A horror game with a sunny island twist and a shocking and now quite famous reveal trailer, Dead Island is the newest addition to the Zombie Killer genre. The one question many gamers had on their mind, would it be successful?
There is very little storyline to the game, other than the one objective: Survival.
The island of Banoi is overrun with zombies, but why is the main question only answered near the end of the game. You can play as one of four players, Xai Mei, Logan, Sam B or Purna, each a survivor of the first attack and somehow immune to both the illness and after being bitten.
The character you control takes charge in leading a group of people who saved you from being killed in your hotel from their hiding hole on the beach, up to the Lifeguard station and further beyond, meeting more infected and more stranded people along the way.
Each character has their own weapon preference, the weapon that they excell at the best. Xai is a sharp weapon expert (Eg: Knives, swords etc), while Sam B is the opposite with blunt weapons (Eg: baseball bats, pipes etc). Purna is a weapon expert (Eg: pistol, rifle etc) and Logan a Throwing Expert (He is hard to define but he is a cross of blunt and sharp weaponry, as both can be thrown)
I decided to play through as Sam B, as he has the most health to begin with.
Firstly, while storyline is slightly delayed, it becomes much more dramatic as time goes on, with the plot starting to unwind till a climax, very simular to Drama expert Bertolt Brecht's Climbing Mountain theory.
The musical score is quite lovely, both dramatic when needed and sweet when overlooking the horror below. Acting is where the game faultls, many of the characters sounding jolty and many gamers displeased with the, quote, "Fake and put on Australian/New Zealand accents". Graphics, while ingame, are quite interesting and stick to a good point, however its the cutscenes that are quite dissapointing, the voice acting not matching the AI's movements or facial expressions.
Many gamers, while enjoying the game, can find it quite frustrating, at the repetitive missionry at main storyline points, some missions very difficult to defeat with the game failing to give pointers or teach how to modify weaponry. However, the game does suggest to look at the "hints" option quite early if you become stuck or travel to the same places, also, each time you accept a mission, there is an indicator telling you how easy or difficult the mission shall be.
Multiplayer is quite fun, but finding a match is a problem, quite simular to the original styling's of Gears of War 2, not showing how the connection is going.
With this in mind, Dead Island is still quite the enjoyable game to play. While not having many truly frightening moments, the game does sneak up on you with its gorgeous sound effects and the howls of the undead coming to eat you!
Out of 10, I gave Dead Island an 7.5/10
Good points: Inventive and fun gameplay
Mix of beautiful island and death all around = genious!
Sound effects extremely effective
Bad points: Cutscene graphics could have been tuned up...
Voice acting too...
Escourt missions are a huuuge pain
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