Dead Island is a first person horror action-adventure game with a strong sandbox influence; the game was developed by Techland and published by Deep Silver. It was released on September 6, 2011 for the PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3.
You are on vacation at the beautiful tropical island Banoi, located off the coast of Papua New Guinea. But after a crazy night of partying you awake in your hotel room to the sounds of screams from the distance. You pound a few aspirin and begin to make your way down the hotel when you notice something foul is about… Zombies! Luckily, your character is immune to this plague but it will take more than their blunt words and skimpy clothes to get off the island in one piece.
So pick up your favorite melee weapon and get ready. To kill some zombies!
Functionality:
The controls for this game operate the same basic way as most FPS’s (first person shooters). The only main difference is that you use right trigger to swing your weapon (when you have a melee weapon) and use left trigger to aim it for a through. Along with that inventory is accessed through your RB button (if xbox).
Weapon swapping is done in two ways. You can hold down RB and choose which weapon you wish to use with your right analog stick, bear in mind that this makes you susceptible to zombie attacks since the game does not pause. Or you can quick swap by pushing RB once, this is more of a clockwise swapping and not based on previous selection.
I will say that while I never had any real issues with swapping my weapons out, it just felt like they could have set it to allow you to specifically swap between two different weapons. Allow you the ability to change between the previously and currently selected weapons in your load out.
Along with that, if you wish to change weapons on the radial you will need to go through a bit of a scenario. First you need to go to your inventory; this is accessed by pushing the start button. Again bear in mind that if you are playing a coop game you will be susceptible to hits, it does not pause or prevent damage to your character. After you have reached your inventory you will need to find the weapon you want, select it and add to radial.
This is just a minor thing that never really destroys the experience, but it just makes the process of swapping weapons a little less efficient. Especially when the vibe of the game is to be fast and effective.
Now this process isn’t that bad when you are not surrounded. But if you just lost your last weapon, because it broke on a zombie skull, and your still in the middle of a zombie horde you will find yourself running for the hills as you try to quickly go through and grab another. This could have been fixed by allowing some of the non-radial weapons move to the empty space once one has been damaged beyond repair.
Along with your normal attacks you can go into “rage” mode, which is different for each character.
- Purna (fire arms specialist), she pulls out her trust revolver and begins to pull insta-kills on any zombies within her given range. Her range feels a bit like ten meters, so make sure if you use this that you start it in a zombie horde and back up as you fire. This way you don’t waste it.
- Sam B (blunt weapons), he goes into a berserker state and can explody-punch zombies to hell! This was interesting in the fact that Sam B was becoming quickly like the berserker from Borderlands.
- Logan (Jack of all trades), his rage mode is identical to Purna’s except that he doesn’t use a gun. Instead, Logan uses his skills as knife thrower to dispatch enemies.
- Xian Mei (Assassin), her rage mode allows her to swing her weapons with a greatly increased damage and speed.
Also it should be noted that each character adds something to the team. Purna is your typical leader, so her specialties are based on aura effects that boost team damage and abilities. While, Sam B is a bit more into money looting, and acts as a tank for the team.
Overall I would say the controls are mostly natural, they seem a bit weird at first but once you have a handle on what does what you will be delivering devastation with no difficulty.
I will mention that there was just one minor mechanic missing, block. Come on now, let people block! It’s a simple mechanic that allows you to defend yourself and is based more into actually fighting. Now they do allow you to kick as much as you want (no effect on your stamina) but the kick doesn’t matter if the game doesn’t register the hit.
Another big thing that bugged me with this game is the guns and how they affect zombies. Since firearms are not the main focus of the game you don’t really see them till around the middle of the game. But they don’t have the proper damage settings. My personal opinion is that guns should be ultra-high powered but lacking ammo. That way if you find a gun you only get one clip or bullets for the game, this can be used to insta-kill any zombies (with a headshot) until the clip is out.
But if Techland was really innovative they would have made bullets and weapon parts the currency in the game. That way you will have a more true blue survival game where the player will have to decide what weapon mod or how many bullets they really want/can give up for a health pack. Cash is just so… overdone in games that make no sense with it. It’s the zombie apocalypse and most of these people won’t get off the island alive, I am sure a lot more of them would be asking for a certain weapon for them to give up food.
