Dying Light: The Beast's blend of parkour movement and zombie-killing action can make for an enjoyable and sometimes challenging experience. Fortunately, the developers have included a number of difficulty levels so players can finetune their experience to suit their playstyle. But how do you change difficulty, what does each difficulty setting actually adjust, and is there a difficulty-related trophy/ achievement in Dying Light: The Beast? In this guide, I'll give you the answers to all of these questions, so you can make the right decision for the experience you're wanting to get out of the game.
Dying Light: The Beast - Crossplay and Multiplayer, Explained
Dying Light: The Beast is best experienced with a group of friends, but some crossplay restrictions might make things difficult for your squad.
How to Change Difficulty in Dying Light: The Beast
To change difficulty, press the Options/ Menu button on your controller (Esc on PC), and go to 'Options' from the pause menu. At the very top of this first tab, you'll find the difficulty toggle, allowing you to change between: Story, Survival, and Brutal. Read these as Easy, Normal, and Hard, and you'll have a better time understanding which one's going to be right for you.
You can only change the difficulty setting once you've loaded up your save game. Difficulty can't be changed at the main menu for an existing save. You can set your difficulty setting when starting a new game.
All Difficulty Options in Dying Light: The Beast, Explained
Adjusting the difficulty setting will change four key parts of the game: enemies, combat, XP, and resources. I've explained what you can expect with each setting below.
Story
This is the setting to choose if you just want an easy ride and are primarily here for the story. It's a good option for newcomers to the genre or gaming in general. With Story difficulty, you can expect:
- Enemies will deal less damage and will take fewer hits to beat.
- Combat actions, such as blocking and swinging a melee weapon will use less stamina.
- XP isn't lost when you die, making it easier to level up fast.
- Resources, such as feathers, are found more regularly and in higher amounts throughout the world. Armor will also provide greater protection, and weapons take longer to break, meaning you'll need to spend less time repairing them or finding replacements.
Survival
This is the normal difficulty setting, which offers the most balanced offering out of the three difficulties. I always consider normal difficulty settings to be the way that the game's development team intended for the game to be experienced. Here, you can expect:
- Enemies pose a reasonable threat in combat, requiring a good few hits to take down, and being capable of dealing a good amount of damage against you. In crowds, they can easily overwhelm you if you're not prepared.
- Combat actions have a moderate stamina cost, meaning you can't go in and spam the attack button. You'll need to effectively manage your stamina and any crowds of zombies you come across.
- XP is lost when you die.
- Resources need to be found fairly regularly to repair weapons and craft consumables, and new gear to keep up with the increasingly challenging enemy threat. They're not as easily found around the world, either.
Brutal
Brutal difficulty is for those looking for a real challenge in Dying Light: The Beast. It's the best option for those who are series veterans or are experienced in action-adventure titles.
- Enemies deal more damage from the beginning of the game and will adapt to your playstyle to find ways to exploit your weaknesses.
- Stamina regenerates more slowly, and actions have higher cost, requiring you to carefully consider and manage your approach to different combat scenarios depending on the enemies you're facing.
- Large amounts of XP is lost each time you die, but you'll earn more XP than you do on the other difficulty levels. You'll also have a better chance of getting more powerful/ rarer gear.
- Merchants have fewer items on offer at the start of the game, and you'll find it harder to scavenge the resources you need. Armor is also less effective than it is on other difficulty settings.
Is There a Difficulty Trophy or Achievement in Dying Light: The Beast?
There is no trophy or achievement tied to beating Dying Light: The Beast on a specific difficulty level. As such, players can play through at whichever difficulty setting works best for them, or adjust it throughout their time in the game without fear of locking themselves out of that precious platinum trophy or 1,000 Gamerscore.
Dying Light: The Beast
