State of Decay 2: Juggernaut Edition

Sunset the damn game, boasting "Quality of Life improvements" alongside this action, game is still riddled with bugs, horde zombies spawning stuck in cliffs, robbing the player of rewards for killing them, mission characters that must follow you being stuck downed on the ground, completely fucking mission progress (great for a game with permadeath and recurring, missable missions etc.) plus I've wasted 20 hours recently across 2 saves, as I have realised multiple times along the way that achievements will not pop anymore.

Pretty average and it rapidly becomes a boring repetitive grind.

Its lacks a story outside of "Destroy 10 plague hearts" and it lacks interesting characters.
Heck, my starting team up was supposed to be a "couple" and outside of the intro they barely addressed it.

I don't think a single "story" / side mission and/or character will have a single long term impact after i uninstall it, which speaks volume when i compare it to the original State of Decay
In place you got 5 different maps to "conquer" in the same way and no development. "Here's random cardboard NPCs, get a base going and clear X numbers of hearts ! Now hope your legacy missions starts ! "

A very good game, addictive, makes you want to play it again and again.

Unfortunately, the story has no continuity, you have to wait a long time for the main missions until they show you and if you don't do them they expire.

It's a bit annoying to wait for some missions that should appear immediately after you've done another one.

The game itself is great. I bought it forever ago and played it a little, and just came back to it today to revisit it but it required an XBOX sign in, so I uninstalled.

Good game with a lot of Updates

I love this game, it's the best open world experience I've ever played.

10/10 Great game, can't wait for the 3rd instalment awesome community management however that stupid tether bullcrap needs to go hopefully they don't add that in the next game.

this game is amazing the only thing bad about it was how hard it was to set up mulitplayer

Great game loop. Multiple difficulty sliders. Could be a forever game if you like.

Very fun game with alot of content and lots of replayability, the devs put alot of love into the game and kept new updates coming for a long time. Even if you are waiting for State of Decay 3 this game is very worth playing.

Great survival post apocalyptic zombie game to play in your free time. The story is interesting, the playthrough is great and overall at the end of the day who doesn't want to smash some zombie heads?

try and knife fight a blood plague jug get horrifically murdered repeat with 4 other characters also die horrifically and lose the whole community 10/10 would do again

Good fun. The Jugg Edition is the dux nuts! Good to play solo or with your mates. Get in and start smashing zombies!

This used to be a 5 star game. Since last update it's not worth playing. So many glitches...playing on lethal and 11 vehicles within walking distance of start. horde materializes inside a building you just cleared. People falling into the ground so can't talk and finish tasks. Again on lethal and 6 sacks of materials in one container..a 3 year old could beat game on lethal now. So sad

open world survival, very fun. series has serious potential, i can only imagine the changes that could be made to make the community system that much more immersive and personalized.

I do not like this game.

The multiplayer is a pain to set up and is very unfair to the person youre playing with.

only the host can start missions, loot most containers, interact with anything to do with the base, so essentially they get to shoot zombies and thats it. extremely boring unless you're the host.

game itself single player is boring as hell too. the only saving grace is having fun with friends but you cant even do that. missions are dull and repetitive, all characters and interactions feel stale after about 20 mins play time.

the combat is extremely basic and repetitive also.

the game is essentially a much worse days gone. with the saving grace of having multiplayer, but then the multiplayer doesnt work. All in all, nothing redeemable about the game to me. tried to get a refund after 6 hours but steam refused. lucky i got it on sale and didnt waste money on DLCs.

State of Decay 2 is one of my favorite games of all time. This is partly because the game has incredible replayability. There are five maps, which are environmentally diverse and generally inspired by the Pacific Northwest in the USA. Besides the selection of maps, much of the replayability comes from the diversity of home bases, character skills, and facilities. Trade-offs exist in practically every aspect of the game, which means that you have to put some thought into the character/skill composition of your community, the facilities you build, and the outposts you claim. However, this does not mean there is one "correct" way to play; for example, if you don't have room in your base to produce enough of one resource (like food), you can instead claim more outposts that produce that resource or recruit/train a community member in a skill that increases production of that resource.

