Dead Island: Definitive Collection

 PC
User Score
7.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 127 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 85 out of 127
  2. Mixed: 24 out of 127
  3. Negative: 18 out of 127

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  1. PublicNuisance
    Jul 18, 2019
    8
    I really enjoyed the original version of Dead Island so when a Linux version of the Definitive Editions was made and went on a deep discount I couldn’t pass it up. Overall I would say that there wasn’t much difference from the normal version. The graphics are a bit better but it’s not like the graphics of the old version were bad. The gameplay is pretty much the same. I played through soloI really enjoyed the original version of Dead Island so when a Linux version of the Definitive Editions was made and went on a deep discount I couldn’t pass it up. Overall I would say that there wasn’t much difference from the normal version. The graphics are a bit better but it’s not like the graphics of the old version were bad. The gameplay is pretty much the same. I played through solo and had a blast. I never felt like there was a point where the game needed you to have a group of human players to progress. Everything felt doable solo which is something some co-op themed games will fail in.

    You get to pick from 4 characters to play as. Their backstories don’t really matter because they don’t get much explanation in game. What will matter is what kind of playstyle you prefer. Each character has a different speciality for weapons whether it be blunt weapons, edged weapons, guns, and throwable weapons. You will gain XP for completing quests and killing zombies. You can then use those points to upgrade various skills. It really does a good job of allowing you to tailor the upgrades to how you want to play. There is also a fury mode which when enabled will send you into a frenzy where you can do much more damage then normally which is very useful on hordes or mini boss type enemies. I picked Xian whose speciality was edged weapons. It is very satisfying to hack off zombie legs, arms and heads. When using blunt weapons you can also crush their skulls and bones.

    There were a few negatives along the way. I pretty much had to turn enhanced navigation on. With it on it literally gives you a line to follow to your next objective on your map. I don’t like this type of handholding but with it turned off the objective marker on the map would often dissappear for me. I would rather have my hand held then have no idea where to go next. There were also a few points in the game where enemies could shoot me through walls. I could also shoot them but would have no idea they were there until they began shooting because I can’t see though walls. There was also a glitch in the jungle level for a bit. Basically for the first bit in the jungle there were no fast travel options to that area and some side missions would send me back to other areas. I could then not be able to travel back to the jungle once complete. I had to quit the game and reload it and would be auto inserted back in the jungle with my progress intact. This issue went away about halfway through the jungle section. There was also a flickering issue. It would happen maybe once every few hours for about 2-3 seconds and then go away so it wasn’t a major hassle but it is still a bug.

    I played Dead Island Definitive Edition on Linux. It may not show it on Steam but I purchased this game back in 2016. I am just getting around to playing it now due to an issue where the game would crash before loading the main menu. At first I just put the game on the back burner expecting the glitch to be ironed out. I kept reinstalling the game to see if it was fixed but several years later, updates to game, kernel, Mesa drivers, and trying several different distros and the game still had this issue. I finally put time into solving it. What was the cause was a file called “LibGL.so”. The game was made to only work with a specific version of that file. As you can imagine over the years updated versions of have been made. The game will crash with anything newer than that version and no distro I tried uses one that old. The file is also not included with the game, it uses whichever version your OS has installed. I had to download a copy of the correct version file and drop it into the game folder. Once I did this the game launched just fine. The performance was great as well. I ran the game maxed out at 1080P and my FPS was usually 80-100 or higher. It supported framerates above 60 which was fantastic. There was no manual saving but the game auto saves after every completed task so it isn’t terrible although I would prefer manual save. There was support for Vsync, one AA setting, one ambient occlusion setting, as well as 7 other settings to tweak. Alt-Tab worked just fine. The game did crash once but just the one time and no more. Not bad for how much time I put into it. My CPU usage during gameplay was usually around 30%, my system RAM usage was usually around 5GB and my VRAM usage was usually around 2.2GB. The game took up 9.22 GB of storage and uses Techland’s own engine called Chrome Engine 5. I played version 1.1.2 of the game.

    I paid $3.30 CAD for Dead Island Definitive Edition. I can say that for how much fun it was it is easily worth $50 CAD. It has some bugs and issues but none overshadow the fun I had. I finished a solo playthrough in 26.5 hours.

    My system:

    AMD Ryzen 5 2600X | 16GB DDR4-3000 CL15 | MSI RX 580 8GB Gaming X | Mesa 19.1.2 | Samsung 850 Evo 250GB | Manjaro 18.0.4 | Mate 1.22.1 | Kernel 5.2.1-1-MANJARO    … Expand
  2. VG_Alex
    Feb 2, 2020
    8
    The first person game with action elements, the gameplay and background of the game are very interesting, the customized weapon system is one of the core of the game, which enriches the fun, the defects are obvious, the details and plot narrative need to be improved.

