Developer: Peach Pie Productions
Publisher: Peach Pie Productions, Black Shell Media
Platforms: PC
Tested on: PC
Zombie Party – Review
Zombie Party has been in development for quite some time, and we had a chance to follow it since it got in the Steam Early Access program. The game has come a long way and a lot of new content was added, let’s see how it does now it has finally been released.
Story
In Zombie Party there is no story to be found during the entire game whatsoever. This is no surprise however since Zombie Party is a simple indie twin-stick shooter, there is no fancy story or voice acting involved. That’s not necessarily a bad thing though since the game is all about fast-paced action without anything else involved.
Graphics
The graphics in Zombie Party are really nothing to write home about. They’re not current-gen at all, but they remind very much of retro games a lot of people used to play when they were young. It looks very much like action-packed twin stick shooters that used to be in arcades. The graphic effects like explosions or shots from guns look pretty nice compared to the rest of the graphics, some of them look more modern than the rest of the game which provides a nice contrast.
A minor annoyance in the game is that the FPS is capped at 30, which is a pretty weird thing to do for PC games nowadays. However, this is a hard thing to change now because the game speed seems to be in line with FPS, and that comes down to the fundamentals in the game engine for Zombie Party. So while it’s a little disappointing, it’s not a huge flaw.
Sound
Zombie Party’s sounds are pretty much spot on and go great with the aesthetic of the game. The music sucks you right into the game and gets you going instantly. Combine this with the nice sound effects Zombie Party has and you’ve got yourself a nice sounding game.
Gameplay
When looking at gameplay, Zombie Party is pretty much your typical action-packed twin stick shooter, but there is a dungeon crawler game mode in the game however. The game can be played with mouse and keyboard but also features full controller support for laid back gaming, and the controller support is quite good for a twin stick shooter.
Zombie Party gives you a huge arsenal of weapons in order to survive against never ending waves of enemies. There are a couple of basic guns like a pistol, UZI, AK and some more, but it’s all about the super weapons you can collect. These can range from a flamethrower to a teddy bear rocket launcher to even a crazy laser gun. There is a huge amount of weapons and some can also be purchased in a store or just found throughout the levels.
In addition to guns, you can also have magic at your disposal. This magic can be found as a drop or can also be bought in the store. Magic is supposed to be an auxiliary utility next to your guns and it can provide both utility, defense and offense. The guns can also be upgraded with glyphs that are dropped during playing. These glyphs can be explosive shot, fire rate, damage, homing shots and more, there are loads of options to pimp out your guns.
There are also several different game modes in Zombie Party. There’s adventure mode, dungeon mode, arcade mode and deathmatch. In the adventure mode you simply go through all the different worlds that are in Zombie Party in order. Every world has a couple of waves of enemies with some time in between to shop and pick up loot. You can also spend skill points which you get by leveling up, by earning experience when you kill enemies. After a couple of waves a boss spawns, killing that will advance you to the next world.
Dungeon mode is basically a little dungeon crawler feature within the game. It’s not that huge of a game mode but it provides some fun other than simply doing the arcade mode all the time. In Arcade Mode you start in a world you choose and try to kill as many zombies as possible, accumulating as much score as you can. Then there’s deathmatch where you just fight in an arena. All these game modes can be played solo, in local co-op and online co-op.
In addition to all these things, there are still loads of things that can be unlocked. When you die, all the gold that you acquired during the game gets put at your disposal. This gold can be used to unlock new characters, give them better starting stats, guns, hats and more. It gives loads of possibilities to upgrade your characters and will ultimately help to enter hard mode.
Conclusion
After following this game since it was in Early Access, it’s nice to see how it turned out and how good it became. Loads of new content got added in the form of items, levels, game modes, characters, magic and more. The only things to remark is that some game modes don’t seem as polished as the other ones, dungeon mode isn’t that interesting and the death match is simply a big clusterfuck but other than that it’s really fun.
Zombie Party - Review,
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