The prologue of the game is a heady atmospheric start to an amazing game, I'm 100% serious about this. I haven't seen this much care or thought placed into an opening of a game since Silent Hill 1. The mood lighting for the slightly abandoned hotel is enough to draw you in and peaks of sun keep you wondering what will emerge from this newly created hell. The couple from the trailer make a lazy appearance as you scoot around the hallways, stealing money and loot, which was something we thought was mildly racist for a black character and then we realised my friend chose the character coz he sounded like Morgan Freeman's slightly slow cousin.

The prologue is strong in making it single player as the closer explains how your bros are there. I could not recommend playing co-op more than I can curse at a mate when there's a zombie on my back and you have a gun and you don't even use it, Chris...The game is a heady blend of exploration and just all out fun and when people compare it to Fallout, I've always believed the series could really do with a graphical update, a nicer setting and better zombies...but Dead Island does lack in a lot of places in comparison.

The characters are unfortunately strictly built around stereotypes and that is their strength and weakness. You listen to a small audio biography of the characters Sam, Xian, Purna and Logan. The characters are all from different backgrounds and all look incredibly different which is fantastic, the amount of dynamics that are – or rather could play out is quite good. I'm not sure how far into the game you have to be, but only playing about 5 hours of the game, the characters didn't interact more than just cursing at each other or sharing a tiny bit of backstory about what they were doing and what they're gonna do next.

It's fairly bland in some places and could have been potentially fantastic. I didn't expect an epic sweeping romance, but you'd think that Purna, a half-aboriginal Sydney cop and Sam, a New Orleans born tough guy would talk about their prejudices and how the zombie outbreak doesn't have those prejudices and how that's kind of amusing and how this whole situation is sad, but no, no interesting dialogue, no key character development, just fairly bland and blank chit-chat in between quests. It's not too much to ask, it always feels like an after thought and zombies are always a good reflection of societal issues from everything from mass media to overpopulation to consumerism, but here, in paradise, it's just a big shambling bore fest.

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