    8.0 Good
  3. Smock
    May 31, 2016
    9
    Bigger, better, faster, kill them all.

    - Better graphics ; lot of improvement
    - New power fist
    - All DLC included
    - Better load screen too
    - A good optimisation
    - A good price if you have the original Dead Islannd

    Cons :

    - No FOV slider
    - No FPS limit
  4. DefinitiveHero
    Jan 28, 2022
    10
    Very solid open world zombie game, that is for some reason extremely underrated. It’s not better than Days Gone, but it’s way better and more fun game than Dying Light. It comes down to two factors - horror and atmosphere. Dead Island has amazing tropical island atmosphere, while Dying Light takes places in boring looking city. Also, Dead Island has actual nice horror vibe to it, whileVery solid open world zombie game, that is for some reason extremely underrated. It’s not better than Days Gone, but it’s way better and more fun game than Dying Light. It comes down to two factors - horror and atmosphere. Dead Island has amazing tropical island atmosphere, while Dying Light takes places in boring looking city. Also, Dead Island has actual nice horror vibe to it, while Dying Light is not scary at all. None of them are extremely scary, but Dead Island at least tried to be and in some cases, it does it well. I have a feeling people often forget that this game came out in 2011, before all the other major open world zombie games. This was one of the first real ones and for that alone deserves a lot of respect. Dying Light 2 seems to be way better than Dying Light 1 and seems to have even some horror back, but Dead Island will always be better zombie games than Dying Light 1.… Expand
  5. Mehrab4K
    Jun 1, 2020
    10
    Dead island and Dying light Is a best game i ever seen and i recommend play this game with controller
  6. TheRadiosongs
    Jan 28, 2022
    10
    This is perfect zombie game, beautiful location, good sound effects, very good graphics for a 2011 game, beautiful women in bikinis and tons of zombies!
  7. Pmstz
    Jan 31, 2023
    7
    Very nice, fun and solid open world zombie game !
    recommanded.
    +++++++++++++
  8. Ferrell
    Mar 2, 2018
    5
    This game deserves some of its praise, just not all. The combat in the vanilla game boils down to how many times can you kick a guy and throwing an electric weapon at some big zombies. The graphics would have been good for a 2012 release, but this is a 2016 re-release that has only added the Ryder campaign from what I understand (more on that later) and didn't do much, if at all, for theThis game deserves some of its praise, just not all. The combat in the vanilla game boils down to how many times can you kick a guy and throwing an electric weapon at some big zombies. The graphics would have been good for a 2012 release, but this is a 2016 re-release that has only added the Ryder campaign from what I understand (more on that later) and didn't do much, if at all, for the graphics. This game was definitely made to be played with friends, but the single player mode was challenging on its own. The gameplay is extremely repetitive and I would be lying if I didn't say it seemed like a chore to do all of these errands for people in the zombie apocalypse. Get fun with it! Make up crazy quests that have twists and turns! Make crazy characters that give the game flavor, characters that players will remember after they play! It seems a lot like Left for Dead 2, and it pretty much is that for most of the game (if you play multiplayer). Now for the included DLC. I think Techland made a smart decision having the dlc only $10, considering the lack of a lot to do in it. With the little story Techland put into Dead Island, they threw a curve ball our way that I was actually shocked by. It gives a lot of ammo to you through the entire thing but you get swarmed with enemies so much that you still feel helpless, a feeling which I tend to like in zombie games. Finally, this game could have done so much with a tropical setting; going through all the crazy scenarios something like the zombie apocalypse. Instead, it felt like a generic zombie survival scenario. If you really feel like getting it, wait for a sale… Expand
  9. TheHungryMingo
    Oct 25, 2021
    6
    The saving grace of the game is 4 player co-op. I didn't feel much incentive to play more than a few hours solo, but with friends its much better. It's janky, so if you want a polished game this isn't it, but it can add to the chaotic fun. The gameplay loop can get repetitive, made worse by making you run back and forth through the same area 20 times, but still fun non the less.
  10. SilentHightimes
    Jul 14, 2017
    5
    The first 9 hours I had fun I had stabbed, slashed, beat, Kicked,burned, and dismembered around a thousand zombies and completed all side missions and main and headed to act 2 just to find out I'm going to have to do the same thing all over again in an uglier environment with Zombies that had, even more, life than before. I just can't keep playing this repetitive game any longer. I can'tThe first 9 hours I had fun I had stabbed, slashed, beat, Kicked,burned, and dismembered around a thousand zombies and completed all side missions and main and headed to act 2 just to find out I'm going to have to do the same thing all over again in an uglier environment with Zombies that had, even more, life than before. I just can't keep playing this repetitive game any longer. I can't stand the repetition the ugly aimer, the guns and be having to hit mobs over and over again back and fourth back and fourth like its an MMO stuck to a path and no one else is playing during my 14 hours of gameplay, not one other person was on or joined.… Expand
  11. Finnstone
    May 31, 2016
    10
    hack hack hack, lvl up, slash, slash, slash, lvl up, loot loot loot, lvl up, quest quest quest, lvl up, skill points skill points skill points ... best zombie game out there. 10/10
  12. dotrem
    May 20, 2021
    5
    Game pretty big, so many details, locations, fore sure that copy-pasted but anyway there are a lot of way to explore. But gameplay interesting in first couple hours only, when you get first weapon, kill first zombie, find first survivor. After thing still same, generic rpg route. Boring craft system, you can choose fire, electric or poison element and add it to weapon. And after spend timeGame pretty big, so many details, locations, fore sure that copy-pasted but anyway there are a lot of way to explore. But gameplay interesting in first couple hours only, when you get first weapon, kill first zombie, find first survivor. After thing still same, generic rpg route. Boring craft system, you can choose fire, electric or poison element and add it to weapon. And after spend time and a lot of money to repair this.
    Thing what i really have is a map. This is joke how bad is it. You don't have a map for all game areas. Markers randomly disapears. Map shows mad direction to quest marker.
    But yeah in early 2010x game was interesting. You played it with freands, and it was so good. L4D, Payday etc were so popular back in the days. But in single player when you have a time to notice flaws the game are looking terrible.    … Expand
  13. jelikey
    Nov 5, 2017
    6
    The first 9 hours I had fun I had stabbed, slashed, beat, Kicked,burned, and dismembered around a thousand zombies and completed all side missions and main and headed to act 2 just to find out I'm going to have to do the same thing all over again in an uglier environment with Zombies that had, even more, life than before. I just can't keep playing this repetitive game any longer.
  14. LimpDingus
    Jan 22, 2019
    7
    Before I begin, I know a lot of the negative reviews are geared toward the fact the original game was removed from Steam and replaced with this remaster. That being said, I did not own the original version on PC, so I have no complaints there. I have however put in a couple hundred hours into the original title on Xbox 360 some odd years back.

