Six top tips you should know before diving into Dead Island 2
4.21.2023
By Craig Pearson
Yes, you can hit a zombie upside its head with a bit of charred wood until it crumbles (the zombie, not the wood), but you can also tee off on one with a customized golf club that specializes in limb damage. One that sends a traumatized zombie careening, hitting, and hurting other zombies as you swing. No, seriously, take a look at our Lightweight Impactor Golf Club.
You won’t see that on the Old Course.
We’ve been playing Dead Island 2 with a sick grin, realizing just how heinous, and in-depth and over-the-top the level of interaction is. So we put together a small starter guide to give you a heads-up (and some heads off) in Dead Island 2’s melee of mayhem.
Here are six things we think will make your trip through HELL-A a bit less… Gnawful.
Dead Island 2’s six survivors have innate skills
There aren’t classes in Dead Island 2, but each of the characters has unique skill cards that fulfill certain roles. These cards are the only ones that can’t be changed. Here’s a quick rundown of the styles of play they create.
Amy has Relief Pitcher, which regenerates stamina with thrown weapons, and Divide and Conquer, which boosts damage when attacking isolated zombies. Her agility is high enough that she’s a good choice for players looking to skirt around the action.
Jacob has Feral, which stacks minor damage when constantly attacking, and Critical Gains, which boosts critical damage and regains stamina when his stamina is low. His high Peak Health means he’s a good selection for players who swipe as wildly and often as the zombies do. First-timers in HELL-A would do well with him.
Bruno’s Backstab boosts damage when attacking zombies from behind, and Rapid Reprisal increases his agility and heavy attack recovery when he blocks or dodges. Combined with his high Critical Damage, he’s a good choice for cagey, stealthy attackers.
Carla loves to fight. Mosh Pit boosts her damage when she’s battling multiple zombies, and Dig Deep boosts her Toughness stat when her health is low. Her high Resilience means she’s a battler of the highest order. Pick her if you don’t back down.
Dani’s Thunderstruck boosts her Heavy Attacks with an explosion, and Bloodlust means she regains health while slaying multiple zombies in quick succession. She has high stamina. She’s good for short, quick battles for those who like to fight in bursts.
Ryan's Retaliation card boosts his power after a successful dodge or block, and Seesaw adds back health when he knocks over a zombie. Along with his high Toughness, defensively-minded players should pick him.
Dead Island 2’s card system can change the game
Each of the six Survivors has four card slots, each with a category: Abilities, Survivor, Slayer, and the mysterious Numen (we’re not that far in). Those categories, like Survivor and Slayer, can have dozens of cards slotted into them, with effects ranging from powering up diving kicks and slide kicks, to complex environmental interactions.
So far, our favorite, Safe Space, sends out a blast that can interact with the environment. You can blow up Flammables with it, meaning you can save yourself and destroy things at the same time!
Dead Island 2 has swathes of zombie variants
Every undead in HELL-A has some sort of designation. The most basic are Shamblers, Walker, and Runners.
As you progress, variants will pop up, like Burning Walkers, and Riot Gear Walkers. The more you kill, the deeper your knowledge will be of how to deal with them, but some tactics are obvious. Burning Walkers can be extinguished; Riot Gear Walkers will have to be attacked quite heavily before you can damage them.
There are Apex Variants, too. These are mini-bosses that have more patterned attacks. The first you’ll encounter is the Crusher, who attacks the ground to send out a shockwave. If you jump these waves, you’ll avoid the attacks. And you can also lop their arms off to block their ground attack.
This is by no means an exhaustive list, but common-sense plays a large part in dealing with the various zombies, such is the environmental consistency of the game. Don’t fight fire with fire, basically.
Dead Island 2 is full of environmental violence
Exploding barrels are a staple of action games, but they’re just one element in Dead Island 2, where everything seems to interact, and you and the zombies can cause a cascade of visceral violence.
There are three main liquids that aren’t blood: water, fuel, and acid. You can spray liquid by kicking or damaging fire hydrants, pipes, or barrels, and these can be found all over the place. There are also Jerry cans, enabling you to control where these grim pourables are spilled.
Water can put out fires, prepare zombies for electric shocks, or clear up acid. You can bridge gaps in electrical wires with a drop of water, too. The acid can block off zombie hordes, melting them as they wander your way. Fuel is flammable and can burn up zombies and also set off major explosions.
Other elements, like electricity, can be spread through dangling wires and batteries or modded weapons. It’s consistent, so you can electrocute creatures swinging an electrified weapon while inside a swimming pool or deep water, but you can also zap yourself doing so. Throwing modded weapons, such as electrified machetes, into fuel and water will set them off. The weapons can be collected later.
If you can see the source of an electrical charge and need to turn it off, you can throw a weapon at it. Similarly, if you set off an alarm, you can find it and hit it to violently override it.
And everything interacts. It’s perfectly plausible to hit a car, set off the alarm, and be surrounded by effect-spewing zombies who end up setting each other off in hilarious ways. We hit a car with an alarm that brought in everyone. In that fight, a Slobber (mini-boss zombie) spat acid at us, accidentally setting off a Shocking Runner, who blasted out a zap of electricity that ignited an oil spill that exploded nearby barrels and took out the other zombies.
Here’s how we wiped out a pool of acid that was keeping us from a loot box: we spilled a can of oil that was nearby over the acid and then poured out a long line of it like a fuse for dynamite. We lit the line of oil, which ignited the can, which in turn set off some overhead sprinklers. The sprinklers washed away the acid, and we claimed the prize.
Dead Island 2’s customization can turn ordinary items into incredible weapons
It’s worth looking deeply at any weapon you collect to see if it has any unusual effects. Even a simple Sign Pole has the Bulldozer damage profile, which means it can cause a Forceful Explosion when thrown.
You can upgrade and change weapons at any workshop. Through a combination of Base Profiles, Mods, and Perks, you can create interesting, upgraded tools. The Impactor Mod, for example, can turn a simple Tire Iron into one that boosts Damage, Force, and also Traumatises anything it hits, leaving them vulnerable to a follow-up thump.
Our favorite base profile is Maiming. Zombies can be taken out limb by limb with critical hits. One weapon with the Maiming profile can do damage to multiple enemies when aimed correctly. Our current record is six limbs lopped off in one swipe, leaving a gathering of zombie admirers weak at the knees.
Should you fall in love with a weapon, you can spend some of the money that’s lying around in HELL-A to level the weapon up as well.
Some quick tips and tricks for Dead Island 2
There are storage lockers in certain safe areas. Check them. You can keep things in there, but it’ll also return lost weapons that you might have thrown and lost in the Unclaimed Property tab. It’s easy to do.
Your flashlight never seems to run out. Set it and forget it.
Remember where items are. Medkits, supplies, etc. They respawn. So do zombies, so it’s only fair.
Ran out of supplies or looking for a random weapon? Carlos, at Emma’s mansion, will sell resources and unique weapons. He also buys weapons at great prices, so don’t scrap them all. It’s better to store some in a storage locker and sell them to him.
Vendors also sell fuses, which you’ll need to access hidden areas off the main track.
We hope these tips help you with your slicing and dicing the citizoms of Dead Island 2, available now on the Epic Games Store.