The game also has a healthy mix of action and strategy. The aforementioned resources are a big part of the game since your base and activities will consume resources on a daily basis. You must scavenge and/or set up your base and community to meet (and ideally exceed) your resource needs. That said, the fundamental resources are fairly simplified (there are just five: food, medicine, ammo, building materials, and fuel), so you don't need to micromanage a huge variety of different things compared to say, a proper strategy game like Civ. Resources are managed at the community level rather than individual survivor level. For example, this means characters do not need to actively eat as part of gameplay (in contrast to a game like Subnautica), but you do have to manage your base's total food income to sustain however many characters are in your community. I am more of an action game player than a strategy game player, so this strikes a nice balance where you can spend most of your time controlling characters, traveling around the map, etc rather than micromanaging your community. If you do enjoy the strategy side of things, there are plenty of opportunities to try to optimize your community; for example, increasing community morale can get you various boosts and bonuses, and you can try to make your base fully self-sufficient instead of relying on scavenging. I view the resources as providing the motivation to explore and scavenge different parts of the map rather than being a huge burden on the player.

The core gameplay remains the same across difficulty levels, but aspects of community maintenance, combat, and scavenging become more challenging (these three components are actually controllable, so a player can create a custom difficulty). I started playing the game in Standard Zone (the second lowest difficulty out of five difficulty levels) and have fully completed one run through of Lethal Zone (the highest difficulty); I think the game really shines on Nightmare Zone (difficulty four of five), where combat is punishing and resources are fairly scarce. I think there's a difficulty where anyone can enjoy the game, and I encourage players to start at Standard or Dread before working up to the highest difficulties. Since this is a review of the game, my point here is that there are several difficulties to choose from, and there is a mechanism to customize difficulty as well.

Since this review has gone on long enough, I'll summarize my ratings below:
Overall: 9/10
Gameplay: 4/5 (highly replayable, some quirks and questionable fairness at the highest difficulty level)
Graphics: 5/5 (they're a stylized realism that should stand the test of time)
Audio: 4/5, very good
Audience: teens+
PC requirements: decent (I run a 1660 Super and can play the game with high graphics settings)
Game size: workable (~30Gb)
Difficulty: easy to learn, hard to master (but highly customizable)
Grind: average grind level (referring to resource management)
Game time: highly variable - can play the same community forever, if you want
Price: I bought at full price and think it was worth it.
Bugs: minor bugs, typically after the major updates

Still a buggy mess, even with the latest and last update. Lets hope they actually optimise SOD3 2/5

Too much fiddling with base mechanics, not enough zombie killing. CONSTANTLY have to switch characters because they're ALWAYS tired, which means you CONSTANTLY have to unload one person's gear and load up the other's. Double that if you take a companion (and you should). There's potential, but I'm 12 hours in, and tired of fiddling with inventory, let alone constant little things your base wants you to do -- and they'll call you up and b!tch about it while you're in the middle of a zombie fight.

Just an edit to add that it logged me out of my Windows acct in the middle of a game after playing for 2+ hours. It just logged me out for no reason. I'm done.

game is ok but i wont promote any game or company that insists i log in to an online third party just to play.
xbox live was NOT needed for this game but it was forced on us..
plenty of games have online features without this garbage
this was a cash grab to get $$ from the console crowd i play on PC im 100% uninterested in consoles and the people who play them
im tired of having them and their restrictions forced on me. i didnt pay 3k for my gaming PC build so some teen on a 300 console, can dictate how my game is made and played..

Still to this day incredibly buggy. Broken quests, vehicles flashing in and out of existence, no squad commands, junk save system, quit out in a cleared room load back in get instantly killed by a complete respawn of everything you had cleared.... How the hell is this reviewed above mixed when it's still so messed up.

State of Decay 2 has greatly improved many aspects that the first game established such as better fluid combat and more variety in to handled the zombie apocalypse. The 4 different community leaders and their respective approach on having unique buildings is a highlight of this leap. Another noticeable improvement is the outpost being more related on landmarks and resource gathering rather than putting the outpost around the base in SOD 1 which is just to make a zombie horde not disturbing the community. The plague hearts being present in the whole map at least encourages players to explore many places and plan to take it out especially in the dread zone towards the highest difficulty to plan better rather than rushing.

But it needs to improve its community management that it presents and highlight as a core mechanic.

