Dead Island 2 Review (Mevic)
I cannot, in good faith, recommend this game when other games, and even older games, do this concept much more justice. Now I am a huge OG Dead Island fan so my bias will definitely show here but I will try my best:
The main story is short, bland, and has a terrible ending not even worth spoiling. It tries to both tie itself into the original by bringing back a fan favorite, while simultaneously trying to retcon how the infection worked and neutering the personality of that fan favorite in order to fit the terrible californicated story. The side missions don't do much better, though that is where you will find the best characters in the game. Most of those side missions are simple fetch quests across relatively tiny zones, or trying to track down missing people who will always be dead. Many of the side characters are fun, but are often underutilized. I think the most Cardinal sin this game commits is ending on a cliff hanger, then not having any of the DLC be related to the cliff hanger itself. That's just wild.
As for the gameplay: it's objectively worse then most other AAA titles in it's genre and even worse than the original game. I understand that this game went through hard development hell, but it was better served just giving the Genre over to Dying light and saving the money on the title. The new weapon damage system is simplified to an elemental system which converts all damage of a weapon to a given element type. This means that whole weapons in your arsenal are rendered useless in certain areas of a game. The original game and Dying light both remedy this issue by adding elemental damage as additive to the original weapon damage. That way any given weapon isn't completely useless in a situation while still punishing a player for using a damage type that an enemy has an affinity for. This method is objectively better for the player but still not utilized. They cut out enemy types from the original game completely; replacing them with Elemental versions of old enemies and one new enemy type that you do not encounter until literally the last few missions of the game. They cut driving entirely from the game, opting for several small walkable zones vs. three or four large zones. This choice cuts a large section of gameplay that was in both the original and it's competitor Dying Light. Running over zombies in cars is something we've expected since Dead Rising and it's silly not to have it here. The smaller zones means there is less to do and less to discover. Lastly, and this is something that is particular to Dead Island: The first game had a setting in which you could aim and release your strikes in a certain direction and this feature completely changed the dynamic of certain weapons. This was a wonderful mechanic and completely unique to the first game and I was greatly disappointed not to see it make it's return.
Sure, the graphical fidelity and gore in this game is very good. The sight of a claw hammer crushing it's way into a skull and actually seeing the skull cave is very impressive. But the small zones and repetitive enemy types just doesn't do the graphics full justice nor do the graphics make up for this games other sins. As someone once told me: "a polished turd is still a turd."
I played 50 hours, 40 of which was spent trying to mindlessly recreate my fun from the original game. I had genuine fun for about 20 of it. I'd say it was worth the $10 sale price but not the time it took to finish. If your interested in a first person zombie game like this and you haven't played Dying Light or even the original Dead Island, then go there first.