Dead Island: Riptide Review - Better Off Dead

[Susan Arendt]

I had a bad feeling about this game when i saw it was starting out at 40 dollars instead of the usual 60 dollars for new games. it sounds like this is a expansion turned sequel much like SR4 is which is too bad it looks like deep silver was counting on fan loyalty and some gimmicks to sell this one.

Oh come on, if they'd released it for $60 you'd have people ranting about paying "full price for a glorified mission pack". Seems like publishers literally can't win sometimes...

As a fairly late adopter of the 360 version of the first Dead Island game I have to say I never really saw any of this "buggy mess" people rave about so much. Seemed fine to me. The gameplay criticisms, yeah, those were all fair.

Did the reviewer not play much of the original game? The "blueberry" whiteboard featured several times in there, too.

Sounds like Riptide is going on my "buy preowned in a year's time" list. Just quickly, is is pretty much the same game? Same mechanics, same skill tree, same 4 characters, same controls?

Also, did anybody play the Ryder White DLC for the first game? Is it any good?

The reviewer played the entire first game. There were graphical shortcuts there, too, which I noted, but they're even more evident in Riptide. The first Dead Island was more enjoyable, so it was easier to overlook its shortcomings.

Also, I answered your questions in the review - yes, it's the same game. Same characters, same mechanics, same mods, same gameplay. A few new elements, but none that add in any significant way.

 

[Batou667]

The reviewer played the entire first game. There were graphical shortcuts there, too, which I noted, but they're even more evident in Riptide. The first Dead Island was more enjoyable, so it was easier to overlook its shortcomings.

Also, I answered your questions in the review - yes, it's the same game. Same characters, same mechanics, same mods, same gameplay. A few new elements, but none that add in any significant way.

Sounds... mediocre. I won't rush to get this one. Thanks.

 

[Parakeettheprawn]

that it only got a written review instead of a video review plus written review like the first one speaks volumes...

i am sure the game is just a mod that was turned to a standalone game only to reek in some money. or at least it feels like it.

Actually, that was just a factor of me wanting as much time as possible with the game to make sure that it had the issues I thought it had. If you play a game on a certain day and have a bad time, that might not be the game's fault, per se. But I played all weekend long and just got angrier and angrier as I went.

So...well, I guess it does speak volumes, but perhaps not quite in the way you might mean.

Man do I know what you mean -- I had the same thing when playing XCOM: Enemy Unknown for my blog review. At first I started experiencing some bugs, even a mission breaking one that forced me to restart the game. I started to get worried, considering I only got it around Bioshock Infinite's release as a pre-order bonus, figuring Firaxis would have found bugs like this, but kept patiently trying to see if it would even out.

It didn't. It got WORSE. It actually stopped saving my games, whether autosaves, quicksaves, or manual saves. Texture glitches. Missions glitches. AI freezing up and lagging, camera and UI issues... I'm kind of surprised at myself that I'm still trying to beat the game. I'm sorry to hear it was probably even more disappointing for you than XCOM:EU was for me.

 

[Darks63]

Also, did anybody play the Ryder White DLC for the first game? Is it any good?

The Ryder white dlc is crap there is no leveling up so no skill tree nor is there any custom weapons.It also very linear not that the original game is super open world but it allows some freedom of exploration.

 

[KhaoticOne]

Welp i knew this game was gonna be bad. I dont really see any sign of improvement or admission of fan feedback from all the videos i seen.

Nothing entirely wrong with more of the same, except when its more of the same broken frame.


Will pick up with a friend on sale, if that.

 

[RobfromtheGulag]

Ever since Farcry [1] I have been willing to give a pass to just about any game with a tropical setting*. This falls neatly into that category, as did the first Dead Island, which I would otherwise have been much harder on. I'm also fine with cliche zombie scenarios. I still go to the theater for each new Resident Evil movie. I've just arrived at the first island in DI:Riptide, but everything's been great and it's looking to be a solid 7/10 experience if nothing else.

*(Ironically this is the only reason I will tolerate FarCry3).

 

[hazabaza1]

Like with the original Dead Island, I'll pick this up once the modding community has gotten its hands on it and made some awesome stuff.

Dead Island mods? Any I should look for? I didn't even know mods existed for the game.

Behold, the "Make Dead Island a good game" mod.

 

[Tanner The Monotone]

As people don't care about facebook comments, I shall post what I said here:

Alright, now that I've played it I can give a simple opinion. It's more of the same. It really is just one massive dlc.

But this is to be expected. A lot of game developers are making these quick games before the console generation ends to gain some quick money and remind people of their existence. The new Gears of War game is just that. I have a feeling the next Assassin's creed will be one too.

For this reason, none of what you pointed out surprises me.

 

[KhaoticOne]

Anybody get the FOV headaches?

I cant play the first one game (thank god for the helper) for more than 20 minutes without feeling it and then im out for most of the day. Supposedly you can change the INI files to portray a different FOV but by doing that will mess up gunplay can anybody confirm?