Do you remember when zombie games used to really be about survival? I’m not talking about surviving a wave of zombies in some generic first person shooter multiplayer mode. I’m talking about true survival; you being thrust in an environment overrun by hordes of zombies using only what you can scavenge to defend yourself.
At PAX, I had a chance to experience the hands-on demo of Dead Island and it was definitely a breath of fresh air (by fresh, I mean the aroma of rotted flesh filled the air). Dead Island harks back to the traditional points for playing a zombie game: blood and gore, survival, and thrill. Granted, games like Left 4 Dead offer that, but not with the in-depth approach Dead Island takes.
So how does Dead Island differ from other zombie titles, like Left 4 Dead or Resident Evil (can that even be considered a zombie game anymore)? Well, for one thing, Dead Island is not just about running around and shooting up the place. It’s about carefully choosing when to engage a horde of zombies. You aren’t given an arsenal of weapons. You are a survivor; that means you can only fight with what you find, and what you find has limited durability. In the demo, the paddle I scavenged actually broke in the middle of a zombie encounter. It literally snapped in two as I cracked the skull of one of the zombies. Zombies were swarming and, with only my fists, I decided it was better to just run. This is just one example of how Dead Island makes an authentic survival experience.
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