Visually, Monarch Studios is the most diverse location in Dead Island 2. Sure, this is primarily due to it being a movie set with the areas literally being 'designed' by film staff, but it's also one of the only areas that has unique zombie designs tied to it with the zombies in the Ruins Set. And, while it's a relatively small area of Dead Island 2, especially compared to something like Venice Beach, there's still a lot to do here. Players will find themselves doing a variety of Quests for one Sarah Sheppard, who plays the lead in Space Fox 2250, an in-game nod to multiple franchises (such as Mass Effect and Starfox).
And, the last quest they'll do for her and her cowardly companion Sebastion is called The Terror of Sound Stage 7. In this Side Quest, players will be hunting down a couple of contracts for Sarah from the 7th Sound Stage as well as a rare zombie that's been preying on other zombies and corpses in the area. So, let's go over every aspect of this Side Quest, step by step.
Clear The Ruins & Investigate The City Set
After accepting the Quest from Sarah (who is in her Trailer this time rather than by the giant animatronic spider), players will want to just follow the blue compass marker into the Sound Stage. This marker will lead them right to the Ruins set that they became intimately familiar with during the Main Story Quest Michael Anders and the Holy Grail. Once Dead Island 2 players make it on set, the Quest objective should change to 'Eliminate all hostiles in Sound Stage 7's ruins set'. As soon as this pops up, the zombies should start digging up out of the ground on the set and players will want to take them all out, preferably by using both the Light Rig and Rain FX Switches just for the sake of convenience.
After clearing out the Ruins, players will be told to 'Set coordinates to Sound Stage 7's city set' which they'll remember also from the Holy Grail quest as the set where they needed to get a breaker to open the door forward. Return to this City Set following the blue marker and immediately the objective changes to 'A hidden Terror lurks within these streets. Investigate its victims'. In this section, players will need to find the three different corpses the Terror was chowing down on spread out around the set and interact with them. Here's where to find them:
- The first one, the Half-Eaten Corpse, is marked by the quest marker in the middle of the set.
- The second one, a Dismembered Corpse, is in a small enclosed area just to the right of the dumpster on the right-hand side of the exit door.
- The last corpse, the Rotting Corpse (which bugged and was invisible to us), is on the second-floor area just to the right of the Dismembered Corpse.
After interacting with all three corpses, the player's Slayer will make some cheeky comments about the Terror not coming out of hiding before the objective change to 'The Terror is a Butcher! Lure zombies to the city set and kill them to bait it out'.
Lure Zombies To The City Set & Draw Out The Terror Of Sound Stage 7
This next objective is one of the only ones in all of Dead Island 2 where players are told to actually lure zombies to a specific area rather than just killing them on sight. To lure out the Butcher AKA the Terror of Sound Stage 7, players will need to bring zombies into the City Set and kill them, 5 zombies, to be exact. The quickest way to do this is to run outside of the city set, fire a single Nail Gun or Pistol bullet into 5 nearby zombies, and wait til they get a bit closer before throwing either a Meat Bait or Bait Bomb Curveball (two of the better Curveball options) into the City Set. Alternatively, players can specifically look for nearby Runner zombies and get their attention, as they move much quicker than the other basic zombie variants, making the objective a lot less tedious.
In any case, right after killing 5 zombies on set, the objective becomes 'Use the city's SFX to attract the lurking Terror'. This request is odd, because why did the player need to kill zombies on set if the SFX would've brought the Terror over anyway? Regardless, to do this players just need to interact with the Temple Doors FX, which is the right-most briefcase SFX in the middle of the set. Directly after this, players will notice a blue objective arrow appearing somewhere nearby, this is marking the Terror, and it's time to take it down.
Kill The Terror Of Sound Stage 7 & Report Back To Sarah Sheppard
Depending on how far the player made it into the Main Story before starting this Side Quest, this may be the first Butcher Apex Zombie they interact with. So, for those players, the best way to deal with these Apex Zombies is to simply shoot or hit their legs when there is a window, and then as soon as they're winding up to attack focus on Perfect Dodging or Perfect Parrying to make them more vulnerable.
Just swinging wildly won't work against Butchers as it does for most other zombies in Dead Island 2, as the Butchers will put up their Blade Arms in response and block all incoming damage. Thankfully, not too many basic zombies spawn alongside the Terror, so players can focus on it entirely since it's quite tanky. As long as players time their defensive maneuvers correctly, the Terror of Sound Stage 7 isn't all too difficult to deal with. Just make sure to pick up the Ravenous Survivor Skill Card off the Terror's body, as this Skill is incredible for massively increasing the duration of Fury Mode.
The Terror Of Sound Stage 7 Side Quest Rewards
After the Terror of Sound Stage 7 has been neutralized, it's time to report back to Sarah Sheppard about the player's success. Once this is done, the sci-fi star will give players the Jade Dragon weapon, a Superior Curved Sword with unique jade sections on its handle.
Alongside this, players will also receive the standard 3,000 EXP they normally get from most Side Quests. Overall, this Dead Island 2 Side Quest is about average in terms of rewards, with the Ravenous Skill Card being by far the best thing obtained from it. But the real reward is that doing this Quest progresses Sarah and Sebastian's storyline, eventually ending with one last Side Quest in Hollywood Boulevard where they reward the player with a Legendary Weapon for helping them out so many times.
Dead Island 2 is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X\S.