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With news that Dead Island 2 is alive and coming next year, what better time to look back at the brilliant trailer that arrived… wait for it…eight years ago!
Yes, the first time we were treated to our first glimmer of Dead Island 2 was back in E3 2014. And what a treat it was.
For those who haven’t seen the trailer, you can watch it below – but be warned, it’s pretty gruesome. I must have watched it about 100 times.
There have been hundreds of games released since this trailer was released. However, despite thousands of other trailers, playthroughs and accolades, Dead Island 2 still always cut through the noise. And let’s not get started on just how many Zombie games have released in that time.
Everything from the music, to the concept – which sees a man jog along a Miami seafront oblivious to the carnage going on around him – is just genius.
Smaller things, such as his perfect hair revealing itself as a hair system and flying off in the wind were hilarious as his body slowly transformed into a zombie.
The payoff, which sees our protagonist get run over by a car is shocking at first – but in time it got me thinking. This guy had no idea that just moments after going for a run his life would end. A trailer that manages to balance on the tightrope between being funny and violent but still manages to get you thinking is a rarity these days.
(It’s not the first time a Dead Island trailer has caused a stir, of course. The trailer for the original game was famously all over the internet, and even picked up awards from the Cannes Film Festival.)
Most of all, still after all these years I am excited about the prospect of Dead Island 2. I’m overjoyed that we’re seeing glimpses of what looks like gameplay footage and I’m hoping the promise we saw eight years ago has materialised into what could be an exceptional game.
The trailer offered everything – a sense of scale, humour and violence. With eight years worth of hype now behind it, Dead Island 2 has a lot to live up to, but the trailer can give us hope that at its core it has everything it needs to still stand out from the crowd.
