As a big fan of zombie games, I always knew I'd eventually play Days Gone. I was also sure I'd enjoy it, with its vast open-world, huge zombie hordes, survival elements, and all the praise it was receiving in the reviews... Having played it though, I feel like something was never mentioned in those reviews. Something that ended up ruining my experience as a whole...
Unaware of what my feelings would be down the line though, Days Gone started off great.
When your biker friend gets into trouble, it's just you and your bike against the world. Where every encounter is tense and scary. Where you need to save gas when going downhill because it is a scarce resource. Where you need to prove yourself to the survivors you meet in camps before you gain their trust, and find ways to limit the noise you make because even a few zombies are a real threat... All of this felt great and very immersive.
Even the story seemed decent, thanks to a few cool characters (Rikki, Old Mike...) who will help you in the pursuit of someone you may have not lost forever... They'll send you on errands across the map as you get familiar with the crafting mechanics, explore the world's many points of interests, find and run away from massive hordes of zombies... There's a lot to do, and the initial discovery of it all under the constant threat of the undead is really fun.
It becomes a lot less impressive once you're a little further into the game. After 12 to 15 hours, the zombies are not scary anymore and the game loses a lot of what made it so interesting.
Saving gas and most of the bike mechanics have become pointless because cash is not a concern anymore, crafting components are everywhere but you're already stocked up on most items, and the story slows down to a crawl as it gets side-tracked into uninteresting love stories, told through flashbacks and painfully boring walking sequences...
The gunplay is still fun, and exterminating a horde by leading it into the traps you've carefully placed beforehand is satisfying... But the rest starts to feel monotonous, and that's when the main issue I have with the game became obvious : Deacon is a terrible protagonist.
You'd expect a character that initially comes off as gruff and unlikeable to grow on you as you get to know him... But not Deacon. He wears on you instead. After a while, some details you hadn't noticed at first become irritating : he's constantly mumbling about everything. Good news, bad news, everything is met with a useless comment or a snarky quip. His mood and attitude towards npcs changes drastically every two sentences, making every decision feel random. He also loves talking to himself after every call, finishing the discussion as if someone were still listening to him.
I certainly wasn't. By the second act, he had become annoying and I was already skipping some of the cutscenes. When the third act rolled around, Deacon was unbearable and I was ready for the game to end. Unfortunately for me, this last act was the longest one and the story kept dragging on, apparently for the sake of doing so.
It's also the environment that this last act takes place in that made me realize something : the map may be huge, but it's really not that interesting. A few houses peppered here and there, a bridge, hills to the left, hills to the right...The landscape is actually quite boring (Oregon catching strays).
I did get to the end, but I'm not sure this was worth it. There's definitely a good game underneath it all, with a map that's vast even if it's not the most interesting, giant zombie hordes and a gameplay that can be really fun, especially on higher difficulties... But if I ever think of Days Gone again, it's Deacon that I will remember, which is a shame.
It's not a bad game, so I'll give it a [b] 6[/b], but I just can't recommend it. Get lost, Deacon. And if it weren't for Steam policies, I wouldn't be this polite.
