Ultimate Zombie Defense 2. I guess the name says it all?
I honestly have never heard of the first game in the series, nor do I really think I would've tried it out. With games like Left 4 Dead and Call of Duty Zombies kinda being the "kings" when it comes to co-op zombie survival modes, there isn't too much of a reason to try something else. Sure, I love the Mercenaries mode in Resident Evil, but that is also an established series I like for many more reasons. Something that comes out of nowhere like Ultimate Zombie Defense 2 is just another random zombie game to join the already over-saturated market. However, when the developer Terror Dog Studio sent me a review key, I figured it wouldn't hurt to at least give it a shot.
According to the prerelease information I was provided, the game was a co-op zombie survival game, likened to titles such as: They Are Billions, Zombie Army Trilogy, Dead Nation: Apocalypse Edition, State of Decay 2, Last Stand: Aftermath, Orcs Must Die! 2, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, Sker Ritual, Ultimate Zombie Defense, Zombie Defense, Dead Trigger 2, World War Z, Left 4 Dead 2, Unturned, 7 Days to Die, The Walking Dead: Season One, Dead Island, Resident Evil 5, Call of Duty: Zombies, Infestation: The New Z, Killing Floor 2, and DayZ, Zombie Army 4: Dead War.
Yeah, I don't know about that...
I honestly took one look at the video, thought to myself "this is Call of Duty Zombies," and enlisted the help of my friend Billy to give it a chance ourselves. What we discovered is that we weren't too far off the mark with our assumptions, but there were a few things here and there that helped make the game unique. Ultimately we did have fun with the game, but it for sure has a long way to go.
That being said, it is important to remember that this game is in fact a work in progress. I can only comment on things that were available at the time of our play testing. Multiple maps were marked as "coming soon," and an entire skill tree was also missing. Game modes were limited to three options, and there wasn't any customization outside of a perk system. The developer does in fact have a "feedback" and "idea" submission page over on the official Steam Community also, so they are serious about turning this game into something people want to play. It's nice to see, but again, I can currently only comment on what is in the game in it's current state. (Note: This review was written on October 6th of 2024. Just for reference.)
Anyway, here's what we thought about the game.
The Basics:
Ultimate Zombie Defense 2 is a first person zombie survival game, where you must survive against zombies as long as possible. You begin each match with a single pistol and no money, and gain cash for getting kills or doing anything that is helpful. Windows can be blocked off (which gives you cash for doing so), guns and armor can be bought from places on the wall, and there are "perk machines" hidden throughout the stages which allow you to buy upgrades for your character. Each stage is also sectioned off at first, with barricades that can be lifted by paying a fee, but doing so makes the game harder as well. Better guns/gear exist further into stages, but it balances out by the monsters and zombies that appear.
If all of this sounds familiar to you, then there is a very good reason for that. This is full on classic Call of Duty Zombies. Everything from the weapons on the wall, to the perk machines, to the window blocking, to the round setup all comes from Call of Duty. It may not be as "refined" as CoD, but it is CoD none the less. However, it does have one unique aspect all its own. The base building.
Building:
Instead of just trying to survive with your weapons and gadgets, the game includes a pretty decent building feature. Between each round you have the option of opening up the build or upgrade menu, and begin placing your own objects around the map. The game gives you a bird's eye view at this point, and multiple options for structures to place where you want them. Everything form exploding barrels, to barricades, to gates, to electric panels to trap enemies, to land mines; there is a pretty wide variety of things to use to help you survive.
This is where the real fun comes in, as you can create mazes for zombies to funnel through, or set traps in the right places to make your life easier. Building such objects uses your own money, which takes away from buying new guns or perks, but every play can be building at the exact same time. With some coordination, you and your team can work together to make something great. Heck, you can even build portals to warp across the large maps! But, as with everything else you build, these can be destroyed if you aren't actively protecting them.
On top of building there's also the option to upgrade your placed objects, as well as repair damaged ones. These upgrades mainly come in the form of increasing durability, but stuff like turrets get options to increase their ammo count as well. These upgrades take quite a bit of money to buy however, but thankfully each member can use their own money to contribute to the cause. This becomes more important in the later rounds (and on harder difficulties), but starting out it isn't really that big of a priority.