The community management for me in SOD 2 during my 4 playthroughs from easiest to harder difficulties felt lacking and made its survivor management based on facilities such as sleeping areas which I learned in many guides online being inconsequential towards finishing a map.

In the upcoming SOD 3, the developers should make the community management more consequential, one aspect could be having interpersonal relations (?) between the members having more weight and more quest variety. The Turnbull Valley map (both normal level and the heartland mode) showed that potential with having story quests and this should have been present in other maps in SOD 2.

Another aspect that can help this would be deeper community customization such as naming the community and character design, that could give players invest more to the community that they are managing.

Overall, SOD 2 is great game for those who a want a great zombie apocalypse experience but it just needs to improve the community management, which I hope SOD 3 will cover.

I love this game so much that after over 1500 hours sunk on the GamePass version, I have bought it on Steam to start the journey all over again with no Legacy Pool or Boons. I wish I didn't have to create a brand new M$ account just to do that, but that's a minor gripe.

A crashing mess full of bugs that will see such things as your car full of loot just vanish after a crash. It is a shame as the game is basically a pretty good zombie game if you ignore the characters you're given.
I paid £6.00 in a sale so I can tolerate the way the game is but don't pay full price for it.

This is, by far, one of the best zombie survival games i've ever played.
It features static maps, but procedural loot and monsters, mutations, and difficulties.
It really allows you to play how you want to play, character wise - but the survivor you choose has base traits that will force a style that encourage you to find others and diversify your characters.
Building bases is fun and meaningful, and so is building a survivor crew.
Controls are super fluid and engaging, and everything feels "right".
Good performance and graphics, and good amount of content.

I can easily get another 60 hours out of this and still get PLENTY of gameplay by trying new maps and trying to reach the end.
Very fun game, i wholeheartedly recommend that people try it, especially for the promotional price of $7 going right now, and I think i bought it for about $15 on sale, but it's worth every penny of 29.99 if it came down to it.

I played a lot more on XBOX. It is a pretty good game and fairly different from the rest of the zombie survival shooter games out there.

- Plenty of different and unique guns, although a very lacking method of customizing them - only barrel attachments which are suppressors, brakes for pistols and rifles and chokes for shotguns.
- The various skills in the game can be interesting and provide different perks and unlocks depending on what your group of survivors know. Some skills are better than others and some skills are completely useless, however you will figure that out with time and you can get rid of useless survivors and pick up skilled or blank ones, the latter of which can then be taught a skill later. However, learn that desired skill quick, they can potentially fill it themselves which something useless like "Movie Trivia" or "Art".
- Building a base on all of the five different maps feels quite different each time, although replaying the same base on the same map with the same community makes things feel stale, unless you like repetition, but you can do either. Base building is fairly interesting, although does feel a bit restrictive and sometimes reasonably good facilities are locked behind a lengthy unlock which is incredibly annoying to go through because it requires a radical shakeup of your survivor pool and potentially a leader change, neither of which are actions you can make frequently or lightly. Some base sites do have different features and built-in facilities which can sometimes make up for a lack of skills or other requirements for certain important facilities, however this also discourages trying out different base locations.
- Resource management and gathering is kind of easy, although if you do not have a method of mass manufacturing bullets, obtaining ammunition is actually more difficult than obtaining guns.
- Melee combat is not too fancy, although there are also a wide selection of weapons and various skills that do shake it up. A lot better than just hack and slash at a health bar until its depleted.
- NPC enclaves are severely lacking and very undynamic. They just kind of show up and you can only really trade with them. Missions from them are random and sometimes annoying, and you are pressured to complete them when they are not really that vital.
- The same goes for your own survivors, who are also highly undynamic NPCs except for the one you take control of. They all just wander around at home base and functionally do nothing unless you have a guard tower or similar, which they will post, but are generally useless even in that position. You can start a labor project, but only one or two will appear to actually do anything, even though completion is dictated by a timer and not an actual contribution of labor. They do not really have conversations either and only spout a line from time to time in the presence of the player. Things do not entirely feel alive.
- This game is quite dated now and does contain some woke SJW nonsense, but it is not overwhelming to the point that it makes the game unbearable to play since you are not actually being lectured about some lunacy. The game was made years ago in more simpler and less ridiculous times, so the leftoid infestation of game development was not as severe.

