Dead Island Message Board older than one year ago

Just when you thought it was safe to get back out of the water, Dead Island is ready to gobble up your brains. Out September 6th in North America and on the 9th everywhere else, the game already boasts one of the most talked about trailers of the year. This latest one still has evocative (and strangely triumphant) music in the background but the foreground looks a lot more like an actual game. Along with the emphasis on co-op we’ve seen from previous marketing material, there’s some enemy variety on show and an urban-type environment alongside the beaches and resorts. Enjoy. We’ll have words about our experiences with the game next week, which unfortunately makes them too late to be featured on the side of a boat or plane wreck. Boo. If the trailer doesn’t contain enough zombies for you, check out this Marvel digital comic prequel to the game. That’s got some in zombies, too.

(more…)

Liberal applications of slow motion and soft music put this zombie murder right back where it should be -- in the fine arts department.

#deadisland With a musical cue taken from the heartbreaking trailer that started all of this Dead Island excitement in the first place, here's the final trailer for Techland's tropical zombie apocalypse, hitting stores next week. More »

The Dead Island Total Game Integration continues in PlayStation Home as the second wave of the zombie horde is unleashed this week. Head to the Central Plaza this Thursday, August 25th and craft a new weapon – the Double Axe (which, by the way, allows for one of the coolest finishing moves in this game). Then get to hacking, slashing, bludgeoning, shooting, decapitating, and dismembering swarms of zombies in a series of bloody, hyper-violent challenges that allow you unlock a host of unique rewards – including the exclusive “Exploding Zombie Meat” weapon for use in Dead Island. Help the community reach 20 million kills and we’ll give everyone a special severed zombie head virtual item. What are you waiting for? Log in to PlayStation Home to play the Dead Island-themed “Zombie Survivor Game” and then preorder Dead Island directly from Central Plaza to receive an added bonus, the “Exploding Zombie Suit” – not available anywhere else!

Lockwood Publishing proudly presents the new Sodium Silicon Lounge personal space, available this Thursday. Set in a secret desert location, the Silicon Lounge is a visually-dazzling personal space that serves as a counterpart to the Sodium Hub. The Silicon Lounge personal space features:

• Ultra-cool after dark desert setting
• Colorful and stylish neon environment
• Animated interactive dance floor
• Integrated Lockwood Gift Machine
• Luxury underground hideaway snug
• Teleporters to Sodium2, SodiumOne and the Sodium Hub
• Animated raised stage area

The Silicon Lounge also comes in 3 excellent value bundles, so be sure to head to the Sodium store in the PlayStation Home Mall this Thursday to add this excellent personal space to your collection.

The PlayStation Home Mall will receive an update this week with the highly-anticipated Combat Armor Suits (as seen on last week’s post), Deus Ex costumes courtesy of our friends over at Square Enix, Lockwood’s Paintball items, and Konami’s new “gothic” collection. Add these awesome items to your collection when they hit the shelves this Thursday morning!

The PlayStation Home Community Theater receives yet another enormous update this Thursday. Watch as Hip Hop Gamer checks out the new Sony Bravia HX929 TV with its new blazing refresh rate. Next, PSTALENT.COM returns with the latest installment of The Spotlight. Afterwards, Replay with Doc takes a look at Payday: The Heist. Finally, HomeCast Rewind provides a special news report of the devastating zombie invasion in Central Plaza.

In case you haven’t heard, the next phase PlayStation Home’s evolution is coming this Fall. This renovation of PlayStation Home’s core experience integrates games, quests, community events and user-generated content, while providing players with additional navigation, shopping, socialization and entertainment options. You can read more about this exciting news HERE.

See you in Home!

Dead Island’s zombie epidemic has infested PlayStation Home for a gruesome limited-time game event. The latest in a series of on-going PlayStation Home “Total Game Integration” content offerings, this special event allows players to unlock an exclusive weapon for use in Dead Island by completing all 10 challenges in a PlayStation Home game based upon Deep Silver’s highly anticipated open-world horror action/adventure title. We’ve put together a list of challenges to help guide you through the undead mayhem as well as quick video that shows the gory and ghoulish action included in the Dead Island TGI event, available right now in PlayStation Home.

