In this week’s stream we will be covering zombie themed games. The post-apocalyptic genre has gained a lot of popularity throughout the years with Call of Duty: Black Ops arguably being the game that caused this genre to gain the most traction. Maps like Kino Der Toten, Nacht der Untoten and Verruckt, players are drawn into a world where being proficient in your ability to kill is your lifeline. Teamwork in this game is imperative and more often than not you will have most of your teammates screaming at you to revive them because they have the ray gun. On the other side of this genre you have games like the classic State of Decay which features a free roam storyline where you, the player, can upgrade your base and go on missions to collect supplies to help your community of survivors.
There are many games that take different perspectives on the post-apocalyptic genre figuratively and literally. Games such as Project Zomboid take a top-down approach to surviving a dangerous zombie infested world. While other games such as Plants vs Zombies throws in a curveball arcade style kids puzzle game. Whatever approach is taken in this genre, they always end up being successful.
This week I will be covering Dying Light. This game is a fun zombie game where the player uses parkour to traverse buildings to get away from hoards of zombies. While this game has been out for a while, I have only played 2 hours of it. This will make this week’s play style a little unique since I have little to no experience playing this game and I honestly have not gotten into the depths that this game offers.
Jonathan will be covering Black Ops 3, which is the fourth generation of Treyarch’s take on zombies. Beginning with World at War the series, Call of duty had included zombies as optional game modes with every Black ops game. Black Ops 3 was released in the fall 2015 and introduced a new engine, which brought the games first cutscenes and connected storyline. With new maps like Shadows of Evil, Der Eisendrach, and my favorite Gorod Krovi there’s no shortage of maps to play. In my opinion this game has become the standard of zombies and there has yet to be a game that has reached the level this one has. Many of Call of Duty’s games have tried to do different takes with zombies but they’ve never been able to replicate what Treyarch made. Their zombies were so successful that Call of Duty added DLC (extra content) to it a year after their next game had already been released. Though this may not seem like that big of a deal, it was a first for that series. The added content included eight remastered maps from previous games including the original four with Der Riese, Shi No Numa, Nacht der Untoten, and Verruckt. The game also brought back fan favorites with Moon, Origins, Ascension, and Shangri La.
What makes this game so great is that it has a well balanced weapon system and features the classic perks and newly introduced gumballs. Gumballs help players in game by giving them ammo, perks, or even special abilities. Each map features a unique back story to one of the four main characters with Dempsey, Takeo, Nikolai, and everyone’s favorite Richtofen. Following the events of World War II, these characters are forced to go interdimensional and find their former selves in order to prevent evil from taking over. If you’ve never played a Treyarch made zombie game I highly recommend you give Black Ops 3 a try. You won’t be disappointed I promise you that and I even have memorabilia from this game because I enjoyed it so much. Treyarch created a masterpiece in this series and although I’m not the biggest fan of zombies current state, I have hope for the future that the series will return to its former glory days soon.
