Last paragraph = TLDR, plus main topics discussed in bold. I just can’t seem to keep these short lately.

It doesn’t happen often these days, but every now and then, right when I start playing a game for the first time, I get this little gut pull of excitement telling me I’m about to really enjoy my time with it. Such a thing happened with State of Decay, a genuinely fun surprise that I didn’t expect to like as much as I did, even considering the issues the game comes with - and there are a lot of them.

I can’t in good conscience pretend this has nothing to do with the setting itself. I’m genuinely fascinated by realistic depictions of post-apocalyptic survival scenarios, and that certainly played a part here. But on the other side of it sits a pretty damn compelling gameplay loop full of interconnected systems and an effectively realised world, both of which are anchored in a basic yet useful storyline that makes you want to keep playing the game.

In the tone-setting phase of SoD there is a tangible aura of danger to every supply run, every rescue mission, every side quest. And this is a direct result of how well designed its permadeath system is. It exists as a non-negotiable, immutable feature of the world, but since you control a group of survivors, only the member you’re currently handling (plus a follower if you bring one) are in danger. This makes the overly punishing nature of permadeath a lot more bearable, yet it still comes with a true feeling of loss: maybe you’ve grown attached to the character as you play them, or maybe you’ve developed their skills to a point where they had become your most valuable community member. Whatever the reasons, their death will always sting and lead you to a bit of a gamified grieving process, offering just the right amount of punishment for your carelessness. (unless of course they were an asshole in your community and you wanted them gone anyway).

There isn’t enough of a fear-inducing atmosphere in SoD to consider it a survival horror - the music is cool but often uplifting, the nights are eerie especially without music, yet also bright to the point where you don’t even need a lantern outside, the overall community demeanour tends to be chirpy, and zombies aren’t scary enough (except the Feral. Seriously, fuck the feral). But even with that caveat, this permadeath mechanic adds real tension to your experience, reshaping the relationship between you and your playthrough. This, however, comes with a very deflating problem. The game isn’t really that hard, even for newcomers to the genre, and because you can’t customise difficulty, such means that keeping your entire community alive and finding resources is a pretty easy affair. Which along with the aforementioned lack of oppressive atmosphere resulted in a real missed opportunity for added tension.

Another thing I was really surprised by was how good the map felt. Trumbull Valley offers a charming, decently sized open world to explore, full of personality and charm, whilst simultaneously conveying a true apocalyptic feel to your surroundings (the outbreak happens mere days before your journey begins). It is all very well laid out, with a proper geographical arranging of residential areas, commerce, industry and farmland. I did not get tired of it once, and even though the driving itself feels a bit floaty, it didn’t affect my enjoyment of the map in any meaningful way.

There are other things I really liked about SoD. Some come with their own sets of problems, but all of them speak to the impressive ambition of a - at the time - really small studio:

• with six different types (I don’t think I’m missing any), there is a satisfying zombie variety, being that a couple of the freak variations present a real challenge;

• mission variety also feels pretty decent in a vacuum - you get the main story, side stories with 3-4 missions each, hunts, infestations, rescue missions, supply drops, etc -, but the problem here is that most feel too similar, often devolving into a similar experience;

• considering their AI is actually better implemented than I had initially thought, being able to have a follower accompany you at all times is great, and the fact that you have to gain their trust before doing so (though this is quite easy to do) is the cherry on top. It does suck however that you can’t give them stuff to carry (this is mitigated by the fact that you can call for runners), and it doesn’t make sense that you have to spend influence points every time you ask for someone’s help;

• watchtowers are one of the most important, and strangely, satisfying aspects in the game, since they are incredibly useful to scout your surroundings for danger and loot, and the perfect complement to a game of this nature. In that sense, they are like the ‘anti-Far Cry’ towers because of how relevant they feel;

