most of the reviews ive seen have mainly complained about it not changing enough and gave it a way lower review than the first.

So is the game bad or just not improved over the first and thus deserving the crappy scores?

I heard people say that riptide is basically the third act of dead island. There is no resort this time which i thought was the best part of the first dead island. I would wait till the price goes WAY down for this

Dead Island 1 was a decent surprise in that it had a cool setting and some interesting mechanics that made it a fun bad game. But at a certain point the things that made that game fun stopped being fun and the bad was all that was left; a sequel that did nothing to improve the bad or even the good things about the game is bound to get far lower scores now that most people have had their fill of Dead Island.

Hm, I'm thinking I might wait until Deep Silver pay me to play it...

Something tells me they should have left this island, for dead...* Badumtisch *

If you want more Dead Island then it's well worth your time. If you don't then this won't change your mind. Personally I'm about 4 hours in and still having a blast but I'm one of the rare people who enjoyed the first game all the way through.

I enjoyed the first one despite the flaws. I'm playing Riptide with a friend and we are enjoying it. Only problem is nothing was fixed. They did add some minor stuff but not enough to satisfy that annoyed feeling in the back of my mind that they could have fixed so many little things. Other than that we are having a good time.

I thought the first one was terrible, and this looks like something they didn't improve at all. So both!

I concur.

The first one was a really good idea that could have been a cool game if it was made by a competent developer. It's sad to hear that they didn't fix the problems in this one.

Me too. I would pretty much say the first its the worst retail game I have played any part of since Conflict: Denied Ops.

From what I understand, this game is a more polished (albeit slightly polished) version of the same game with a new character and a new location/story. If you enjoyed the first game and felt like you need more, then this will be right up your alley. If you didn't like the first, well, spend your money elsewhere.

I had played most of Duke Nukem Forever earlier that year, so it certainly wasn't the worst retail game I'd played in 2011. But I would have given Dead Island two stars when I played it. It is a POOR game.

It does not sound as though Riptide has solved my issues.

It seems like it'd be decent for people who want to pay less than 60 dollars to play Dead Island but cant find a discounted copy of the first game... I guess?

Too bad, I was hoping this was a bit more than Dead Island 1.5. I found myself enjoying Dead Island despite itself, and managed to get most of the way through a second playthrough, even. Still could've used some gameplay enhancements, though. I'll get this when it's five bucks on Steam.

Played for a bit, seems like more Dead Island. It's been pretty clear since the original that people are either going to love that or hate it. Personally, I love the formula, I love the combat mechanics, and it's a blast with a group of friends.

Like a lot of people, I never assumed this would be a full blown sequel, pricing and development time make it pretty obvious that this would just be more of a standalone expansion than anything. I dunno how long the game is, I've heard 12-15 hours, which seems to fit the $40 price tag.

Definitely a bummer they didn't fix some of the more glaring issues from the original game, but I'm still excited to jump into that game world again and smash some heads.

I'll be picking this up later today, so I'll find out soon enough. fwiw Total Biscuit did a quick look of his own, and stated how much fun he was having. Caveat was he never played the first game, so its unchanged state meant nothing to him. And just watching his vid and GB's gameplay vid, the game does looks utterly the same. Still, I'm looking forward to bashing some zombies around, a feat which DI does very well.

Right. Just play Left 4 Dead instead.

That's all I need to know. It seems there is a consensus that Dead Island's resort was the only really fun part, so the fact that nothing in Riptide tops the resort, I'll pass on it.

Eh, Just do what I'm doing, watching The Original Dead Island TNT A.K.A. Truck Warz!

God Damn was the beginning of that first game fun... such a shame this one is kinda not fun...

With how it's reviewing, I'm guessing that isn't very far off in the future.

Noticing there seem to be a lot more zombies milling around this time, I went in a house that had to load in and was instantly run at by like 8 at once, which was not fun.

As soon as I walked in, it also told me "Find the gas can" so I spent like 20 minutes clearing out zombies and couldn't for the life of me find an actual gas can anywhere, so I'm not sure what was going on there.

Still loving the analog combat tho, it's not going to be everybody's cup of tea or keep them engaged, but it definitely clicks something in my mind that makes me want to keep playing.

if you wanted more of the same stuff that first game was giving you then boy does deep silver have something for you.