After you’ve taken the “Zombie Survivor Quiz” and unlocked Dead Island-inspired clothing items and snapped photos of yourself posing with the walking dead in the hilarious “Zombie Photo Shoot” game, approach the tiki bar in PlayStation Home’s Central Plaza to play the Dead Island-themed “Zombie Survivor Game.” Hack, slash, bludgeon, shoot, decapitate, and dismember swarms of zombies in a series of bloody, hyper-violent challenges that reward survivors with special Dead Island content – including the “Exploding Zombie Bait,” a mega-powerful weapon for use in Dead Island that can only be acquired by surviving the onslaught in PlayStation Home. Here’s a list of all the challenges (and what you’ll win for completing them):

• One Man Army – Survive all three waves of zombies in single player.
• Iron Will – Survive an entire wave in multiplayer without being downed.
• Nobody Left Behind – Survive an entire wave in multiplayer with all four players.

*Reward for completing challenges 1-3: Dead Island Deck Chair furniture item.

• “A” for Style – Kill zombies using every available finishing move in single or multiplayer.
• You Got Red on You – Stack up 100 kills in single or multiplayer.
• They Belong to Me Now – Cut off 200 limbs in single or multiplayer.

*Reward for completing challenges 4-6: Dead Island Suitcase furniture item.

• Handyman – Craft 10 different weapons.
• Here, Have Some Random Stuff – Craft and donate 10 items to the community.
• Smorgasbord of Stuff – Craft and donate every type of item to the community.

*Reward for completing challenges 7-9: Dead Island Electrical Machete furniture item.

• Completionist – Complete all nine challenges.

*Reward for completing challenge 10: Exploding Meat weapon for use in Dead Island.

After you football kick the head off of a twitching, dismantled corpse (yes, that’s a real finishing move) be sure to pre-order Dead Island directly from PlayStation Home’s Central Plaza and receive an exclusive “Exploding Zombie Outfit” for your avatar. Do you have what it takes to decimate the ranks of the undead menace or are you just another meal in waiting? Log in to PlayStation Home today and show the reanimated hordes of the walking dead what you are made of.

When the zombie apocalypse strikes, it will be of utmost importance you set the appropriate mood, and thankfully composer Pawel Blaszczak knows exactly how to do that. Blaszczak wrote the spine-tingling soundtrack to Dead Island, and he's now sharing a few tracks so we can prep our survival kits accordingly.

You'll want a melee weapon -- baseball bat, crowbar or frying pan -- for the slow walk down a deserted hallway at the 20-second mark of "Surrounded by Zombies," and a well-stocked crossbow for the panicked rhythms in "Zombie Rising." The "Main Theme" will play when you awake from a coma, exit the shower or begin walking to work to find the world overrun with the undead. Because that's how this stuff works, even on islands.

#deadisland Pawel Blaszczak, a composer with credits on Call of Juarez and the first The Witcher, is handling the music for the upcoming Dead Island, whose soundtrack will be released separately in the game's collector's edition. Developer Techland let the Polish-language site Gameplay hear and share three of the cuts, embedded here and below. More »

#deadisland From its bittersweet debut trailer to its brutally gore-ified combat,Dead Island has captured the attention of zombie gamer around the globe. Earlier this week it captured my attention for several hours, and I wasn't entirely pleased. More »

Hooray! Just when things seemed really gloomy, here’s comes a zombie apocalypse scenario to put things into perspective. Even if your capital city is on fire and your “leaders” are unable to do anything but share holiday snaps, it’s worth remembering that you aren’t going to be eaten alive by the shambling undead. Ah, that’s a nice feeling.

