REVIEW: ‘Dead Island 2’ is a Hella Good Time (XSX)

The first Dead Island was released in 2011 with a standalone expansion, Dead Island Riptide, following it in 2013 that continued the original’s story and increased its level cap. In 2014 Dead Island 2 was revealed only to spend nearly a decade being passed around between development teams. The final form of Dead Island 2 has been developed by Deep Silver Dambuster Studios and published by Deep Silver. Now that Dead Island 2 has emerged on the other side of its languished development, the time has come to see how a decade has changed the zombie-slaying series. 

To start with, Dead Island 2 takes the series to a post-apocalyptic Los Angeles, cheekily referred to as Hell-a. Sometime before the start of the game, Hell-a was subjected to quarantine, leaving many citizens to fend for themselves against the ever-growing hordes of zombies patrolling its sunny streets. The setting is explored by up to four players at a time, with each controlling one of six unique characters to try and escape the quarantine after learning they are immune to the zombie virus. 

Each of the six playable characters come with their own stats and two passive abilities, like healing after killing a zombie with a heavy attack or getting stat-boosting stacks after blocking attacks. Each character having their own innate skills to define their playstyles is great on paper, but in practice, they struggle to feel impactful enough to be worthwhile. Most of the time, while playing, players won’t even think to take advantage of the innate skills, and they won’t miss out on much for doing so. 

This leaves the differentiation between the characters resting almost entirely on their unique appearance and voice lines. There is a good amount of variety between them, but the quality of their writing is rather hit-and-miss. In fact, the writing for the entire game is as such. Dead Island 2’s main story and missions are void of new ideas for the genre, but this is balanced out with the infusion of some great dark humor that grants Hell-a a lot of character. Some of the characters and jokes throughout a playthrough can tend to come off like they are trying a bit too hard to connect with a younger audience, but the ratio of jokes throughout the game heavily favors the ones that work. 

Character progression in Dead Island 2 has also been heavily changed from its predecessors. The three skills trees of the original games have been replaced with a deck-building system similar to what is found in Fallout 76. Every player’s deck is built up of a handful of categories that each contain a particular number of card slots. As players level up, they unlock new cards that can be slotted into each category for effects that range from small buffs to entire abilities. The system is adequate, but it does feel as though a standard skill tree system would have worked better. The card system adds a few layers of obfuscation to character building that can make it feel as though you don’t entirely understand how it works. The slow rate at that players unlock cards also prevents the system from feeling very rewarding and railroads players into near-linear progression until later levels when more options are unlocked.

What hasn’t changed much with the series’ advancement to Dead Island 2 is its combat. It features entirely first-person combat with a heavy emphasis on melee combat. Players are able to wield various types of weapons that each have their own characteristics and animations while also drop-kicking zombies to send them flying, throwing weapons for some range, and using elemental traps like exploding barrels to their advantage. Dead Island 2 also continues the series’ love for elemental attacks by featuring weapons that electrify bodies of water, apply acid that eats away at a zombie’s flesh, and numerous other options. 

Elemental weapons are primarily acquired through the game’s crafting system which allows players to upgrade weapons with mods and buffs that improve their overall performance. It is never as simple as making a single god-tier weapon, however, as each one has its own durability that is quickly drained by using it. When the weapon’s durability depletes, it breaks and is unable to be used until the player uses some resources to repair it. This forces players to switch between a loadout of weapons depending on their environment and situation, adding dynamic decision-making every time the player ventures out from a safe area. 

With Dead Island 2’s development history, it is a very pleasant surprise to see the game release in as complete and stable of a state as it is. It ran flawlessly on Xbox Series X and looked beautiful to boot, especially its incredible new gore system. While it may not deliver the interesting stories or new concepts of its genre contemporaries, it’s sharp humor and satisfying combat helps make up for it. Players looking for something fresh will likely want to wait for Dead Island 2 to go on sale before picking it up, but any players looking to smash some skulls or find a new game to run through with their friends should have a great time with it. 

Dead Island 2 releases on April 21 for PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.