I saw State of Decay on a Steam deal and grabbed it a week or so ago.
Oddly it had a sequel release (State of Decay 2) in May of 2018 but has yet to be released on Steam.
Anyways, it is zombies and it is mildly entertaining.
Concept is a good one IMO... zombie apoc sandbox where you build up your home base and group of people with various skill sets and personalities.
You can tell it is a port from console because many of the controls feel really clunky at times or they don't exactly have seemingly obvious features, like if i am carrying a rifle and a pistol, to switch between them I have to go into my inventory and equip the gun I want, which isn't feasible while I am being attacked.
Conversely the consumable items are all available for quick use via the mousewheel and F button.
They have this concept where you can play as any survivor in your group so long as they are in the Friend status for you.
As you switch between more people you have to modify their inventory before going out.... they keep w/e you leave them and they pick up junk and clutter their own inventory.
Also you can have a friend accompany you going out into the world, but it costs 100 influence (influence is the game world's currency) and often as soon as you talk to someone for a mission, your friend peaces out and like walks home.... even if you are super far away from home.
Btw that 100 influence, at least in early game is a large amount, so having it be wasted simply because you talked to a guy about a mission is annoying.
There's a woman on the radio telling you about stuff going on, time-sensitive missions you can go do.... I kinda like that dynamic, but she seems to be chattering about a new thing or new mission non-stop.
Not sure if they designed it that way, but every second of the game there's 8-12 things to do and 8-10 of them are time sensitive so you can probably only accomplish half of them.
Which leads me to my biggest grievance... there is a nice map you can look at, but the game does not pause... so the only real time you can safely review the map and decide where you're going next and how you're getting there, is if you are inside your home base or if you've like climbed a tower where it is safe.
Combat is more/less button mashing melee, but they did a decent job with it where noise and mini-swarms of 10-15 zombies continually feel dangerous, because they are.
Game is fun, but between the clunky port stuff and some of the flaws of the game overall, it is no slam dunk.
blog.us.playstation.com