Along with weapons Dead Island really swung and missed with health packs. You can find health packs throughout the game but they don’t really heal you at all, which seems a bit of a dumbfounded idea. The method for healing is by ingesting a huge amount of energy drinks, snacks, or apples. Now this, right off the bat, makes no sense and should be different. Having to drink 10 energy drinks is just ridiculous when you could just use a health pack to heal. Dead Island should allow you to fully heal with a health pack and then it would make sense for you to pick those up, otherwise why bother?
GLITCHES! I have to mention that Dead Island has some of the worst and most constant glitches to come out in a main stream game. The amount that in the game really show you that this game just should not have been released yet. Now it was mentioned that the team had to basically rush to release this title, and that would answer some of the issues in-game but it makes me think “well if it was that bad maybe we should postpone production”.
One of the main glitches I found was that after Purna went into rage mode the game started looping the rage mode sound, after only being able to listen to the constant loop for a minute I decided this was giving me a migrane and reloaded my last checkpoint. Upon reloading the game stopped showing a stamina bar, subtitles, and allowing me to accept quests. It would pop a piece of paper infront of Purna’s face (how you accept quests) but it would provide the option to accept or deny. That was about the time I said “screw this” and turned the game off.
But being the gamer I am, I popped the game back in the next day and began again. This time however I discovered that certain fetch quests had an issue with recognizing if you were giving the NPC the requested items. They would take it but not allow the quest to progress. So after handing a character about 20 alcohol bottles, a quest that only required 3, it finally finished and I walked away with my 50 exp points and a tad bit of anger that I needed to take out on the nearest zombie head.
Along with your single player game you can join friends or random people in your quest to quell the zombie infestation. This is actually set up to work quite well. To join a friends game you simply find and jump in, if your xbox live you can do this through party invites and session joining as well. If you decide to join a random game you can do that with one button click. So in that way it works great. But there is one big issue; quest completion does not transfer to all players in a game. So if you are helping a bud out you will not be able to have that quest completed with your game. Come on guys… Borderlands did it, why not you.
In some cases this game seems to be one of the most frustrating (do to glitching) but most stress releasing game out there. From that spectrum it is easy to see how this game has survived it critic’s reviews. It’s a not finished overall unimpressive game that just so happens to be hellishly fun and entertaining.
The hud for this game is a mix of the old school and new age. You have your health bar, which does not auto refill, at the top left. Your weapon of choice at the bottom right and map, map does not display where zombies are unless they are higher levels than your character (like the death squad concept in borderlands).
Presentation:
The graphics are good, especially for a sandbox, they are not extremely amazing in any way shape or form but again they are very good. The main thing with this game is that it looks pretty because it is on a tropical island, so it’s hard to see a lot of issues with their overall look of the game.
Only issues that stand out in this game are that it will have rendering issues pretty often, granted in an open world sandbox that is expected. But all together the graphics and overall feel of this game are great. It feels like you’re on a beautiful tropical island, which just happens to be infested with zombies.
Along with rendering you do have some repetitive character modeling with the zombies that would have been nice to prevent. I would have loved to see some zombies that are crawlers, this is just a zombie concept we all remember from the movies and certain games (COD: Black Ops – Nazi Zombies). It works great and adds more diversity in NPC designs.
The four main characters are designed well. Well I mean, if you’re going for posers and chumps than yes they are design very well. All of the characters match what their background is, or at least look the part for it. I will say it would have been more interesting for this game to show a bit of progression with the look of your character. Like as the game progresses they get more scarred up, more noticeable in cut scenes, or allow the equipment of some type of armor.
This just adds to the concept of survival and would be a bit more believable. Now granted it is a tropical island so I can understand that armor is readily available but how about this, instead of your typical armor you can equip certain types of diving armor used for shark diving. This would keep with the tropical theme and would also integrate the armor element nicely.
Or at least allow you to equip cop equipment on. I mean you do pass a police station! Either allow you to equip their armor or pick up a riot shield so you can defend yourself, that would just have made the game a bit more epic and intense!
Atmosphere:
The soundtrack is a nice mix between horror and mystery. It molds with the game pretty good, although the tracks are at time a bit too mainstream zombie horror and not too much of its own feel. I would have loved to hear a more tropical sounding track that has a horror element in it. Like integrating a zombie feel with steel drums, that way the game begins to feel more unique with its idea and location.
The sound effects are great, every sound just hits that cord in you. That one cord that brings a smile to your face, this is by the sound of you melee weapon hacking a limb off or the nice squish of a zombie on the concrete. It isn’t the most realistic sounds, but it is the most fun and pleasurable sounds.
