henke on 2/8/2013 at 11:04
MORE LIKE STATE OF DISMAY! MY DISMAY THAT IS ALLOW ME TO ELUCIDATE
I'm only 2-3 hours into it and I think I may have painted myself into a corner. My character is ill. So ill in fact that he can barely swing a wrench, and when you're trapped in Zombieville not being able to swing a wrench is a serious handicap. My next story mission is the one where I rescue a doctor and bring him to our hideout. The doctor could patch me up, but I'm not well enough to save him. Catch 22! Having some bed rest has the chance of curing my character, but the only way to make him sleep is by switching to another character. Which I something I also can not do since the only other playable character permadied a little while ago! So now what? Do I just have to start the game over from the start and not get really ill before I can save the doctor?
There might be another way. Perhaps some of the other survivors in town that I can save are also playable characters? Despite my poor condition (stamina and health at 30%) I'll try saving some of them and hoping for the best.
Oh yes, as for what the game is like: It's really rough around the edges. Character animations and graphics feel like something from an XBox 1* game. There's also some noticable pop-up of scenery, and occasional lag when driving. But the gameplay and the atmosphere are very good. You can enter pretty much any building in town and loot stuff, and lots of unexpected stuff happens along the way. If you like open worlds and emergent gameplay, this is a good one.
*the old one. Not the new One.
Angel Dust on 2/8/2013 at 11:16
That sounds fantastic.
I gotta wait for the PC release though. :(
Which is probably going to be a complete train-wreck. :D
Renault on 2/8/2013 at 16:43
I've been playing this too and am digging it. You should have a couple of people to switch to and from, but if not and your group is minimal, then yes, you should be able to recruit new playable characters. You can also upgrade your medical area and I believe cook a meal to heal up some.
EvaUnit02 on 3/8/2013 at 05:08
Quote Posted by Angel Dust
I gotta wait for the PC release though. :(
Which is probably going to be a complete train-wreck. :D
Their biggest challenge with the PC version is adapting it to kb+m. Because consumers are impatient, they're planning to do a Steam Early Access release supporting only controllers. Obviously the "finished" game will have kb+m support.
The PC release will worth the wait, since the game currently makes the aged 360 hardware cry. I.e. severe framerate drops; poor draw distance.
henke on 3/8/2013 at 14:51
Quote Posted by Brethren
I've been playing this too and am digging it. You should have a couple of people to switch to and from, but if not and your group is minimal, then yes, you should be able to recruit new playable characters. You can also upgrade your medical area and I believe cook a meal to heal up some.
When I started the game back up last night I was relieved to find that my character had become healed in my absence. Also, turns out I can radio the preacher and he will inspire my health and stamina back up to max with some sage words. Heh. It took a few more hours of playing, however, before Ed regained his health and I finally got a second playable character. But anyway, I am fucking
loving this game. Played it for 3-4 hours straight last night. Cleared out several zombie infestations in the town, gathered material for upgrading our base, made some new friends and some new enemies. I love how the factions work. That you have to maintain the trust of the other survivor-groups/camps, and sometimes form alliances even if you don't like them. Like most good zombie-stories, it's as much about the people as it is about the zombies.
henke on 5/8/2013 at 20:06
After an intensive weekend of zombie-bashing I've reached the rather unspectacular ending of State of Decay's story. I say unspectacular because this is not a game that invests heavily in story-moments or setpieces. The presentation overall leaves a lot to be desired. As stated before the engine neither looks nor runs great, the cutscenes all take place from more or less the same third person camera that the rest of the game is viewed from, and there are enough glitches in a single playthrough to provide content for a hundred youtube videos. Luckily, when it's not trying to tell a story, but rather just focus on being a zombie-apocalypse survival-simulator, the game is very enjoyable. The way you and your campmates deal with, and are affected by the zombie-infestation feels very organic. The gameplay, from the combat, to the sneaking, to the exploration, is all great. Even the cars are well implemented. You'll be safer in one, but hit too many zombies and it'll start falling appart. Also, cars (much like guns) make a lot of noise, so whenever you park and get out, even if you feel like it's in an isolated spot, zombies from a wide area will soon close in and surround the car. This means you'll usually want to stop a good distance from where you're going to, and walk the last bit of the distance, lest you bring unwanted company with you that can jeopardise your own and your friends lives.
The characters and their dialogue is quite well written also. However, since the game is as open-ended as it is, it feels like the writers/coders didn't manage to anticipate every possible scenario that the player could cause. For instance early on I (accidentally) banished one of the characters from our camp, only for him to show up later on during a mission acting like he was still part of the group, and noone batted an eye. And that's not the only mistake or plot-hole. There are also a few other seemingly important characters that get introduced, and then never heard of again. I guess since this is a zombie-apocalypse story you can probably just explain it away with "ah, they probably got eaten by zombies", but that feels like a cop-out. More likely the deadline was nearing and the devs couldn't finish those plot-lines in time so they just left the first few missions in there. In a sense, I get this feeling from the gameworld itself as well. The world is quite sizable, but if feels under-utilized in the missions and sidequests. There's a lot of cool areas that you can completely miss during your playthrough unless you go out specifically just to explore.
Another thing I like about the game that I gotta mention is that the locations of loot make sense. In most RPGs the locations of loot is completely randomized (I guess Bethesda's games are the worst culprit) and you can find ammo in trashcans and jewlery in the freezer or whatever. But in this game, if you enter a house looking for, for instance building materials? Where should you look? The livingroom? The kitchen? The bedroom? Nope. The workroom or the garage of course! Need some food supplies? Check the kitchen. Need some meds? Bathroom most likely. Something like this shouldn't really need praise, but somehow when it comes to videogame-logic, it doesn't feel as obvious as it should.
So, bottom line: Good gameplay, characters, and atmosphere. Poor presentation. It feels like the devs focused on what they felt was most important, namely the gameplay, and skimped on the glitter, and I admire that. I got maybe 15 hours of gameplay out of this, which is good for an XBLA title. I'd defenitely be up for a sequel or some DLC. Hell, if the PC version gets some added content I may well buy it a second time. :)
henke on 6/11/2013 at 08:08
Don't wanna look through that whole video of the DLC while at work, but it seems like just some new playable characters (and probably some new missions) in the same gameworld? Would've been nice to have a new area to explore. Eh... might still pick it up if it's cheap enough.
