Dead Island 2 is an action-packed zombie game that features sporadic boss fights introducing new zombie variants. The game’s core pursuit is the animalistic nature of swinging makeshift melee weapons at unending queues of zombies. Each fleshy zombie becomes damaged in unique ways, depending on where and how you hit them, and the kind of weapon you used to do so. The advanced zombie variants regularly appear to mix things up with higher-stakes affairs, pushing the player to make more creative use of their weapons, defensive maneuvers, and the environment.
The game takes a mostly grounded approach to the player character’s ability, with most weapon swings feeling slow and deliberate to give a sense of exertion. The feedback the player gets from making their own impactful, violent mark is so barbarically fulfilling that it disturbs some players.
An Attractive but Ultimately Cursory Facade
Dead Island 2 is not an open-world game, but one of several discrete areas, some bright and expansive, some dark and claustrophobic, others a complex upper-class suburban labyrinth. The game’s juxtaposition of bright and sunny LA and a portrait of American excess, along with the macabre nature of the walking dead, takes more than a few pages out of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.
The game’s approach to satire is more often akin to the likes of Grand Theft Auto by way of Far Cry. The core supporting cast fares better from sitting at the more dramatic side of the scale, though the strange places the plot of Dead Island 2 ends up going is never really completely explored to any kind of meaningful fruition.
Like a music video, that extraneous color and flavor don’t really need to make complete sense. Dead Island 2 is fulfilling in that respect. By the end, it leaves you teetering on that precipice between wanting a little more and feeling satisfied enough.
Dead Island 2 is a satisfying, perpetual cycle of gory combat, and its sunny surroundings are just inviting enough to keep that momentum going. The game’s focus on being a ‘walkable’ game helps make the world of Dead Island 2 feel expansive without really being so. The game’s unique features and thrilling gameplay make it a must-play for all zombie game enthusiasts.
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