See: the four-player co-oping in Dead Island that we’ve already seen a bit of already. Consider: that it’s actually not all that like Left 4 Dead. Suppose: that it might actually be fairly entertaining. Wonder: when the zombie games will end.(more…)

There seems to be only one rule when it comes to successfully escaping the dead island of, err, Dead Island: Leave no man behind. Unless, of course, that man has already been turned to the ranks of the shambling dead. Then you leave them behind with something sharp in their brain.

The season for big games has arrived and August’s Episode 39 set sights on mankind’s last stand, a prequel sequel in the future, and a tropical island…filled with (surprise!) zombies.

The lead feature is Insomniac’s Resistance 3. The Chimera have really made a mess of planet Earth, but with a co-op partner, and the return of the weapon wheel loaded with some pretty cool editions, there just might be some hope left for mankind. Veronica Belmont travels back to an alternative mid-century USA to meet up with one Joseph Caplelli to preview his daunting adventure.

If you’re into the Mod-scene, as in cybernetic body Mod-ifications in the future, then you’ll enjoy Eidos’ prequel sequel Deus Ex: Human Revolution. From Montreal, the Qore team dives into this immersive world of the future to preview the ‘mod’ upgrades, variety of styles of play, and discuss creative decisions made by game director, Jean-Francois Dugas.

While in Montreal, Veronica also checks out the local geek hangouts such as the Biosphere and Foonzo in another installment of ‘On the Road with Qore.’ But, that story can’t compare to the holiday experience on the Island of Banoi – the setting for Dead Island.

Zombies in paradise prevail in this survival game and Qore learns about the character choices, story, and dynamic changes that occur as you try to survive another zombie nightmare.

And finally, annual Qore subscribers also receive an exclusive Resistance 3 theme as we begin to count down to the September 6th release date.

We hope you enjoy this month’s Qore.

The opening of Dead Island sees you lurching through throngs of blissed-out partygoers, pawing at them desperately and mumbling incoherently as neon lights blur and swirl around the edges of your vision. But this isn't some unique narrative twist in which you begin the game from the perspective of an infected zombie. The explanation is far less sinister: you're drunk...

It's not that you don't want to play Dead Island -- of course you do. You love mangling zombies as much as the next thumbstick jockey. It's just ... what if she's there? You know ... the one from the trailer? It's bad enough that little Zombie Stephanie haunts your nightmares, but what if you should meet her in-game and have to stab her with a garden trowel?

Shhh, it's all right. We've got a solution for you: the Dead Island novelization arriving alongside the game from Bantam. The author, Mark Morris, is a successful horror writer in his own right, but he's also written novels featuring Doctor Who and Torchwood, so playing in someone else's world is nothing new for him.

We can't promise the little girl won't make an appearance, but at least if she does you'll be able to close the book and go get some warm milk. That's right, just set it down, walk to the kitchen, open the fridge --

OH GOD SHE'S IN THE FRIDGE!

... Sorry, she's not. Zombie Stephanie's not in the fridge. We just couldn't help ourselves.

#deadisland Inspired by the award-winning CGI trailer that sort of vaguely touched on the actual gameplay of Techland's upcoming zombie survival game, UK author Mark Morris delivers his take on the tropical carnage with Dead Island: The Book. More »

LARKSPUR, CA - Deep Silver announced today that shortly before its release at the beginning of September, the zombie outbreak from the highly anticipated game Dead Island will also spread to PlayStation Home, offering players aged 17 and up an exclusive opportunity to further deepen their Dead Island experience through PlayStation Home's Total Game Integration campaign...

Key features, zombie killing and melee action as you take the beach in this walkthrough!

We can't let him die. You owe him your life in this gameplay from San Diego Comic-Con 2011!

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the Ripper (no relation). As our more astute readers have no doubt already noticed, the Ripper is a baseball bat combined with a rotary saw. It's available for free to those who pre-purchase Dead Island on Steam.

The Bloodbath Arena DLC is another pre-order bonus, and pits players against multiple waves of zombies. Players earn cash and XP in Bloodbath Arena, all of which is carried over into the main campaign. The arena also includes a new weapon, the Sonic Pulse Grenade.

