Game: Dead Island (Techland, 2011)

It was always going to be the case that Dead Island would never be as good as the announcement trailer. Debuting earlier this year, the trailer was a tight little story told Memento style involving the demise of a young girl. Both breathtaking and heartbreaking, it was masterpiece in short concise fiction and got everybody talking about the game. The only problem was it was a pre-rendered cinematic and showed absolute zero of the game itself.

For those who haven't played Dead Island, let me get to the point: no, it's nowhere near as good as the trailer. Is it, however, a good game? Yes it is, but it's also the most frustrating game around since Mirror's Edge.

There is no way it could be considered bad though. Whilst the story is paper thin (zombies plague holiday resort, you must escape), it doesn't mean the game's not engrossing. In terms of gameplay, it feel much like the bastard son of Borderlands and Dead Rising (1 & 2). From Borderlands it steals the RPG elements, with numerous missions that progress the story and reward the player with XP and upgrades and from Dead Rising it steals zombies and melee combat as well as modifications for your weapons. And the emphasis is on melee combat with plenty of items from sticks to machetes to use as killing tools. The player must balance the use of said tools though as continued battering wears them down and it aint cheap to repair them. Guns are available but their use is limited to only a handful of missions with most of said mission pitted against human enemies that have taken advantage of the disaster.

But the high emphasis on melee combat is also the game's downfall. Once you enter Act II and the city of Moresby, the difficulty curve rises sharply as, more often than not, you are surrounded by beasties from all sides. Whilst this in itself isn't a huge problem and is expected from city overrun with the walking dead, it quickly becomes apparent that Dead Island is a game built with four-player co-op in mind (further emphasised by every cut scene including all four playable characters). As such, many of the later missions are near impossible in single player as you are literally overwhelmed by flesh eating nasties. And, to add further frustration, once you die you respawn at the nearest checkpoint with the same horde of zombies waiting for you whilst your weapons retain their degradation prior to your death. Fighting the horde that killed you with weakened weapons does not denote a fun and flowing gaming experience.

But, when all is said and done, it made me want to keep playing. More so than Gears of War 3 at any rate as at least Dead Island featured enough variation to make me want to come back (as opposed to sitting through the deafening rattle of continuous gun fire from Marcus Fenix and pals). Much like Mirror's Edge, Dead Island is a flawed yet, ultimately, very entertaining foray into the survival horror genre. Any game that can keep you on edge during day light confrontations is doing something right.

4/5