Predictable gameplay is “impossible” in Days Gone

It’s the end of the world in Days Gone. Eye of a hurricane, listen to yourself churn! World serves its own needs, Don’t mis-serve your own needs! Speed it up a notch, speed, grunt, no, strength! The ladder starts to clatter With a fear of height, down, height Wire in a fire, represent the seven games and a government for hire and a combat site!

Sounds about right, doesn’t it? Potential REM lawsuits aside, Days Gone may smack of your typical sandbox. Massive, open and probably filled to the nines with all manner of diversions, developer Sony Bend’s upcoming romp in the Freaker apocalypse needs something to set itself apart from the pack. Needing to be more than just a love letter to the horror genre that spawned it, the studio is banking on their particular sandbox being deadly, unforgiving and completely random.

“All the systems come into play in a way that makes predictability impossible, and that’s what makes the gameplay experience awesome,” Game Director and Writer John Garvin said in an EDGE Magazine interview via WCFTech of the game world and the lengthy six year development periodfor Days Gone.

The permutations, how many different kinds of things that can happen, are just astronomical. And to make that work, you have to have all the systems there and in play. You can’t really tune the game if you don’t have the melee system quite done yet, because then you can’t really tune the crafting system. All these systems have to be in play at the same time, and that means all of them have to be done and in the game and working. That’s what takes the time.

It’s those very checks and balances, that Garvin reckons will make Days Gone stand out as lead protagonist Deacon St. John will need to keep his motorcycle in running condition in a world that will throw plenty of danger at his head. “Fuel management is not something you see often in games, because it’s very tricky to balance,” Garvin explained.

You don’t want to punish the player, having them constantly run out of gas and making it a chore. But on the other hand, you want that tension that comes from that constant fear of ‘Oh my god, am I going to run out of gas.

Days Gone finally reaches the finish line on April 26. I’ve got a feeling that it may be one of the definitive games of the PlayStation 4 era. Only unlike that time when Tony Hawk Pro Skater 5 crashed and burned, I think I’ll actually be right for once.

Last Updated: March 29, 2019