Dead Island

Dead Island set a zombie apocalypse on the tropical island of Banoi, where a group of surviving tourists, immune to the infection, try to escape a paradise turned into a hell full of the infected. The game combined survival horror with RPG elements - characters had their own skill tree split by combat style, weapons could be upgraded and crafted using scavenged parts, and combat took place primarily in melee, with an emphasis on physically believable hacking and severing of the infected's individual limbs. The island's open world offered dozens of side quests, trading with survivors, gathering materials to upgrade weapons, and gradually unlocking new areas from luxury beaches through a resort to a town and inland jungles, with each area featuring its own types of infected and side stories about survivors.

On Xbox 360 the game supported co-op for up to four players, which significantly changed the pace and difficulty of combat and allowed roles to be split among different character types specializing in different weapons, from bladed edges through blunt weapons to firearms. Technically it stood out through the contrast between the idyllic tropical setting and the brutality of the zombie attacks, while the melancholic music accompanying the launch trailer became a viral hit even before the game's release, setting high expectations that the game itself only partly fulfilled with its story depth and technical execution.

At the time the game was criticized for technical shortcomings, repetitive quests, and weaker storytelling, but was also praised for its addictive combat system and the atmosphere of a tropical paradise turned inside out. Today Dead Island is respected mainly as one of the first major cooperative zombie survival titles of its generation, one that inspired a number of later games in the same genre and paved the way for its own sequels and spin-offs set in the same universe.

Why play it: For fans of cooperative zombie survival, it's one of the genre's first major titles, one that inspired many later games, despite its technical shortcomings at launch.