease and wants Kyle Crane to endure beyond his current hardships.

The absence of fast travel within this first-person adventure, the latest entry in a popular lineup with action-packed survival titles, is surely designed to encourage exploration, but all it does from my perspective is to breed irritation. Although carefully considering the arguments why this open-world zombie survival game shouldn’t have a fast travel option, every one fails — similar to the main character, if I leap him from a building in haste.

Why the Omission of Fast Travel Falls Short

For example, one could claim that this game’s parkour is amazing, and I’d wholeheartedly agree, but that doesn’t mean I wish to sprint, leap, and scale all the time. Certainly, the game provides vehicles I can use, but vehicles, route access, and energy stocks are restricted. And I would agree that encountering fresh areas is what creates an expansive game engaging, however, once you’ve traversed an area repeatedly, there’s little left to discover.

Subsequent to my initial trip to the city’s historic district, I got the feeling that this game was intentionally extending my transit period by spreading out objective locations inside identical missions.

As soon as an optional task led me to a dark zone within the old district, I checked my map, sought out the most accessible automobile, discovered it, traveled to Old Town, used up my fuel, opened my map again, sprinted the remaining distance, and, in the end, had a lovely time with the zombies in the unsafe zone — merely to realize that the next quest objective returned me to the place I originated, on the other side of the map.

The Reasoning supporting Fast Travel

I need to recognize that the title lacks the most expansive landscape ever seen in a sandbox title, yet that is a stronger argument to support instant movement; if its absence annoys me in a more compact world, it would certainly annoy me on a larger one.

Of course, it would be beneficial to arrange mission goals in a certain order, but can we honestly say concerning “fostering adventure” when I feel forced to shorten my journey? It sounds more like I’d be “minimizing annoyance” as much as possible. Additionally, when I am engaged in a plot and wish to discover the subsequent events (which is beneficial, creators!), I do not want to accomplish further task targets beforehand.

Workable Alternatives for Fast Travel

There is a single point I can imagine supporting banning instant movement: You don’t get a straightforward way out. And I need to acknowledge, I wouldn’t want to miss out on the small heart attack I encounter each time darkness comes – but certainly there are alternatives for this. To illustrate, fast travel from Dark Zones might be banned, or instant movement locations could be positioned outside safe zones, compelling you to make a short run through the dark prior to arriving at safety. Possibly more suitably, the game could permit fast travel via instant movement points only, thereby you minimize transit period without the possibility of instant teleportation.

• Quick transport could be restricted to vehicle spawn points, for instance,
• require virtual currency,
• or be halted by random encounters (the risk to be attacked by surprise enemies).

Certainly, it is only logical to activate new instant movement locations following investigating the nearby area.

The Best Reason in favor of Instant Movement

Maybe the most convincing point advocating for fast travel, though, is freedom: Even with an instant movement feature available, users who choose to travel solely by running and driving would still have that possibility, however, players with less time to enjoy, or with reduced interest for driving and parkour, could allocate that time on different game tasks. This, in my view, is the true feeling of independence gamers should look for in a sandbox title.