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Dead Island Review
A new take on the zombie apocalypse.
After some 5 years in development, Polish developer Techland's ambitious Dead Island is now available in stores. It's a familiar tale at first; four strangers are thrust smack dab in the middle of an area being overrun by zombies, tasked with somehow finding a way to escape. This time around, the action all goes down on the fictitious tropical paradise of Banoi, an island off the coast of Papua New Guinea. Following a brief introductory cutscene, players are given the choice between four characters: Xian, a blades expert, Sam B, a blunt objects specialist, Logan, who specializes in throwing weapons, and Purna, a firearms expert.
Dead Island's core gameplay mechanic, unlike most other zombie themed titles, is stylistically closer to the Fallout series, than, say, Left 4 Dead. As such, while there certainly are plenty of undead minions to dispatch, there are also a number of RPG elements here. Not only do characters accumulate experience points (and thus level up), but gameplay itself is broken up into quests. Ranging from something as simple as item retrieval, to something as complex as retrofitting an armored car into a tank, quests are varied, and often lengthy to complete. Especially in later chapters, many of them will seem a little too difficult for a single player to complete - and while this may come off to some as a possible design flaw, this difficulty level is intentional; certain quests are clearly designed with co-op in mind.
