I am surprised I never heard of this game prior to a few days ago. Despite what I read in some other reviews, the game has ran well for me with no crashes and feels very fleshed out for an early access game (There is definitely room for more, but the standard for early access varies so widely that I am always happy when a game baring that status has this much content). I seem lucky to have started playing now though; reading through the update logs with what was fixed, what was added, what was changed, etc. makes it sound like I probably wouldn't of been this pleased a few months ago.
I liked This War of Mine and I like games like State of Decay 1 & 2 and Project Zomboid. The most obvious influence here is TWoM. The core mechanics are just about the exact same. I like how the characters written and how many of them have handcrafted story missions. By coupling this with the permadeath aspect, morale system, and the relationship mechanics - PikPok gave their characters a strong feeling of depth. They aren't like blank-slate peons that can die and be easily replaced, especially because of the new skill tree system. Each character can change the course of the run when they have the right perk. On the other hand, there are negative perks that might alter how you play. For example, some people are vegetarian, some don't like being penned up in the shelter all day, some are really annoying if they're in the same room where someone else is trying to sleep.
Now that I got the hang of it I do believe this game is significantly more forgiving than TWoM. Combat is much less risky and a core part of the game, whereas in TWoM it was usually a bad idea even if you were armed up.
There is a chance to get infected is present, and more likely the higher the difficulty. Backpack size is limited and can vary from one person to the next which gives the game challenge while you try to develop your shelters utilities. People dying affects shelter-wide morale as you would expect. Killing innocent people does the same, but where this game diverges from the latter is some people just do not care!
It sounds messed up, but it's nice to see a game like this where everyone is affected differently. I even had a character gain a positive trait after completing a mission that involved some questionable choices. Neat!
The game is visually captivating. The art direction, the 1980 Texas setting, each location looking lived in and modeled meticulously. It all contributes heavily to the experience and immersion. The game world changes as you progress which spices things up and there are multiple endings in addition to the character missions i mentioned earlier. Each one seems to have it's own challenges and gives the game some nice variety.
What I don't like:
There's a handful of mostly knit-pick things that comes to mind for me personally. I'll list them in order from dumbest to least dumb:
1. Why do I need tape to make a broken glass bottle? is the idea the tape protects the neck of the bottle as the character smashes it? I don't think that helps... also nail-bats should be made from baseball bats not a pallets worth of 2x4s.
2. The guns do this weird audio cut-out thing when I fire in rapid succession. It throws me off when my D9 suddenly goes silent as I am laying out a swarm of zombies.
3. It is way too easy as a new player to miss-click and skip an entire dialogue exchange between characters. I did this at least 3 times early on and had to go to the wiki to figure out what was said.
All in all i think this game is the best $25 I spent in a long time and I look forward to seeing what's to come!
