State of Decay

[Frenetic Pony]

Ok wow, just watch the quicklook:

 

http://www.giantbomb.com/videos/quick-look-state-of-decay/2300-7452/

 

It's, yeah. I'm at least as interested in this as The Last of Us. Story? Blah blah blah, gimme game mechanics and originality, and despite the roughness this seems to have it. Looking forward to this on the PC.

[twmac]

Yeah, the game should be fun as it has an open world to it that seems to rely on setting up defences.

[thorn]

  On 6/6/2013 at 5:45 AM, Frenetic Pony said:

Ok wow, just watch the quicklook:

 

http://www.giantbomb.com/videos/quick-look-state-of-decay/2300-7452/

Jeez... Since when has a video that's longer than an hour counted as a quicklook?!

 

I went on Youtube to watch a trailer. Can anyone explain to me how this is different from any other zombie game?

[Murdoc]

This looks kind of cool, I'll be into it if it ever comes to PC.

 

I like the scope of it, open world game where you have to manage survivors, supplies, and a base seems rad.

[Justin Leego]

  On 6/6/2013 at 1:21 PM, thorn said:

Jeez... Since when has a video that's longer than an hour counted as a quicklook?!

But for always!

[thefrozenpoison]

I played for about an hour last night, and had a great time playing what I can already tell will be to be the sleeper hit of the summer. Base building and foraging combined with great AI and story/dialogue yields the experience that I really wanted from the  L4D franchise. Anyone else played yet?

[Dewar]

I really want to, but I don't get downstairs to my Xbox very often anymore. I'm hoping for an official PC announcement.

[Dirk Anger]

  On 6/7/2013 at 3:41 PM, Dewar said:

I'm hoping for an official PC announcement.

 

http://undeadlabs.com/about-state-of-decay/:

 

  Quote

State of Decay is our ambitious zombie-survival open world game currently under development at Undead Labs for release on Xbox 360 / Xbox LIVE Arcade and PC.

 

That seems pretty damn official to me.

[Dewar]

Hmm, everything I had heard before was couched in a wierd "This other guy said the developer said that they'd like to put it out on PC sometime" sort of thing. Good to know it's official, hopefully we get a date soon.

[natetwoc]

Watching the quick look right now and it definitely looks pretty cool.  When it makes its way to PC I'll likely pick it up, backlog be damned.

[Roderick]

Polygon thinks pretty highly of State of Decay. A whole point higher than The Last of Us, even, as far as the two can be compared.

 

I get the feeling the comparison is really skewed. Apart from the zombie theme, the games are very different. State of Decay is open world survival, The Last of Us a rollercoaster action/stealth game. I think their core experience will prove really different from each other.

[youmeyou]

Yeah, I'd wager a guess that - apart from theme - the two games have nothing in common.

[Stephen]

I think that, regardless of similarity between games, a score denotes how well a review believes a game accomplishes its goals. How close its grasp is able to settle towards its reach. At least, I believe that's the case for these two zombie games.

[Dewar]

Also state of Decay is $20 and Last of Us is a full price game, so you can't really draw a direct comparison there.

[thefrozenpoison]

I'll put on my tinfoil hat and say that this has been in Microsoft's pocket as a direct alternative to Last of Us. Not that it really competes in any conventional way, but I would assume that the last thing Microsoft needs is a paradigm-shifting Sony exclusive whose release immediately precedes an E3 which features both new consoles. I have no doubt that State of Decay's overall story, themes, controls, art, and graphics will be held up as a shining example of what this console generation had to offer. State of Decay is $20, the world is massive and detailed, the story so far seems adequate if not exceptional, and the gameplay is fun. A sequel seems obvious. I'll probably buy another Xbox.  

 

Also, J Allard

[melmer]

It's only just twigged for me that this is on Xbox, huh. I've seen gaynor calling it goty on twitter, I had assumed it was some PC indie thing

Oh wait my Xbox gold account has run out so fuck it (I'm assuming this is a multiplayer game, I actually haven't a clue what it is, I'll go do my research)

I'm getting the last if us on Friday so probably wait a little while on this if its that good

[melmer]

Also, this is kind of crazy to me considering i hadn't really heard if it...

