Renewed hope for a sequel to Days Gone was not on my bingo card for 2025. Primarily because I don’t play bingo, but also as I had long since given up on it ever truly happening.
In breaking news on Friday 17th January, it was reported by various gaming news outlets that Sony had scrapped two previously unannounced live service games. You love to see it. The games in question being a live service God of War game (hilarious, and yet not a joke) as well as a game by Bend Studio, whose most recently released title was Days Gone in April 2019.
Releasing to middling reviews, Days Gone was hugely underappreciated in the year following its release. Because of this, Sony declined to green light the sequel the game set up in its final cutscene, instead assigning the development team a live service of all things. Unfortunately this game will now never see the light of day despite years of development, and while that isn’t entirely a bad thing for the industry, it does mean that the relatively small studio now has to start all over again on a different game.
In the years since its release Days Gone has enjoyed a surge in popularity, largely for the time it spent in the PlayStation Plus Collection launched for the PlayStation 5 in 2020, but also from players picking it up at significantly reduced prices. We’ve all seen it as a familiar face in many game sales, both physically and digitally, as well as it being the main PlayStation Plus Essentials offering for subscribers in April 2021. With so many new gamers joining the Horde clamouring for a sequel, heightened by Sony’s new push to abandon the live service model and branch out into new mediums for their IP’s, it is time to give the people what they want!
It’s no secret that Sony are pursuing the idea of creating various film adaptations for their video game franchises, and as Days Gone is among those in early production, it makes so much sense to stick to what they know will bring in the big bucks, that live services weren’t capable of.
I have started and played through Days Gone to completion three times. I love the game. I love its world, its gameplay, the frights and adrenaline rushes of taking on a Horde or battling through waves of Anarchists and Rippers. In its opening hours it’s true that it is little more than a post-apocalypse in a picturesque forest; but what it does, it does well, and Days Gone is comfortably one of the most immersive experiences I have ever played.
One of the things I love most about Days Gone is how it feels like it contains an entire sequel within its run time, as the story could have ended around the two thirds mark, yet didn’t. I won’t talk about story spoilers here, because of course I want as many prospective players as possible who haven’t played it already to experience it knowing as little as possible. What I will say is that just as the game feels to be wrapping up, it slams its foot on the accelerator for a relentless and ridiculously enjoyable final act that I am still in awe at to this day.
I’m not completely enamoured by every element of Days Gone however. The dialogue for the most part is dreadful, and some of the story missions will feature you walking and talking at an incessant crawl for what feels like an eternity. The middle of the game sets up story arcs which ultimately go nowhere and unnecessarily pad the runtime, all while making you interact with characters you won’t like or empathise with in any way. Damning stuff I know, but in a twisted way it helps to invest you even more in its world. You don’t care about most of these people, if any, but you see their insecurities and tension in everything that they do. They’re fighting every day to survive in a post-apocalypse, where the world is no longer their own.
Cannibalistic zombies (called Freakers in game) roam the land in imposing Hordes sometimes numbering in the hundreds, and they don’t even have the good grace to do this quietly. They scream as they shamble; pursuing food, water and shelter like a living person would, and are always ready to break into a mad dash in your direction should they spot you. I lost count of the amount of times I would crest a hill or turn a corner and find myself eye to eye with dozens of horrid monsters that start shrieking at the sight of me, but enough about my last trip to Torquay, I want to sell you on Days Gone.
I have somehow made it this far into the article without talking about our protagonist: Deacon St. John, captivatingly portrayed by the hugely talented Sam Witwer. To say Deacon has had a tough time in life is an understatement, and upon starting the game, his life is about to get quite a bit tougher. Traversal around the games huge open world is done by your customisable motorbike, called a Drift bike in game (because Deacon is a ‘Drifter’, in essence a nomad). The bike is a lot of fun to use, and like Deacon it gets better and better throughout the duration of the game.
Combat is another highlight within Days Gone with a vast array of weaponry that, along with bike upgrades, become increasingly formidable as you visit more survivor settlements throughout the story. Any Days Gone fan worth their salt know that as soon as you unlock the Chicago Chopper, a Tommy gun, you’re in for a good time. There is also an assortment of grenades, mines and molotovs, as well as a good old fashioned crossbow when you want to literally bury the wood from the trees around you into your enemies. Playstyles tend to heavily lean on either guns blazing or silent assassin, with both options being well optimised within the games mechanics, and assisted by the game allowing you to switch between the two in combat provided you can break line of sight and hide.
With villains you’ll love to hate and gameplay that is simultaneously thrilling and immersive, I absolutely believe that Days Gone fully deserves a sequel. Now that the team behind the original game has their schedules looking a little clearer, and in the hope Sony has no plans to close the studio down, I would love for Days Gone 2 to be full steam ahead and in production soon.
If you haven’t played Days Gone, I cannot recommend it enough. It offers such a rewarding challenge, and a very accommodating easy mode if difficulty is not what you want from games. Join me, and the rest of the Horde, in hoping that the franchise is not as dead as its Freakers, and wishing the very best for the team at Bend Studio.
Written and edited by Alexx.
Sources
Full Days Gone Let’s Play – Get Low Gaming (Part 1) – The Broken Road Begins
Full Days Gone Let’s Play – Get Low Gaming (Part 18) – Nothing But Napalm