In all honesty I would say that Dead Island pretty much hit what they wanted with the sound. It would have been a lot nicer to have a bit more innovation in the overall music soundtracks but it doesn’t deter the feeling of the game.
Plot:
The plot is meh. It is nothing special or leaves you with a lasting impression. Again Dead Island is not a game that you play for the plot, it is a game you play for the overall experience and fun times with zombie killing.
With all that said it should be noted that Dead Island presents itself in two very different ways. It presents itself as a horror survival game but also as an entertaining zombie killing experience. The issue Dead Island runs into is that these two concepts collide a lot, like almost 80% of the game.
The times these duo-directions collide the most, are when the plot progresses. You will be doing a little zombie clean-up, which causes constant laughter and enjoyment, when all of a sudden your stuck listening to some girl whine about all this bad stuff that is going on. Now while this adds the “drama” element it just doesn’t blend with the games gameplay. They should have just kept the entire game light-hearted and enjoyable.
I mean you can skip the story sections if you want, and I highly recommend you do if you just want to have fun. But you should never be in a game and start thinking “come on get on with it!” It is just bad writing and bad direction. It’s like what borderlands would have been if they chose to not change the art direction and story, keeping it with the original serious tone. (Ergo Borderlands would have been a lot less memorable).
Would you have prefered this from what was released? I think not!
This huge plot issue with the game is met with dismay when the game chooses to hint at what the virus may be. Dead Island chooses to go rage virus (28 days later) with the explanation, saying it is a form of mad cow disease that effects humans. Now the only issue I have with this concept is that there are a lot of zombies out there that are broken apart and rotting, if its madcow it doesn’t make you invincible to pain or death. They would be able to die the same way a normal person dies.
I don’t know how many times I need to say it but I guess one more time won’t hurt, “if it doesn’t link to your entire game don’t introduce it!” If your zombies are taking a more classic undertone than obviously they are more of the living dead type and not the rage virus type. Mad Cow Virus = they die like us but are just crazy. Mad Cow Virus ≠ body parts being cut off but they are still able to fight, even though they are bleeding everywhere.
I know this may be considered “nit-picky” but to introduce a cause or type of virus with a zombie game makes no sense if you are going to have a whole different gameplay mechanic.
Besides the root of the zombie infection there is also some issues with character development and overall direction. Throughout the game you will find that your characters are just, for a lack of a better word, “dicks”. They don’t connect with anyone or seem to really develop a “lets help them” attitude. It all becomes so forced that you begin to think it would just be better to not have them talk and take on the “character who can’t talk, but takes orders” feel.
One scene in particular has Sam B walking up to one of the main NPC girls, about to punch her in the face, right after she got raped by who knows how many guys. The whole reason he is angry is the four main characters had to go through a police station, killing off the local gang who occupied it, just to save her. She wanted to supply everyone on the island with meds, and apparently the gang thought of another med they wanted more (yes, rapies). Now I can understand that it is a bit messed up that she brought that situation on but I just can’t see how it would be normal at all to think “I am gonna punch the hell out of this bitch!” right after all she had been through. I may say “well you’re on your own” but a punch may be a bit too much.
This is just one of the scenes that appear in Dead Island, and it really just shows that they game doesn’t have the characteristics of a real drama in it. So it should not be a real drama. It would be a much better game if they just had fun with the story, make it entertaining and enjoyable like the rest of the game.
Legacy Rating:
Will this game last through time? I feel this is a game that can easily be ousted from our memories, if it is done by the right company. Dead Island is a fun and entertaining game but it lacks full originality. There are too many factors in the game that just feel like other games you played. Throughout the game you notice similarities between Left 4 Dead, Borderlands, and COD: Nazi Zombies. And with the continuous glitches you can find yourself thinking, “wow the other games did it better”. With that said I know that this game could have been twenty times better, and that will be on a lot of minds as we wonder what this game could have been instead of the shell that we have now.
How does it compare with other games? Dead Island is a hard game to compare, in a direct sense. It is one of the few out there that provides a FPS zombie experience and one of the only to provide a open world zombie experience. It is worthy to stand somewhat on its own merits, but it is just not finished. So I would say when compared to games like COD or Borderlands, Dead Island doesn’t stand a chance. Those games are done and finished; Dead Island is like 80% complete.
Buy or rent? I would say rent. It is a fun as hell game; you will definitely be entertained and enjoy the combat mechanics. To purchase it would be up to you. I really enjoyed it but I don’t think this game is valued at $60, it isn’t finished and to me that means it should $40 dollars maybe.
