Despite a long absence, Dead Island 2 is still what it originally set out to be: an open-world, co-op, California-set sequel to Techland’s well-received (if incredibly shonky) original. While that vision was first put together by Yager Development, and then passed onto Sackboy: A Big Adventure creator Sumo Digital, Dead Island 2 is now in the hands of Dambuster Studios, the folks behind Homefront: The Revolution. Rather than continuing its predecessors’ work, Dambuster has built a new version of Dead Island 2 entirely from scratch. Despite all this, that sun-soaked, humorous, pulpy vision from the original trailer remains. In fact, much of what I’ve played looks reasonably similar to the gameplay we saw of the original version, but with a few modern upgrades.
The short demonstration puts me in control of Amy, one of six different playable characters. The final version will support three-player co-op, for now I’m stuck solo in what Dambuster affectionately calls ‘Hell A’; a bright and bizarre Los Angeles that’s been devastated by a recent zombie outbreak. At this mid-point in the campaign, I’m on a beach searching for a laptop containing a ‘Blood Drive’ for plot reasons that I’m sure will make more sense once I’ve played the preceding hours. But for now, the only thing to care about is butchering zombies in increasingly horrific ways.