Well, at least it's more indicative of the game than the trailer for the first one was.

This is going to end VERY well...

Off topic: Is this Dead Island 2 or something?

Furioso:
The company already stopped this and apologized for it, to quote:

A statement on the Zombie Bait Edition:

We deeply apologize for any offense caused by the Dead Island Riptide "Zombie Bait Edition", the collector's edition announced for Europe and Australia. Like many gaming companies, Deep Silver has many offices in different countries, which is why sometimes different versions of Collector's Editions come into being for North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia.

For the limited run of the Zombie Bait Edition for Europe and Australia, a decision was made to include a gruesome statue of a zombie torso, which was cut up like many of our fans had done to the undead enemies in the original Dead Island.

We sincerely regret this choice. We are collecting feedback continuously from the Dead Island community, as well as the international gaming community at large, for ongoing internal meetings with Deep Silver's entire international team today. For now, we want to reiterate to the community, fans and industry how deeply sorry we are, and that we are committed to making sure this will never happen again.

Source: http://www.twitlonger.com/show/kngs7f

I, for one, are glad they saw reason, but one has to wonder how this ever made it out the door in the first place

I'm not sure I see anyone "seeing reason" here, so much as "well, we thought it was okay, but if you're going to freak out, you do that, and we'll look sorry, just for you, over here, and still sell it."

Also, the gift of quote tags... if, you know, you want those.

Anyway, my day is now officially fucked. :\

Eh, don't really see the problem here.

I'm not all that well-versed in the horror genre but aren't boobs and blood pretty much a staple of it? You know, the big breasted blonde who always gets killed first. The smart good girl who always survives until the end. The gal in a relationship (or not) who has sex for whatever reason midway through and gets killed shortly after along with her boyfriend.

I don't really see how this is so very different.

It's about as intelligent and artistic as your average horror movie, which is to say hardly at all. But hey, it's not like the devs have some sort of responsibility to create intelligent artistic content, free speech and all that.

It's just a pair of fake tits and some fake blood, who cares? Isn't the entire point we're trying to make on violent video games that the human brain is perfectly capable of distinguishing between reality and fakes and thus any fake violence we might see does not desensitize us to actual real violence.

I never thought I'd be so disappointed to see a pair of breasts greeting me as soon as I entered The Escapist homepage...

Hagi:

It's just a pair of fake tits and some fake blood, who cares? Isn't the entire point we're trying to make on violent video games that the human brain is perfectly capable of distinguishing between reality and fakes and thus any fake violence we might see does not desensitize us to actual real violence.

I don't think that's why most people are upset about it, man.

I'm offended. Mainly because they thought that this would encourage me to buy the game, because they've slapped some tits on it, partly because I'm british, partly because of the blood (I have no FUCKING idea who that's supposed to appeal to, and I don't want to know...) Christ this is scary.

Were they even thinking when they send this offer out? At all?

Eh it looks like a takeoff of those "artsy" torsos you can buy in a store. I wouldn't want this but some people collect horror memorabilia.

What's with the oversexed female Zombie thing I've been seeing around lately anyway? Is it meant to be fan service or fan disservice (ie intentionally taking something that is usually fanservice and making it creepy and disgusting)?
I'm assuming it's the later. I'm sure someone somewhere will getting their rocks off to this sort of thing but I don't know that was the intent.

People are getting worked up about this? Eh, I can't be bothered to write out another long post. All I can conjure for this thing is apathy. It probably does appeal to fans of tacky horror memorabilia, who are we to judge?

On the misogyny front, it seems to me to be a complete subversion of the usual sexy-advertising thing by making boobs completely un-sexy. Apart from that, it doesn't seem to actually say anything about women whatsoever. The parody of he artsy female bust thing is actually kinda clever (not clever in any kind of deep way, just an interesting idea) and the obvious intention is to shock, not titillate, which makes all the porn comparisons seem kinda stupid.

Actually fuck it, I'll pick apart just one post before getting on with this essay. Procrastination to the max!

Patrick Buck:
I'm offended. Mainly because they thought that this would encourage me to buy the game-

That would only be worth getting offended about if they'd specifically profiled you and come up with it. Otherwise you're crying that this doesn't appeal to you when actually it's targeted to a different demographic so it shouldn't anyway...

Because they've slapped some tits on it

Well fair enough if boobs bother you that much.

Partly because I'm british

You're bothered by them using the Union Jack? I'm British too, flag pattern bikinis are quite commonplace... not sure what there is to be bothered by here.

Partly because of the blood (I have no FUCKING idea who that's supposed to appeal to...)

I'm guessing the kind of people that play gory zombie games? There tends to be blood in them...