Long-awaited Dead Island 2 reveal headlines Gamescom announcement frenzy
This gallery of Dead Island 2 gameplay footage is pretty gruesome; clicking through gets more violent from here on out. [credit: Deep Silver / Dambuster ]
Eight years after its public announcement, Dead Island 2 finally looks like a video game-and its bloody, polished gameplay reveal capped off a lengthy Gamescom opening night presentation of video game trailers and announcements.
The open-world zombie survival game, as developed by British game studio Dambuster, also got a firm release date of February 2, 2023, on current- and past-gen consoles and Windows PCs (via Epic Games Store). It uproots the series from its island origins to a zombie-savaged version of Los Angeles (or, as the trailer calls it, "Hell-A"). The gameplay reveal for this melee-focused first-person game is so ripe with detailed facial animations, massive open-world environments, and gory amputation that we wonder how it will scale down to the Xbox One's hardware. Still, the trailer does a solid job emphasizing humor, conflict, and solid voice acting, which might be the production-value spark this game needs to stand out from so many video games about open worlds, zombies, and gory combat.
Gamecom's event didn't have a unifying concept beyond "game studios who paid for premium placement," so the rest of this article will highlight the event's revealed games that stood out, either because they followed up on previously anticipated games or impressed as new teases of gaming fun to come.