Dying Light 2's open world is hypnotic to navigate

gamedeveloper.com:

Open world level design is a weird beast, especially when developers are crafting environments meant to evoke familiar modern settings. Dying Light 2 Stay Human's city of Villedor for instance, is both meant to represent the apocalyptic wasteland of a European city and also be quickly navigable using the game's parkour-inspired traversal system.

That means instead of prioritizing roadways and public transit, the level designers need to emphasize travel by way of rooftops, narrow streets, and more. And in a huge open world filled with zombies (that behave differently depending on time of day), there are a lot of dependencies to account for in order to make a world that's fun to navigate.

Dying Light 2's open world thankfully isn't just fun, it's sometimes hypnotic. The details of Villedor fade away as you focus on what path you'll take to get to your next objective. Its fluid movement systems pair nicely with an environment that keeps the player progressing (and also punishes them for their mistakes. Sometimes that hypnotic fluidity gives way to the *splat* of dropping three stories to the ground).

What were Techland's level designers thinking about when designing the city of Villedor? Lead level designer Piotr Pawlaczyk was willing to chat with us and share some insight on the company's design process. 

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

Game Developer: What were some of your big ideas for Dying Light 2’s open world? What did you think you could do better than in the first game?

Pawlaczyk: When we started working on Dying Light 2 Stay Human, we defined the main pillars of the game on which we wanted to build the whole: "Melee Combat," "Natural Movement," "Day and Night Cycle," and "Choices &