Unfortunately, Bloody Ties, the next story DLC for Dying Light 2, has been delayed for a second time.
Originally unveiled in August 2022, Bloody Ties extends the original storyline of Aiden Caldwell. Let’s say Techland switches out Dawn of the Dead for Death Race, as instead of fighting swarms of zombies, Aiden goes into an arena to fight with other elite warriors, for the entertainment of a live audience. Both are very culty genres in the movies, that have also proven fruitful scenarios for video games. Of course, there’s no lack of modern zombie-themed video games, but examples of games that adopted the post-apocalyptic game show to the death themes include Smash TV, MadWorld by PlatinumGames, and more recently, Madd Moxxi’s Underdome Riot in Borderlands.
This DLC was apparently originally intended to release in June 2022, two months before it was actually revealed. Techland’s first official release date was October 13, 2022, but now it has been delayed for just one month more.
Given current circumstances, it isn’t quite clear what the reason for the delay is. It may simply be the case that the DLC needs some more time to polish and make it ready to be unveiled to the public. However, it is also possible that the pandemic has caused the understandable delays to the game. It should also be noted that Techland is based in Poland. Although their country is not a direct participant in the war between Russia and Ukraine, Poland’s logistical position, the way the war has affected Poland’s economy, having to host refugees, and the general disruption caused by the war may have been a factor in this delay as well. Techland did make it a point to announce their support for Ukraine.
Now, Techland also addressed concerns raised by a YouTuber that Bloody Ties may not have enough content. Gameplay director Tymon Smektała himself tweeted a promise of a six-hour story campaign. This would be augmented by side quests and continued encounters with Dying Light‘s Infected, their future plague version of zombies. This arena combat apparently only makes up 20 % of the entire campaign, meaning there is a firm focus on this new story direction that they want to tell.
There is one more prospective reason for the game delay, which is that Techland announced a cloud-based port for Dying Light 2 later this year. Notably, this will be the first cloud-based port for the game. With all that said, it’s more likely that work on the cloud port is completely separate from this DLC. If anything, there is a possibility that Techland wants to settle all issues with the DLC before it gets released to any platform, and the Switch version hasn’t affected it at all. Nonetheless, it was worth pointing out.
Dying Light 2 is available now on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and PC.