I'm enjoying it for what it is. I hear it gets bullshit-hard later on, which might sour my good will, but for now I'm just enjoying running around and killing new zombies with new weapons while laughing at new ridiculous fetch quests (but doing them anyway because the combat is still a blast).

Two changes that really stick out, besides the big(-ish) new systems: 1. Zombies don't drown anymore, which is either nice or shitty depending on the situation. 2. The new leap attack is baaaaaaaaaa-roooooken! It glitches constantly, and you can often trigger it by being half an inch higher than the target. It's hilarious.

I do really like the weapon type leveling, as well as the new guy's healing buff thing.

But like the reviewers say, if you didn't absolutely love Dead Island, just don't bother.

I'm waiting for the moment down the line when Jeff suddenly decides to openly shit on the game; like Majora's Mask.

I doubt Jeff will ever play it. Of course I guess that hasn't stopped him from openly shitting on other games like Red Dead Redemption.

I completely agree with the complaints leveled against it, but I've played about ten hours so far, and I've been enjoying the hell out of it. I certainly think it's more of the same, but I really had a lot of fun with the first game (even in its later acts), so that's not a deal-breaker for me.

As for the difficulty, I'm playing with the Asian knife expert, and it hasn't been too terrible. The only disappointing part has been the random drop-ins I've played with. They've randomly killed civilians, been general assclowns, and haven't really helped do much of anything. That's disappointing, especially since I had such great experiences in the first game with random players. But I guess that's the nature of online gaming anymore - ruining someone's experience so you can have your laughs for a few minutes is the new social norm. Ugh.

May this should have been released as an expansion.

Must say that I was expecting the worst after reading Brads review of the game but I have had a good time playing this game. Its been pretty long since I last played Dead Island so maybe the long break helped to keep the gameplay interesting.

There are lots of small improvements in the game. For the lovers of zombie bashing I would recommend this. Others would be well advised to stay away from buying the game. Its kinda an aquired taste thing.

I've been playing for like 17 hours between my own campaign and jumping into friends' games to play, and I've been having a great time with it. No, the story isn't great, but it's tolerable, about what I'd expect for a game where people are working to escape a bad situation.

All in all, still glad I bought it, I'm still not tired of the analog combat system, and have only had 2-3 times where the game broke so badly that I died and/or had to reload (2 of those going underwater for no reason and drowning).

If anyone wants to add me on Steam to play, it's Krakn3dfx (or maybe [3dfx]Krakn, can't remember).

Looking at a lot of the responses from people to this game, there is a common thread among many people that the initial resort area in Dead Island was the best part. I don't want to presume that everyone says this for the same reasons, but the common statement seems to be that this was the most open world part of the game with the most to explore.

Having played 4-5 hours of this game so far and roaming around the opening jungle map, I am confused at the reaction that this game doesn't have the same openness that the first game did. There is nothing about this opening area that feels small, or that doesn't let me take a number of different paths through the map. I almost feel like the opening map is bigger and covers more variety of terrain and setting than the first one did.

If you don't like the game, you don't like the game. I'm not trying to tell you that you're wrong, but the critique that (at least the opening area) this game is less open to exploration than the resort level seems like its being looked at through rose coloured glasses. Go back and play that act again... there might be a lot of paths, but they're all just as narrow as this, but with less variety.

Like everyone I really wanted them to take this idea of theirs of making a zombie based, first person, Diablo style game all the way. They need to make sure their combat is solid and doesn't bug out (Xian's special jump attack doesn't *ever* seem to land). The quests are just tasks meant to send you off and play the game, so they should let you skip the useless dialogue and have some more randomized events/encounters. I like the little dead zone tasks and bosses, but if you don't like the combat being as dangerous as it is than I can see why you wouldn't like it. They also need more items in their craft/loot system... armour or clothing... set items like Diablo 3.

They took a bit of a step in that direction by letting your character cause more damage with a certain type of weapon the more you use it to level the skill up. If they had a system where a set of armour enhanced a strength skill for example, and the strength is a modifier that enhances the force damage of weapons... that's one way they could beef up the RPG system without encumbering it with too much stat modification. They could also stand to add just a few more combat skills for each character to spice it up a bit.