State of Decay XBLA second fastest selling game in XBLA history

http://m.neogaf.com/showthread.php?t=580397

Guess people really like them zombies huh

[melmer]

It's not multiplayer \o/

[Murdoc]

I had to wiki this game because the developer name seemed familiar.

 

Awhile ago Jeff Strain, former Blizzard programmer (He helped make the original Wow engine) who went on to help found Arenanet left NCsoft to go make a zombie mmo. Well, turns out State of Decay is that game, at least the first part of that game. I guess in the process of developing a more robust multiplayer game, they decided to release a single player version first after making a deal with MS and still plan on doing their "mmo"/multiplayer game based on the same mechanics.

 

So that's pretty cool and probably explains why the game feels like it was built for multiplayer to most people. Either way, I just want to see the PC version before buying in.

[Dirk Anger]

I second all of those calls for a PC version (which has been confirmed, but anyway). The game looks interesting - but the prospect of Mods? 
Holy shit! 

Zombies aside, I've been waiting for an open-world-rpg/social-simulation/shooter hybrid for... a very long time. Come to think of it, I might have had visions about a game like this in 1994. Fortunately, XCom came out shortly after.

[Frenetic Pony]

  On 6/8/2013 at 1:32 PM, Murdoc said:

I had to wiki this game because the developer name seemed familiar.

 

Awhile ago Jeff Strain, former Blizzard programmer (He helped make the original Wow engine) who went on to help found Arenanet left NCsoft to go make a zombie mmo. Well, turns out State of Decay is that game, at least the first part of that game. I guess in the process of developing a more robust multiplayer game, they decided to release a single player version first after making a deal with MS and still plan on doing their "mmo"/multiplayer game based on the same mechanics.

 

So that's pretty cool and probably explains why the game feels like it was built for multiplayer to most people. Either way, I just want to see the PC version before buying in.

 

Ok now there's going to be a multiplayer version of this coming out too? Fuck. There goes my money I guess.

[Brendon Chung]

State of Decay is an open-world game that takes advantage of its open-world structure. It leans toward the Mount & Blade & Elite model of world simulation.

 

For example: my buddy Ed became infected. I scavenged some medicine for Ed. It slowed down the illness, but Ed still needed more help.

 

I received a mission to fetch the camp's doc, who was currently squirreled away in a barn some miles away. Before I embarked on that, I decided to clean out some of the infested houses near our camp, since our camp barely survived the last zombie horde attack.

 

As I'm cracking zombie faces, a couple message boxes appear:

"Ed is dead."

"Fetch doc mission: failed."

 

And just like that, a playable character was now permanently gone. The on-going nature of things, coupled with perma-death and events that organically sprout out of the systems, makes for a game where decisions feel meaningful.

 

The game can be janky. Framerate and performance chug, there's roughness in the camera and animations, and it's a little strange you can't bring an AI buddy with you on your explorations - yet they kinda-sorta let you do so by accepting a mission with an AI buddy, and then just ignore the objectives.

 

In short, this is an open-world game that really shows the promise of the genre.

[Dewar]

Makes me wish that Fort Zombie had actually turned out the way everyone wanted.

[thefrozenpoison]

 

 

In short, this is an open-world game that really shows the promise of the genre.

 

Glad to see that someone else is playing it. While it's selling well, no one I know seems to be playing it.

Last night I had an extremely rewarding session, despite my dwindling population, and my resource gathering seems to have turned a corner. I did nearly buy the farm defending one of my scavengers in a gas station, but ended up with a couple nice trucks and a bunch of food/materials. While future iterations will certainly improve upon the game, I am loving the hell out of what's there right now.

[twmac]

The eurogamer review made me feel very positive:

 

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-06-11-state-of-decay-review

 

And if Brendon Chung himself is making appreciative noises then I should definitely get it.