    To start things off, let's look at the    Before I begin, I know a lot of the negative reviews are geared toward the fact the original game was removed from Steam and replaced with this remaster. That being said, I did not own the original version on PC, so I have no complaints there. I have however put in a couple hundred hours into the original title on Xbox 360 some odd years back.

    To start things off, let's look at the negatives I've experienced

    Cons
    |
    - Movement/Controls: I played this using an Xbox One controller and it felt like I was ice skating the entire time. Character control as a whole feels almost lagged and slow to respond.
    - Combat/Analog: As I said, overall control is slow and combat unfortunately falls into this. Also, hit registration seems to be set to miss roughly 35-40% of the time. 1 inch too far = miss, 1 inch too close = miss.
    Analog is an option they added specifically for the combat in this game that allows you to customize your attacks. Pull your analog stick in any direction and then flick it to attack your enemies. Sounds cool, doesn't work; It slows the combat further and makes the game near unplayable.
    - Bugs: Every game has them, but this one is still plagued by some that have been present since the game first launched in 2011. There are many audio bugs that will have you hearing things as if they were right beside you that aren't even there(explosions, fires, screaming, etc.). While I'm mentioning audio bugs, I must warn of very, VERY loud spikes in audio that last for only a split second. Another occurrence, resting enemies and dead bodies are prone to levitating or just standing. Getting stuck is very common and very frightening, usually it happens in doorways and while trying to traverse rock. I should also note, some of the achievements are bugged as of the writing of this review. Finally, but not least, the worst bug in the game that has been around since launch... randomly blowing up. No joke, not sure why it happens, you will be walking, driving, fighting, AFK, doesn't matter. You will hear loud explosions and then you will be killed(every time you die you lose money). I used to think it was multiplayer related, but I've had it happen while switching the online feature to Offline. It doesn't happen often, but I've had it happen twice in this version.
    - Story: Without going into any spoilers, the story of Dead Island isn't what I would call lazy writing, but it isn't great either. The story feels rushed, and yet at the same time, it feels drawn out. It really begins to overstay it's welcome for me in Act 2 and then gains some traction again in Act 3.