So... I guess to answer the question, no I don't think it's that bad. I haven't seen the game devolve to the prison level (the only part of the first game I disliked), but to be fair I haven't played all the way through. I'm enjoying playing with other people, and when I'm not, I also enjoy taking my time and treating the combat like encounters you would have in Dark Souls. People get frustrated because they can't wade in and just win quickly I've seen, but that's not what this game is.

If you didn't like the first one, and were tired of the first one though? Yeah... don't get this game.

Finally got around to finishing the game. Since user reviews are still broken and relatively pointless at the moment, I thought I'd share a few quick thoughts.

-The game isn't as good as the first, as you've guessed by every review by now. Neither game has a really strong plot, but the first definitely has better pacing. Overall though, I really had a lot of fun with Riptide. The new weapon class leveling system is neat (though it could have used another 5-10 levels, as you'll max them out rapidly - with Xian, I had a maxed out Blade skill before even leaving the jungle in the first playthrough, and had most of the others maxed out soon after). The defensive missions aren't too terrible, though they're often a means to stretch out the game's campaign, similar to Halo Reach.

-Whereas the first game had three or so major environments plus its ending prison, the second game has two major areas split by a fairly annoying bit of traversal through some underground WWII bunkers. It's not nearly as bad as the sewers from the first, but you'll want to have your waypoint marker option set to "Always On." It helps, particularly if you're having trouble reading the mini-map like I did. The two major environments are essentially a swampland, filled with riverways and some light jungle, and a city, which thankfully is easier to traverse than the first game's town. Indoor areas are recycled all too often, as are visual assets from the first game. Unlike something like New Vegas, which attempted to add some cool mechanics to the backbone of what was already there, Dead Island Riptide never really improves upon the first game, instead just sort of stalling in every area.

-The new enemy types are pretty rad, though most of the basic zombie types are just variations on what you found in Dead Island. The best of the bunch are the screamers and the beefy Thing-looking mutations. It's nothing you haven't seen before, but the new enemy types do make the enemy killin' a little more interesting.

-I have seen a lot of reviews talking about the game's difficulty in single player, but I had no trouble beating the campaign solo. I had a couple of people drop in for random co-op, but to a man, every one of them acted like a douche, so I made my game private and finished it myself. If you are going to play solo, go with Xian. You can "cheat" the bigger baddies by concentrating on her bleeding/poison skills, which are terrifically effective at stopping just about every enemy. In fact, I beat the last boss in a matter of seconds just by abusing a poisoned katana. Her skills are practically game-breaking. Just be sure to invest in some stamina regenerating skills along the way - she tires quickly at first.

-Speaking of leveling, the skill trees are divine. Not all the skills are as advertised (as mentioned by another user, Xian has a jump attack that never works right), but by the time you hit level 50 or so, you'll be a walking powerhouse. I'd recommend investing heavily into XP boosting skills at first, and then working on playing towards your character's combat strengths. Even the football hero is a more viable option this time around, thanks to a heavier emphasis on allowing you access to all sorts of weapon types right off the bat. Every character should have weapons appropriate to their combat focus practically from the get-go, so if you're playing as the new brawler, you should be able to find some brass knuckles or something similar in short order and be able to focus more quickly on making your character useful. You'll level pretty damn fast, too. That's sort of nice.

Most of this sounds negative, but I honestly liked my experience with it. I plan on playing through to level 70 with Xian and figuring out where I want to go from there. If the assclowns popping in and stealing mines and causing gamebreaking bugs on purpose didn't sour my mood on it early on, I likely would have finished it in days rather than weeks. I won't recommend it, simply because all the reviews dumping on it are technically correct. But if you're like me and you enjoyed the first game enough to look past its problems, Riptide's not too bad. Then again, with Hellraid looking like a reskinned Dead Island, maybe you ought to just wait for that.

i don't understand why everyone's bashing this game...it's very fun game and slashing zombies to death with tons of weapons is very fun the only thing i really hate about it is the respawning zombies...u know u kill them u walk away few meters and back u will find them alive and in the same place