Dead Island is asking a $50 entry fee on Steam -- or, if you've got three reliable friends, a four-pack will set you back $150, essentially knocking the individual price down to $37.50. But can you really put a price on a baseball-bat slash power-saw thing?

#deadisland It's no surprise that Deep Silver's zombie title is getting an M-rating. The certificate just handed to it by the ESRB is still a little interesting for the bits of details it gives up from the game, from dialogue to gameplay features. More »

#preorder A preorder of Dead Island with Amazon will land buyers a digital art book filled with "game art and concept art of everything from the characters, that fat tourist dude with the camera, zombie types, environment concepts" and more, Deep Silver says. More »

Remember that Dead Island trailer? The ass-backwards slow motion one? Sure ya do! It just won the Gold Prize for Internet Film at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Congrats! [VG247] More »

Remember that excellent Dead Island teaser that spawned a nontroversy over its absence of gameplay footage? Well, it just won an award in Cannes.

But in the interest of clarity, we should note: This Cannes award isn't for the prestigious Cannes International Film Festival; rather, it's for the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, a "global meeting place for creative professionals in the communications industry." Yeah, it's an advertising award, not a film award, but that's okay - it is an ad, after all, and the Cannes event is a major focal point in the ad world.

The Axis Animation-developed short won a Gold prize for Internet Film, alongside massive brands like Google and Skittles. Not bad for a zombie game by an unsung Polish developer, Techland, and a relatively unknown publisher, Deep Silver.

Oftentimes with games, what you want is to gain knowledge from scratch. There’s a title, a genre, and what we need is to build information upon that. With Dead Island it often feels like things are working in the opposite direction, thanks to that trailer. Everyone invented their own version of the game, and the reality can often feel like the result of chipping away at this impossible ideal. So let’s scrap all that, forget the trailer since it has no real bearing on the game you play, and start getting interested from the ground up.

(more…)

Fluid multiplayer transitions discussed and more in this Dead Island interview!

A hangover AND a zombie attack? Not a good way to start the day.

#handson Dead Island had been sending mixed signals—I wasn't able to tell whether this title was meant to be a goofy splatterfest or emotionally devastating. Having now had the chance to experience the game first hand, I think it's trying to be a little of both. Surprisingly, the combination works. More »

If you ain't plannin' on dying together, you'd best get learnin' to fight together. We got our first bite of Dead Island's co-op at E3, which adds a lot more dimension to the overall game than the single-player experience we had before.

Getting the zombified elephant out of the room first, though, publisher Deep Silver says the game's animations and combat feel aren't yet finalized yet. A good thing, since many of the melee weapons still aren't satisfying. For a game that has three of its four core characters focused on beating the infected stuffing out of the undead, the melee looks like chaotic slashing and feels incongruent with the effort put into the rest of the game.

That's not to say all the melee weapons feel awkward, which makes the whole situation even more bizarre to explain. The baseball bats actually seem to have a heft to them, so when you're attacking a zombie there's a reaction. You'd expect the same kind of look from a heavy metal rod, but it just doesn't seem to jive. Whether it's the animations, zombie reactions or something I'm just not pinpointing, the melee combat still needs work. I didn't have an opportunity to try out a gun, but Dead Island if very focused on melee combat being core to the overall experience.

As for the co-op of Dead Island, now that's something worth possibly getting stuck on an island of the undead for.

When there's no more room in hell, the dead will go on vacation!

Every preview on IGN about Dead Island mentions the teaser trailer. It blew us away with how much emotion it conveyed, setting our expectations impossibly high for this zombie survival title. Yet despite not coming across as all that serious when various editors have seen it, one thing's agreed upon: Dead Island's still fun. There's a simple pleasure in bashing zombies with a club or machete and, unsurprisingly, it's better in four player cooperative mode...

It's all fun and games until someone gets bit by a zombie! Check out this outbreak trailer from E3 2011!