--- Development has officially ended too, however the third installment is now fully underway and I am looking forward to it. This is still a good pick up as well, although it is not highly recommended. Play through game pass or get it on sale.

Overall, 6/10.

They just put out the final update and the game is still buggy so i'd only recommend buying if your ok with 3 - 6 bugs per play session

And they're not easy to ignore bugs either stuff where you'll put time, gas and other supplies into completing a mission and then it bugs and doesn't let you finish and claim your reward so it was all just a complete waste

I really enjoy how the base building works in this game along with the ability to increase different characters stats through certain actions. The fighting isn't way too difficult but not really easy either. You have to pay attention and plan things well or you lose at least a community member. Overall I think the game has a good combination of strategy and action combined together.

Fun game with non-linear stories and infinite gameplay. Lots of interesting details and nuances. 4 years of strong support from the developers polished it into once of the best titles of all time as far as I'm concerned. It launched in a good state, and they were able to refine even more.

I hope to see mods as part of the SoD3 roadmap. As a single-player and co-op game, a strong modding community and workshop support is the only thing missing from this title. The Nexus has a good start, but mods make games like SoD and Valheim even more replayable.

Good survival experience, should buy when on sale. It's more fun to co-op with friends

this game is awesome, but ever since their so called "final update ive had a multitude of new glitches including infinite daily maintenance change popups and freezes that last around a minute at random, these glitches are persistent through reboot and are on all saves in the campaign so they are ruining my enjoyment of the game. i have also had physics and clipping issues that result in player being sent into the sky to break their legs and potentially die.
with the game in its current state i cannot reccomend it

Everyone is basically saying the same thing, and i have to agree. This game has so many good base building and combat features that its a little sad to see it flop so completely in the co-op area and the story line. The first one was a little lacking but there seemed to be a story progression, nothing super convoluted but i felt there was an end goal in mind. Not the case here. Grind, build, repeat. it gets boring fast and the novelty dries up kinda quick.

As for the co-op, No real interaction as someone who joins a co-op game. you're an npc. An AI player at best. Between the lack of interactive opportunities in multiplayer and the stupid need for an xbox live acct i gotta say this is just not worth the money. Maybe they'll do it better in the next one but this... this just ain't worth it.

I have been playing this game ever since it came out. It's a bit repetitive but it can still be enjoyable! I'm so happy I watched this game grow. I am so excited for State of Decay 3, this game will always have a special place in my heart <3

This is a sequel in the truest sense of the word. It fixed nearly all the flaws and improved upon the mechanics of the original title across the board.
It is not without faults, but the dev team has worked on it tirelessly since its release to hone the SoD title into a very engaging and well supported game franchise. I am looking forward to SoD 3, and hope nothing changes with the development team or publisher to risk the franchise.

What if we took the Ubisoft Open World Formula and applied it to a zombie survival game but instead of 1 big map you are moving between multiple maps of small counties with some light randomization of loot and survivors/factions. Lets take all of the special Zombies from Left 4 Dead and give them different names. You have your Towers to help spot things like looting point and previously mentioned special zombie & roaming hoards. You have a home base and a community both of which you grow by gathering, trading, crafting, and doing missions for other survivor groups.

The crafting, base management, and community building are all the real stars of this game. The gunplay and Melee combat don't really feel any better than the gunplay in Rockstar Games Open Worlds tends to be (Red Dead Redemption and Grand Theft Auto). The melee in particular tends to lock you into animations in a somewhat awkward way (expect some small teleportation). Luckly the awkard animations are pretty much always going to act in favor of the player, unless you let yourself get surrounded as you have I frames on most of the special animations and a dodge with I-frames to cover you exiting the animation. Attacks are Stamina based but even with no stamina your weakened attacks can stunlock 1 or 2 zombies. Stamina Management in Melee is more about being able to run away if needed and being able to stunlock 4 or 5 zombies at once.

If you took out each system of this game and just evaluated it on their own then most of this game feels like a 7.5 or 8.0 out of 10 game. What makes this game better than that for me is that the game is very content rich and all of these somewhat okay game mechanics combine to make something more than the sum of their parts.