    Pros
    |
    + Graphics: This remaster really went further than I would have guessed in terms of graphical overhaul. Now, I'm not saying everything looks jaw-dropping, but from a distance it looks very beautiful. The brand new lighting system is one of the most notable differences for me, adding light sources randomly throughout the world really livens things up. Higher texture resolutions with just a few low resolution textures here and there, but nothing too distracting. Replaced small things such as the brown smog with simpler partical effects which cleans the air up and looks way better.
    + Remodeling: They have remodeled nearly everything from building, world objects, survivors, and enemies with more polygons than the original version. They even went so far as to add new enemy variation, so it's not just the same 5 zombies attacking you anymore. Only complaint with the remodeling is the new thug they introduced which is about half the size as the old one.
    + UI: They've done away with some of the hideous old UI and updated it with a nice, simplistic update. In the original version, accepting missions would bring up and physical object that would have mission details on it along with some clunky animations. This was a slow task and has been replaced with a simple, easy to read pop-up menu. All menus have also been given this same treatment. Also, ghost objects(where the game wants you to place somethings) has been updated to where you can actually see it now.
    + No Crashes: Thankfully, this remaster fixed a problem the old version had a lot of, which was constant crashing. Again, I played the original back on the Xbox 360, so maybe it was just poorly optimized for console. Either way, I have had absolutley no problems with this verison.
    + Frame-rate: The game runs at a steady 60fps(V-sync) on maxed settings with my FX-8350 and GTX 1060 6GB. I know this is originally a 2011 game, but with this remaster adding more polygons and a new lighting system, you would expect performance to take quite a hit. There are a few times where my fps will drop for just a second when loading in large chunks, but this isn't at all a problem.    … Expand
  15. Iowntheworld
    Feb 15, 2022
    10
    Dead Island is far from perfect, but in 2011 it was at least somewhat original concept, after all open-world zombie games weren't really a thing back then. Overall it's literally only decent game that Techland has managed to make. Dying Light 1 had extremely boring environment and meh story and Dying Light 2 is just an absolute joke.
  16. tangerine_dream
    Jun 14, 2023
    5
    This game is very good when played in co-op, but in general it's boring, buggy, blurry piece of junk with primitive combat (just right click them zombies to death), weapons constantly breaking, and uninspiring plot (go fetch these packs of juice, go find a car, go drive away, go kill these bandits etc.).
    There are better zombie co-op games though, and if you want single player melee    This game is very good when played in co-op, but in general it's boring, buggy, blurry piece of junk with primitive combat (just right click them zombies to death), weapons constantly breaking, and uninspiring plot (go fetch these packs of juice, go find a car, go drive away, go kill these bandits etc.).
    There are better zombie co-op games though, and if you want single player melee zombie smasher, just play Dying Light 1 from the same devs, it's amazing & has fixed all the flaws of this game.    … Expand
  17. Pluk_Dejv
    Jul 4, 2022
    1
    A fairly ordinary graphic remaster of the rather unusual first-person zombie slasher, which includes all patches, DLC and additions, including Dead Island: Riptide. A small bonus is a classic-style arcade slasher, but it won't really excite ordinary fans of 3D action games.
  18. Nick7000
    Mar 7, 2023
    9
    Прекрасный тайтл. Увлекательный, захватывающий, залипательный. Если какие-нибудь минусы у него и есть, искать их я решительно отказываюсь.
  19. imalynxcat
    Aug 15, 2023
    6
    vuruş hissi çok zayıf, karakter hareketleri çok keskin ve oynarken çok göze batıyor.

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
70

Mixed or average reviews - based on 8 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 8
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 8
  3. Negative: 0 out of 8
  1. CD-Action
    Aug 21, 2016
    70
    Everything that was good in the original Dead Island and Riptide (like the combat system and the co-op) is still good in the new versions remastered with the Dying Light engine. Unfortunately everything that was bad (like the writing and repetitiveness) is still bad. [08/2016, p.59]
  2. Games.cz
    Jul 18, 2016
    60
    Fairly common remaster of a quite unusual first-person zombie fighter game, which includes all the patches, DLCs and add-ons, including Dead Island: Riptide. Small bonus is a classic arcade fighter game; however typical fans of 3D action games probably won't be pleased.
    Read full review
  3. GameOver.gr
    Jul 7, 2016
    70
    A quite decent package that contains the two Dead Island games with updated graphics and lots of extras. It’s not something really new, but if you’ve missed them on their initial release now is the time to try them out.
    Read full review
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