Get ready to vomit. Dead Island, the zombie survival game is due out on September 6, 2011 and the game should come with its own barf bags given the level of gore and violence and mayhem.
It’s from developer Techland and published by Deep Silver and distributed by Square Enix. The game utilizes the Chrome Engine and is designed for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360. It’s a first-person shooter in a sandbox environment and has both single and multiplayer modes. For anyone who has seen the trailer will know that this game has kicked up one heck of a buzz concerning its future release.
“Special class zombies”. That’s what the game boasts and that should have been your first warning before stepping into this game. It is evilly gruesome and gross with no one spared any mercy as you go through trying to survive on an island infested with zombies.
Nowadays zombies just won’t let up and in this game you have to use customizable weapons, vehicles, and other strategies to survive. The Special Class Zombies are what gets you. They’re like super-zombies or something that just when you think you’ve figured out how to beat down a zombie with an ax or or baseball bat, a Special Class Zombie shows up and totally upends your game play.
We’re talking gross to the max possible levels. Picture hordes of zombie enemies coming after you and they look like the stuff the butcher shop throws out at the end of the day, dressed up in clothes and heading right at you. Fortunately you have your choice of four hero class characters to play as, to battle the flesh eating nightmares and that’s where you should take the time to learn about each one’s abilities.
Some are brute force and others more tactically oriented. Developers have also included a four player cooperative so you can have yourself some zombie bashing parties, whilst trying to eat snacks without throwing up.
The graphics are excellent too assuming your have the required equipment to show it to its fullest potential. They needed to be to make a game about a beautiful tropical island the centerpiece for bloodthirsty zombie mayhem to ensue. The gameplay is more than just a fist person shooter. You have to choose and select the right tool for the right zombie, as well as the smartest action to achieve the best results.
It’s thick with options and the baseball bat with nails in it sends out so much blood when you’re bashing in heads that you might flinch now and then to keep the blood from splattering off the screen. The bat is one weapon, but you have a sinister assortment of goodies that set zombies on fire so that they roast in the open, and then you can meat cleaver them while they’re sitting there writhing and sizzling. It’s just gruesome all over the place.
The island is big enough that the developers have included vehicles for your killing pleasure. Of course these can be modified too. It’s so satisfying to run over a zombie and watch their body parts come crashing through the windshield still spurting blood.
You have allies along the way who team up with you to battle the zombies, and they use a combination of weapons of their own so you need to watch out when they start killing and maiming as body parts will be flying all over the place.
We wouldn’t be surprised if this game gathers the kind of following that other games enjoy the success off. The reason being is that it’s very competent, gives the player the basics but adds its own quirkiness to make it stand out a bit. It could use more but for right now it does just fine, and lets remember all the footage that has been seen of the game so far is still in beta mode so who know what will change by release date. If the game can be modded for the PC it will be a super monster hit with gamers.
Changing the zombies to look like enemies of yours, or adding fan story and strategy will boost the game’s credibility even more. So there you have it. Dead Island contains Blood, gore and mayhem with great AI, storyline and lots of horror. Just the kind of ghoulish gaming you’ve been looking for and easily a contender for our Top 10 PC Horror games of 2011.
