Dead Island Definitive Collection

It's been five years since Techland and Deep Silver gave us a zombie game that brought a dying genre back to life. Two years later, and we got a sequel that never lived up to its predecessor, but that still managed to keep us entertained enough. Now we're getting both games once more, only this time with even shinier gore and blood.

It's a beautiful sunny day. You wake up at a gorgeous beach resort on the island of Banoi after a few drinks too many and quickly realise something isn't right. The hallways are empty, briefcases are strewn all around (coincidentally, filled with just the type of stuff you need), and people are nowhere to be found. Then, as you walk out on a balcony, bodies start to fall, and you realise the hangover will be a really bad one. The bodies are zombies. Not just zombies, but the running type. And escaping them won't be easy.

This is the start of the first Dead Island game, which takes you on a journey through the island, where you find new survivors, battle against the living dead, and try to figure out how to get the hell out of there. In other words, it's what would happen if Far Cry and Left 4 Dead had a baby. It's a paradise turned rotten.

You follow a main storyline, but you're also given smaller side-missions along the way that will give you extra points. It's challenging, it's fun, and it's surprisingly scary. What is impressive about Dead Island is the fact that they are making you scared in a setting that most horror film directors would shy away from. A sunny day at the beach isn't exactly what most would associate with horror, but mixed with horrifying zombie noises and lack of overpowering soundtrack or clichéd thunderstorms creates an eerie sensation and a feeling of being completely alone. In other words, the scare is of a more "realistic" nature.

In short, Dead Island is... well, a lot of things. Sometimes it feels like the game doesn't really know what it is, but it offers a good mix of FPS, RPG, and horror elements that will entertain you for a weekend or two.

But it's not all paradise and zombie excitement, for the game has a lot of weaknesses. The mechanics are often a bit too clunky for their own good, and might take some time getting used to. And when it comes to the missions themselves, they're as varied as the characters you can play as are... you'll get it once you see the gallery of stereotypes you can choose to play as.

What's most disappointing, however, is the plot itself. We all remember the emotional and beautifully rendered trailer that was released ahead of the first game, where we witnessed the last moments of a family through the reversed story of their daughter's fall to her death. It was shocking, heartbreaking, but necessary, for it made things human, which is an element that can make or break a zombie game. Unfortunately, we didn't see a lot of this in the actual game. And sitting here now, it's hard not to compare Dead Island to The Last of Us, which used the element of humanity to make the story as memorable as it is. Dead Island's story is the complete opposite.

Then we have Dead Island: Riptide, and everything stated above, both in terms of weaknesses and strengths, still very much applies. It starts where the last game left off, and you meet up with the stereotypes yet again, the ones you still won't care about. They're stranded on a different island this time, alongside some new survivors who also look like they had one too many Botox shots. This time you're trying to get off the island, which will soon be nuked - yes, they used zombie cliché number one in this one. You try to survive, get away, kill zombies - everything from the first one. And, if you're anything like us, you'll start to wonder who the real zombies in this game are, given the fact that the zombies have more facial expressions than any of the people you're trying to save.

Playing through Riptide felt the same way it did when we saw 28 Weeks Later, the sequel to 28 Days Later - it's pretty much the same repetitive stuff, and with no real element of surprise. But it was still fun to smash zombie heads and upgrade weapons Dead Rising-style, despite the stiff faces, clunky fighting mechanics, and cheesy voice acting.

Now here we are with the Definitive Edition, a collection of the games that were some our favourite tools of procrastination, only presented in HD on newer consoles. Much was promised in terms of improvements - higher resolution, better graphics and new lighting are only a few of the things, and yes, the game looks a whole lot better. Movements are softer, colours are more intense and the surroundings are even prettier, and we couldn't help but wish that this had been what it looked like the first time we played it. Nothing new is added to the gameplay, but that's what you would expect from a remaster. But pretty isn't always enough.

Even if Dead Island and Dead Island: Riptide (to a lesser degree) were great games when they first came out, they now come across as old and outdated, especially considering that nothing new has been added to the gameplay itself. The graphics, the story, the voice acting and the zombies themselves are simply not good enough by today's standards. It pales in comparison to Techland's Dying Light - an evolution of the concept if you will - that came out last year.

Graphics were never the real reason why the games originally weren't perfect tens. It was the lack of a story, good dialogue, variation, and the clunky mechanics that were the weaknesses.

The one thing that actually adds to the game other than pretty colours is an entirely separate game - Dead Island: Retro Revenge. The game is an old-fashioned 16-bit side-scrolling arcade game, where you kill various types of zombies while playing what appears to be a younger and more athletic version of Jack Black. Is it good? Well. It's okay, and it works as a time sink once in a while if you just want a quick fix. It's a cute tribute to retro games, and the developers probably had fun making it, but as a standalone game it doesn't impress.

Dead Island: Definitive Edition is a pretty upgrade of the classic zombie series. It's challenging, entertaining, and you get three games for the price of one, so if you've got some time to kill (literally) between the new releases this year, travelling to the gore-fest that is the Dead Island franchise isn't the worst thing you can do. If you've already played through the series, however, it probably isn't worth a revisit. Because unlike remasters such as Grand Theft Auto V, there isn't anything that has been added to the experience. And after playing more recent zombie games, especially Dying Light, Dead Island feels old and outdated, which naturally affects the score.

If you're new to the series, give it a go and have some good old fashioned zombie slaying fun. But for those of us who've already visited Banoi, we suggest taking a trip somewhere else as no matter how much makeup you put on a corpse - it'll remain just as dead.