• some will find it too long, but I really feel like the devs absolutely nailed the day/night cycle. There seems to be some debate on whether one day lasts 1h30 or 2h (though it’s recently been confirmed SoD2 has a 1h30 cycle), but regardless I think this is a perfectly reasonable choice for a post-apocalyptic survival world, making days truly feel like days. For basic comparison, Skyrim - one of my all-time favourites - featured a 20min day cycle which I always thought was absolutely absurd;

• the heavy gore effects, dismemberment mechanics and environmental kills are amazing stuff. SoD has an uncompromisingly bloody, punchy and brutal nature to its zombie interactions that I really love, even if combat itself, especially when talking about range weapons, is nothing to write home about;

• I also liked the visuals, but this came with an expectation check. Before playing, I had read several horror stories about how bad the game looks, yet my experience was nowhere near that awful. Yes, the game looks a bit rough and a lot of textures up close are quite blurry, but the overall aesthetic of the world, I thought, was pretty decent;

• I enjoyed the immersive nature of some NPC interactions depending on their personality traits, flawed as this almost always was (e.g. you being able to take them out with you to cool off or calm down when they’re angry or afraid is great, but on the other hand, not only does this happen way too often, the very low-budget, repetitive nature of both their dialogue lines and their voice acting is at odds with the immersion this seeks to achieve);

• being able to barricade windows to protect houses and bases is a really nice touch. Unrelated, but so is the UI design, which clearly takes inspiration from Telltale’s The Walking Dead series;

• using outposts to extend the safe zone around your base and allow you to store/retrieve items is a good idea, but they could’ve done with a bit more purpose to them.

Now come the pure downsides. And there are quite a few of them. Some are minor niggles, or at best immersion-breaking, whereas others are downright irritating. The main one, of course, is the unpolished nature of SoD. Even though my experience was definitely not as buggy as some reported (maybe because I played this version), there is still enough in there for it to become a nuisance: NPCs glitching out in cars, random commands that don’t trigger/register, cars being parked away from base (or even getting completely different cars) upon reloading, animations looking very stiff, etc, are some examples of frustrating things that compound to eventually take away some of the enjoyment.

Lack of polish aside, there were some other things that I didn’t appreciate: 1) not having destructible fences is a pain that negatively impacts traversal; 2) NPCs talking that loudly when you’re crouching right next to noise-sensitive zombies is quite a bit off-putting; 3) not being able to keep specific specialised characters at base (they’d often go off on random missions) is really flawed design, because it would make you temporarily unable to craft/build things that were tied to that specific skill; 4) recruited survivors should sometimes come with a better skillset, but what invariably ends up happening is that you have to level up all of their skills to an acceptable level; 5) the fact that all humans are non-hostile towards you is a really weird choice in a post-apocalyptic survival scenario prone to having people’s worst impulses come out; 6) it’s puzzling that you get a morale penalty for every single member you exile, no matter how annoying or toxic they were to the community; 7) there could’ve been a much bigger emphasis on the handwritten notes you find in the world, both in quantity as well as detail, since the world and lore building would’ve benefited greatly from it; 8) finally, it is frustrating that you don’t get a clear indication of what goes on in your base. All of a sudden, you’d see ‘Ran away’ in the history section of a given character, and you’d have no idea how, when or why that had happened.

These issues do pile up. Ultimately, however, they don’t really hold a candle to the SoD’s strong overall showing, which is why I had such a fun time with it. I am currently going through the sequel (which I will write about on my next post), and I’m honestly not sure why this franchise isn’t talked about more. Perhaps people are just sick of survival games, zombie games, or both. Or perhaps they are somewhat put off by its buggy reputation. The latter, at least, is now partly unfounded, since these games - especially 2 - have come a long way in addressing theses aspects (in fact, in this sense, the SoD franchise works almost as a standard bearer for the wonders of patient gaming). Whatever the reasons, I seem to have valued my time with the first State of Decay more than most. The wealth of intricate, interconnected systems, the addictive gameplay loop, the world design and the brilliantly implemented permadeath feature, along with a ton of other smaller positives, are more than enough for me to look back at the game with fondness and remember a great playthrough experience. 8/10