Dead Island 2 begins in the sun-drenched, blood-drenched City of Angels, but there are no angels here. Brain-dead, ravenous zombies rule the city, now casually known as HELL-A. You wake up on a plane already dead from a zombie plague, with only the clothes on your back and immunity to undead slobber bites, and you need to escape from HELL-A. Even if you have to be the go-between for every other survivor in the process.
As you make your way through HELL-A, you’ll explore numerous mansions, approach well-maintained sewers with great courage, and even leave your mark on Hollywood Boulevard. For all its flaws and quirks (and there are so many of them), Dead Island 2 does exactly what it needed to do when it was first announced less than a decade ago, and what it needs to do now at launch: Mindless zombie-slaying fun in an environment of life, energy and eccentric charm. Incredibly lifelike warts and all.
Dead Island 2 takes the same basic ingredients as its predecessor — disfigured guts, mindless zombies as tough as fingernails, and a Tarantino-esque obsession with gore — and dresses them up in a package fit for 2023. The scene spanning where you find yourself adventuring is stunning, the dialogue is cringe-worthy, albeit well-founded, and yes, there are a few glitches here and there. I expected no more, no less, and ended up finishing Dead Island 2 satisfied with my experience.
However, starting from HELL-A does feel tiring. Once the thrill of the zombie massacre wears off, brain-slamming the undead in the luxury homes of movie stars and influencers can become tedious, fast. The first part of the game is the worst part of Dead Island 2; everything, from the combat to the story progression to the setting, just keeps improving from here on out. HELL-A jet lag really sucks.
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With the city opening up, you have the opportunity to have a little fun, too. Taking on hordes of undead in a movie set? Use your set’s SFX rig for some blockbuster sets. Disinfect a bunch of zombies in the sewer? Use your electric weapons and watch them crackle. Tired of zombies screaming in front of you? Immediately scream for them to t aste their own medicine. Dead Island 2 excels at combat variety; different moves for different clans, and eventually, you’ll find yourself constantly changing your playstyle to suit different challenges. That’s where the real fun comes in.
In the early stages of the game, build customization is minimal; you have few cards in your Skill Deck, you have fewer weapon upgrades, and, well, your weapons aren’t all that great. As you leave Bel-Air for the more diverse pastures, your skill deck will fill up and your weapons will become more powerful. Fighting zombie after zombie is no longer tiring as you customize your build and learn to use your environment effectively.
Dead Island 2’s “eat the rich” story isn’t half as daunting as it first appeared, either. My first thought is the endless generic jokes about content creators, and the 1% who are entitled and arrogant actually have some soul about it. Even the weirdest and most infuriating characters have redeeming qualities, and for every nasty thing they say, there’s another comment based on a reality we can all relate to. Even in this hazy hell. Granted, we’re not in the tense apocalypse of Dead Island 2, but real life hasn’t been that far off in the past few years.
Dead Island 2 shines in co-op; after all, intense battles are more fun when you have friends around. However, only the host will go through the story progression, so you’ll need to go through the entire quest together, or make two saves on the go, which isn’t all that convenient. On top of that, the co-op experience is definitely more error-prone than the single-player experience. Single player is relatively problem-free (barring occasional lag spikes on PC), while in co-op it’s the exact opposite: getting caught in a door means restarting my game, other players are in a perpetual animation loop, the HUD pops – Ups telling me to rejoin my team will always be there, albeit literally, to stand with my fellow killers.
Co-op is still fun when it works well, and game-breaking bugs are rare–they’re not great, but they don’t detract from your overall experience in the end. However, accessibility features in Dead Island 2 might do just that. Available in both controller and KBM schemes, each button can bounce to the extent that suits you. There are adjustable subtitles and a highly customizable HUD – it’s awesome. Color-blind or hard-of-hearing players have few options, though; there are no options to change the contrast, color scheme, text-to-speech, or sound visualizer. There’s at least one dangerous threat indicator, so there’s that. In a game that supports a wide variety of playable characters, I expect more from player accessibility.
Dead Island 2 is exactly as jaw-dropping as it promises to be. Dambuster should iron out some kinks over the next few weeks, but if you were looking for mindless mayhem and extraordinary entertainment in HELL-A’s mill slaughterhouse, you’ve got it right here.
The Standard Edition of Dead Island 2 will retail for £59.99/$59.99 on Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and PC from 21 April via the Epic Games Store.
This review is based on a PC game press release from the publisher.