Dead Island Ryder White Review:

Downloadable content, at its core, is about delivering more of what players loved in an original game. For a game like Dead Island, this should mean a new area to explore, new weapon mods, new skills to use in levelling up, a new game mode, a new set of characters to play as, or at least a re-spec option for your original characters. The first DLC, the Bloodbath Arena, added a new area that gave players a new game mode they could enjoy in the midst of the main campaign, so what does the second DLC, the Ryder White Campaign, bring to the figurative table? Not a lot, it turns out.

The Ryder White Campaign shows us the events of Dead Island's story from the perspective of the titular Ryder White. There's nothing new here in terms of gameplay, with the same types of enemies, the same weapons, and the same areas (albeit slightly remodeled) from the main game. As Ryder, you begin at the makeshift landing site of your recently crashed helicopter and fight your way through the city of Moresby to finish objectives your own soldiers failed to complete. You eventually work your way to the prison and begin setting up the chain of events that leads to the four heroes coming face to face with the final boss. Being a game focused strongly on melee combat, there are certainly blunt objects and knives available for use against the walking dead, but about a fourth of the way through the DLC, ammo will be around every corner, making the gameplay much more firearm-focused than the original Dead Island campaign.

Contrary to its announcement trailer, Dead Island's story is hardly emotionally engaging and is only occasionally somewhat coherent. That being said, it's undeniable that the Ryder White Campaign provides some truly intriguing plot twists that fully change the context of the ending. However, the campaign caps your character at level 15 from the start, giving you no freedom to level up or customize Ryder to suit your playing style. There are only a few available mods for you to use to customize your weapons, and no merchants available to sell old equipment or buy new items. There is no co-op available at all, and instead of freedom to explore and quests or secrets, you can only march forward on a linear path toward the ending. The campaign is also incredibly short, with my final time clocking in at three hours and fifty-three minutes. There aren't even any achievements to promote replaying the game or trying to do things differently.

All in all, the Ryder White Campaign is a nice idea that is disappointingly executed, and only the most die-hard of Dead Island fans should bother spending 800 Microsoft points on it.