Summary

• Dying Light: The Following DLC concludes the story of Kyle Crane and forces the player to make a critical choice that has major consquences for the franchise.
• Both the Infected Ending and the Nuclear Option result in mayhem, but only one of them offers a glimmer of hope that the virus has been eradicated.
• Dying Light 2 contains plenty of clues that finally shed light on whether the Infected Ending or the Nuclear Option is canon.

Dying Light: The Following is a single-player campaign DLC for Dying Light (2015). The DLC concludes the story of Kyle Crane, the player-protagonist during the game, which originally began in the base game. Instead of the base game's pre-determined narrative, The Following's story ends with a critical choice left up to the player. Depending on their actions, the possible Dying Light endings wildly diverge.

When Dying Light 2 Stay Human was released in February 2022, it seemed that there should have been one single canon ending for the original game. However, Developer Techland purposefully kept the question of the "true" ending unresolved. Still, fans of the series have noted a few hints toward what might ultimately be the definitive ending of the original game.

Updated on October 12, 2023, by Ajay Aravind: Zombie games are a dime-a-dozen, but there are a few examples that stand above the rest. Both Dying Light and Dying Light 2 received some critical acclaim, but many fans aren't sure what happened in either the Dying Light ending or the Dying Light: The Following ending. As such, we've updated this feature with some more information.

The Setup To Dying Light's Ending

Throughout Dying Light, Kyle Crane lends aid to the survivors in the city of Harran as they fight off Infected, try to suppress the symptoms of the virus and, ultimately, work together to develop a cure. In The Following, Kyle investigates the "Cult of the Sun" and its mysterious leader, "the Mother." The cult seems to protect people of the countryside around Harran from becoming Infected, leaving Kyle no choice but to follow this line of inquiry.

As Kyle slowly gains the trust of the cult in a bid to determine if they have a cure for the virus, he finally uncovers two horrifying facts. First, the cult's elixir, far from a cure or even a symptom suppressor, slowly turns its users into Infected, albeit able to control themselves during the day while still turning feral at night. Second, the Mother herself is one of these sentient, mutated Infected, whose use of the elixir has granted her control of her faculties during the daytime. These quasi-human beings are known as Volatiles, of which there are two unique variants.

As a terrified Kyle backs away from the Mother's disfigured face, she presents him with a request. As a culmination of the ancient religion that her cult has co-opted, the Mother asks Kyle to detonate a nuclear weapon, installed by the military as a "fail-safe," sacrificing himself and everyone in Harran to stop the virus and potentially save all of humanity. The player, at this point, can choose to go along with the Mother's plan or defy her and fight to escape.

The Infected Ending Doesn't Hold Out Hope For Humanity

If the player chooses to defy the Mother's request, she immediately grabs Kyle and forces him to drink the elixir. In their ensuing fight, Kyle begins to show symptoms of infection. He manages to kill the Mother and escape the facility while suffering from hallucinations and blackouts.

Eventually, Kyle emerges into daylight, seemingly far from the quarantine zone around Harran. He sees regular commuters on the road and a mother and her children in a nearby playground. As the sun sets, Kyle lets out a horrifying scream and looks down to see that his arms have become mutilated like a Volatile's.

In this Dying Light ending, Harran and the city's Infected are still standing, and the Harran virus has likely escaped the quarantine zone via Kyle, where it will infect the general population and bring about the doom of humanity. The fate of most of Dying Light's characters is left ambiguous, and it's unlikely that they can hold out for very long.

The Nuclear Option Also Doesn't Indicate A Bright Future

If the player helps the Mother, however, Kyle follows her to a back room to find a nuclear warhead. Kyle had already received a set of codes from an earlier character who was supposed to arm and detonate the weapon. Kyle inputs them into the console and, standing by the Mother, dies in a nuclear blast that presumably engulfs the entire area.

Though the long-term consequences aren't seen, the game's familiar characters and locations are probably destroyed in the nuclear explosion. This ending allows for the greatest chance of successfully containing the zombie virus — an important point when considering which Dying Light ending might be canon.

That said, there is a similar secret ending that requires the player to locate a seemingly random collection of codes and keycards scattered throughout the game world. Then they must use them to enter a nondescript military truck abandoned on a city highway. In that truck is a nuclear warhead, which the player can then detonate. Though it altogether foregoes Mother's choice, the outcome of this secret Dying Light ending is identical to the Nuclear Option. It also rewards the player with a special cosmetic outfit.

The Canon Dying Light Ending After The Sequel

Techland initially didn't make clear which ending was canon but suggested that Dying Light 2 may reveal the true conclusion. However, DL2's premise hints toward the canon ending of Dying Light. The sequel takes place 20 years after The Following, in a completely different city than Harran, and with a new protagonist called Aiden Caldwell.

Dying Light 2 strongly implies that the Infected Option is canon, because the Nuclear Option would have presumably prevented the spread of the virus. Further, the Infected Option better supports the premise of the entire world falling to the Harran Virus, especially in as little as 20 years, though nothing of the game sheds light on Kyle Crane's fate. Further, Piotr Pawlaczyk, the Lead Level Designer at Techland, has gone on record saying that Kyle was ultimately responsible for the pandemic that would soon engulf the world. While Crane isn't the sequel's protagonist, his legacy lives on in Dying Light 2, and he remains an important figure in the Dying Light franchise.