Even if you asked me which zombie game was the best at some aspect people play zombie games for; then I can easily point to other games that do those aspects better. Project Zomboid is a better at being close to a real life simulator as you need to manage real life needs in that game that State of Decay just simplifies alot (food is just a general resource depleted at the base for example, sleep is just switching characters). Dead Rising is going to have better Melee combat and bigger hoards and comparable crafting and open world mechanics. Dying Light 2 has much more interesting movement with the parkour. Left 4 Dead or Killing Floor are better Co-Op experience with better gunplay. Pretty much all of those games have a better story as the main quest line in State of Decay 2 is written for a randomized character to go on, so the story doesn't do anything interesting or personal with the character backstories.

The only thing I can think of State of Decay does better than other zombie games I know, is the community management and having a ton of content from being developed for a very long time (development only stopped earlier this month with the last patch in in October 2024). Like I said earlier though this game is more than the sum of it's parts and when you take look at the whole game altogether it winds up being one of the more interesting Zombie Survival Open Worlds in my opinion.

Its a great Zombie survival game. I wish there were more co-op abilities though.

The updates and fixes have made the game more challenging but not overly difficult. You need to think more about what you want to do and how to best include new members. (hint- spread your groups abilities)

The game has its rough aspects...but as someone who bought the ultimate edition in the microsoft store, proudly purchased it again on steam and has sunk hundreds of hours in between both platforms i can say that this is my favourite zombie game ever made and possibly my favourite game ever.

I wish in all the later updates they had shown some love for the base building and i'm not the biggest fan of the curveball system...but even with those negatives i'm still very happy with the time i put on this game. And with the final update making all the FOMO content avaliable forever (outside of the monthly bounties which rotate permanently so it's just a matter of time to get them animal crossing style) now it's the best time to jump in.

I got turned off at the start by the stupid banter dialogue, but it's turned out to be the sandbox type game I was looking for - I love all the stuff to do, I just can't stand finding myself watching a stupid movie when I sit down to play a game lol

The greatest zombie survival game you've never given a real chance.

my steam time played doesnt even show the whole story as it didnt track my offline play, this is an amazing zombie experience. has been from the start, 38 updates later and its still the masterpiece it was at launch.

The last and final patch (38) brought with it lag. Patch 37, no lag - Patch 38, lag. I know there are no more patches but hot fixes?

Undead Labs has spent almost 6 years adding fresh new content to the rotting hordes of undead. I played the original on xbox long ago and have played and replayed State of Decay 2 many times on several difficulties. This game really hits all the checkboxes. Scavenging, survival, community management, lovely bluegrass and intense combat tracks, the combat feels good, the visuals still hold up, I could go on and on. But with this final update, #38, I just wanted to give my thumbs-up of approval and wish Undead Labs best of luck with State of Decay 3!

Managing your base and survivors in a zombie apocalypse is tense and rewarding. The gameplay is fun, especially with friends, though it can feel repetitive after a while. Still, a solid survival experience.

They released the last update ever for the game and although it's sad, i'm very grateful for the devs with all the work they've done.
The support for the game is up there with No Man's Sky.
Many years after release they still kept updating and improving the game.
Amazing game, good luck to the devs with all future titles and thank you for the work you've done.
(Hopefully a better multiplayer experience with the next State of Decay. :D)

I'm not the most sophisticated or skilled of gamers, so you can take my review with a grain of salt if you are, but I absolutely LOVE SoD2. It's easily in my top 10 games of all times. I find myself coming back to it all the time still all these years later. The custom difficulty sliders are awesome, all the flavor texts are fun to read about the world & characters, and base building is so cool. I love how open ended the world is so you can really do anything from logging in to go zombie hunting to just wanting to collect or build. I cannot wait for the third game!

Game is fun but doesn't have as much of the same feel as the first game. just missing some of the charm, cant quite put my finger on it. still worth playing if you can get it on sale.

This game's combat is focused on stealth more than gunplay.
The overall gameplay plays more like a base building, resource collecting, community management game than what you would expect from a zombie shooter.
Keep in mind the multiplayer is very lackluster and is more of an afterthought that was tacked on. Hopefully State of Decay 3 fixes this.

Good game. Very punishing in the harder modes until you better learn the mechanics. Overall 7.5/10

Cann't play do it needing to sign MS to even play the game. I hope 3 Fails do it not letting me play game I purchased for single player!! DAMN LIVE SERVICE CRAP!!!!