Friday, August 31, 2012
Preview: State of Decay, XBLA & PC
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Preview: Although PAX Prime doesn't officially begin until
tomorrow (or rather, later today by the time you read this) there were a few
events happening in Seattle before the show opened. One such was a preview for an upcoming XBLA/PC game
called State of Decay. The developers, Undead Labs, were kind enough to extend
an invitation to see the Alpha build, and I was glad to accept.
I didn't know much about the game other than that it was an
open-world, third-person title about surviving a zombie apocalypse. A quick
look at one of the trailers got me incredibly intrigued, and after having the
chance to talk with several of the people responsible for creating the game, I
got even more fired up.
There's a lot to discuss with regard to State of Decay, but
the first thing that’s important to note is that it takes a much different
approach to its zombie theme than most of the competition. Although I can
certainly understand some players feeling burned out on the undead, I would say
that very few games which feature zombies have attempted to address the
survival aspects of the concept in a cursory fashion, much less in any
substance. SoD bases its entire experience around it.
The game takes place in a huge tract of land with two
central towns and numerous other areas to explore. Although it's officially set in "Anytown, USA”, it was suggested that the team took some
inspiration from Eastern Washington state -- a hot, dry, rural area that stands
in stark contrast to the tech metropolis currently booming underneath the Space Needle.
The player is free to go absolutely anywhere on this map,
and every building on it can be opened and entered for the purposes of exploration, hiding
from the undead, or scavenging for supplies. Scattered cars can be commandeered
for faster travel, but characters are easily able to scale slopes, hop fences,
and otherwise move in a natural, logical fashion through the landscape.
As the player explores, they will come across survivors.
Some will be friendly and some not-so-friendly, but at this point, there are
reportedly no hostile human factions to contend with, just the undead. After
meeting people, the player has to build relationships with them before they can
be recruited. Once trust is established, the player is able to switch from
their original character and take control of them.
I was quite curious about this player-swapping, so after a
few more questions, it was explained that State of Decay takes a
"community" approach. Rather than investing in any one particular
character, the player is encouraged to take turns with each member of their
group in various ways. The most obvious one is that each character has a
limited amount of health and stamina. Frequent activity will drain this, and it
can only be replenished by letting that character rest. To continue playing, a
fresh character must be put into action while the exhausted one hits the hay.
Another interesting way of encouraging these other
characters to be used is that they each have varying skill sets. While the
combat-centered former soldier is sleeping in the barracks, the former gardener
can tend the vegetables in a guarded safe-zone planting area to increase the food
supply available to the group. Another character may be great with carpentry,
another may be a faster runner, and so on. While many skills are common to all
characters, there will definitely be an advantage to putting those with special
aptitudes on work details which suit them.
This brings me to what is probably the most unexpected and
fascinating part of State of Decay - the sim aspect.
Once a sufficient number of people have been returned it
into the group, the player can assign them different roles in a variety of
locations. Some can tend the safe houses and outposts which are built by the
player, some can staff clinics, some can help research new weapons and generate
ammunition, and so on. For the community to survive, it will take more than one
gung-ho hero chopping heads off of the undead to win the day. In this game,
every able hand must pitch in, and the player controls it all.
One of the developers shared an interesting example of how
this might play out when he described discovering some ammunition in a house on
the other side of the map. He radioed back to headquarters and told one of his
non-active characters where the supplies were, and then that character used
pathfinding AI to make its way to the goal. As that character was traveling, it
picked up a pack of zombies as it crossed town, so the developer hopped in a
car and ran down the horde to in order to give the runner some assistance.
There's quite a bit more to say on this game, but it's quite
late and I have a full day of PAX in the morning. (Sorry, just keeping it real.)
In the interest of saving time, let me rattle some of these factoids off,
rapid-fire style:
>Staff members include an animator from God of War and a
writer from Fallout: New Vegas
>Every character in the game suffers nonrecoverable
permadeath if taken down by zombies.
>Players can order non-active characters to perform
various tasks all across the map in real time.
>There are 20 ‘major’ characters and 30 minor ones.
>Both XBLA and PC versions will be single-player, and
feature identical content.
>The game can be played indefinitely, but there is a
campaign with an ending.
>All dialogue will feature full voice acting.
At this point, the game has been in development for around
two years. There is no question that the team still has more work ahead of
them, but what I saw today was quite impressive. Toss in the fact that it's a
downloadable XBLA title, and what they've created seems to approach a scale and
complexity currently unmatched on the service.
If you're attending PAX Prime this year, the developers and
State of Decay will be on the show floor. If you're not, then stay tuned for
further updates on this one in the future. I've got my eye on it, and my inner zombie fan is positively rotten with
anticipation...
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Posts
Awesome piece, thanks!
Your description sounds awesome, I think the trailer sells it short. I watched it first and I thought it just looked like Alan Wake with zombies.
The community aspect of it sounds interesting and actually somewhat similar to the Metal Gear games on PSP.
Great game. But my survivors keep going missing, and cant work out why.
it might be because you left some missions unfinished before turning the game off.
In my game, I had too many infestations left on the map but I needed to go to bed because it was late. The next time I logged in, one of my characters went missing because he encountered one of those mobs.
Although I think SoD absolutely nails so many elements that other games don't, I have to admit that I'm really not sold on the "game continues when you're not there" concept.
That makes sense in a true MMO, but not so much in a single player game.