The Dying Light franchise has had an interesting relationship with guns throughout its 10-year existence. After being accessible in the original Dying Light‘s mid-to-late game, guns were removed entirely from Dying Light 2 until a later update following fan feedback. Dying Light: The Beast reintroduces guns as a viable option for combat, albeit one that comes with some significant trade-offs.
Game Rant spoke with game director Nathan Lemaire and franchise director Tymon Smektala to discuss the role that firearms will play in the upcoming action-survival horror game. They discussed how the importance of guns has changed a little compared to previous installments, and they also shed some light on the types of guns players can expect to come across in Dying Light: The Beast.
How Guns Are Handled in Dying Light: The Beast
While guns undoubtedly play a bigger role this time around, Dying Light: The Beast is not a shooter by any means. Players must still use ammo sparingly and will often need to engage in certain activities to obtain more. Then there’s the noise to worry about—guns will attract plenty of unwanted attention for players who choose to rely on them, which in itself presents new challenges. As Lemaire explained,
“Guns were always a tricky topic in the franchise. For Dying Light: The Beast, we consider them to be powerful tools coming with trade-offs. The first one is about the scarcity of ammunition. Finding ammo requires players to focus on certain types of activities; it does not come for free. The second is about the noise. Using firearms in the open may attract more zombies, which in the end might end up in players using more ammunition than they would have liked for a given encounter. For us, it is important to allow players to expand the amount of toys at their disposal, while making sure we don’t turn the game into a shooter.”
Dying Light: The Beast’s Guns Will Offer Increased Variety for Players
As well as the increased frequency at which they are available, the variety of guns on offer in Dying Light: The Beast has also been improved. The usual offering of pistols and shotguns is accompanied by more complex, outlandish options, like a flamethrower and a sawblade launcher, which sounds particularly brutal. Smektala said,
“We also decided to have some fun with weapons that are – more or less – ranged but aren’t your ‘old war veteran grandpa’ guns. We’re introducing a flamethrower for close-combat zombie frying – a classic, iconic zombie fiction weapon which, for some reason, we didn’t have yet. We’re introducing a grenade launcher, great for bigger zombie hordes and encounters with the Baron’s army. And we have a sawblade launcher, a great, portable, gory tool that allows you to launch spinning saw blades that cut enemy limbs in an instant. I guess we’re as hungry for Half Life 3 as any other player on the planet!”
The game’s new guns should help to set it apart from its predecessors and offer a new layer of depth to combat encounters. That being said, melee combat and the Dying Light franchise’s trademark parkour elements will still be front and center, so guns are more of another toy in the sandbox than a definition of that sandbox.
Dying Light: The Beast
- Released
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September 19, 2025
- ESRB
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M For Mature 17+ // Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Language, Use of Drugs
- Multiplayer
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Online Co-Op
- Franchise
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Dying Light
- PC Release Date
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September 19, 2025
- Xbox Series X|S Release Date
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September 19, 2025
