Dead Pixels 2 - EGX Preview

One of the more visually exciting booths at the indie area was Dead Pixels 2. Sequel to Dead Pixels (obviously), the title taps into the 90’s gamer in everyone by offering a co-op side scrolling action game reminiscent of the River City Ransom, Streets of Rage 2 and even the more recent Scott Pilgrim vs The World.

Gameplay is fairly basic, you kill zombies with weapons; the beauty of it is how you decide to do that. Dead Pixels 2 boasts a fairly impressive weapon and loot system meaning there is an impressive amount customisation for your arsenal. I spent the first half of the demo wandering around with an antique blunderbuss, cause why wouldn't you?

Alongside the impressive amount of guns there is alas a surprising library of melee weapons, the game even encourages you to use them over the guns at times. Add to this throwable explosives and you've pretty much got all you need to cause some mayhem and destruction with your friends over multiplayer.

It's nice to see a 2D game like this feature a fairly impressive world, one that lets you the player, enter buildings to scavenge items which can be used or sold for money. There's almost elements of Fallout in the way the economy works, something that make exploration far more valid.

I did have an issue with how scarce ammo is, especially for a game designed around gun use. I often ended up running away from zombies whilst looking for ammo I could scavenge, but this rarely equalled the crowd of zombies I had amassed. This was a big issue for myself and also a friend that happened to play it, it was actually the first thing we both said about it.

Dead Pixels 2 has a lot of potential, the game represents an era of gaming that many, including myself, absolutely adore. The inclusion of four player split screen is awesome, and really acts as the games calling card. As much as things change, they also kinda stay the same; Dead Pixels 2 is far from tame.