Although the game does give you a decent amount of time to build between rounds, sometimes it feels like "too much time." Thankfully there is an option to hit Enter to "ready up" and skip the round count down timer, but it's always possible that not everyone will be on the same page with this.
The Game Modes and Maps:
Currently the game has three game modes, with two of them basically being the same. You have your classic survival mode, which asks you to make it as long as possible, you have a survival mode with building turned off (think classic CoD Zombies here), and finally you have a tower defense mode where you must defend a point. All of these modes do go on indefinitely, and at the time of this review could be played on three maps.
Airport Terminal seemed to be the largest of the three maps, and took place in an Airport. It began in a smaller enclosed area with some hallways to watch out for, but eventually opened up into a larger open section with escalators that brought us up to an upper area. Eventually the map leads you to the back end of the Air Port, with multiple points where zombies could get in. This is where me and Billy setup camp and went all out in the end, but were ultimately taken out when we were pulled into literal Hell.
The Cemetery was an interesting map, and where we first tested out the tower defense mode. This map contained multiple old buildings, a creepy area that looked like it was covered in the Flood from Halo, a main graveyard, and some upper and lower level sections that we accessed later on. It too was a pretty large map overall, but it didn't have the same linear progression that the Airport Terminal seemed to have. Our base was chosen for us, due to having to defend an object, but we simply overloaded it with traps and barriers and we were fine.
The final stage was the Bridge, and it felt like the smallest of them all. It had a few barricades to open up going north, and a few going south, and that was about it. It's a straight shot with some cars to block your path, and some catwalks off to the sides. Honestly not a lot to say about this one, expect for the fact it reminded both of us of an area from Left 4 Dead.
Outside of these maps the game listed "Military Base" and "London" as coming soon, so at least two more are currently planned. Hopefully there are more, but that's all the game has to offer at this time. On another note, the menu does mention a "Custom Map Editor," which implies we will be able to build our own maps at some point. (Just not right now.)
Leveling up and Perks:
After completing each game, you gain experience points to increase your rank, and unlock perks. These perks are split into three trees: Engineer, Scavenger, and Slayer, but only the first two were included in the game.
Engineer allowed you to unlock permanent upgrades to your building, such as "MORE POWER!" which increases the effectiveness of your electric traps (and seems to be a reference to the classic show Home Improvement), while the Scavenger perks gave you better combat abilities. One perk allowed you to carry more grenades, and another gave you an increased chase to get more money for each kill. All of these perks are useful, but require time and effort to actually unlock them. That being said, those who play the game longer have an obvious advantage, but as a PvE game rather than PvP, this isn't really a problem.
Outside of this no other customization seems to be offered at this time.
A Fun game that needs Improvements:
As it stands, Ultimate Zombie Defense 2 is a fun game. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with it, but it is also very clear that it is still in development. It is being developed by a very small team, which is pretty impressive, but it is still missing features that could help make it "great."
The biggest issues for the game mainly come from incomplete features. There is no option to rebind buttons to a gaming mouse without using a third party program (I couldn't put Reload and Melee on my main two side buttons for example), gun and armor on the walls are blank outlines without giving you a real good look at the gun you are buying, some guns have way too high of a recoil (making it pointless to aim down the sight), and there is no ability to jump over objects. This is especially a problem because it is possible to trap yourself with your own placed objects, and your only way out of it is to wait till the next round to "sell" them. It also makes it weird when you come across spots that LOOK like you can walk across, but are really dead ends. (Watched Billy get mauled by a boss because of this.) It is just odd, and messes with what most of us have come to expect from modern first person shooters.
Outside of these issues, there are quite a few areas that could use polished as well. For example, when getting on a turret and spinning the camera, the character model cannot keep up with the turret itself. This often means that the one using the turret will get to watch their own head and body flop in front of their view, while their friends get to watch a pretty funny sight themselves. It isn't game breaking, but things like this go a long way in the actual presentation of the game, and improving it would look a lot nicer.
Gun balance could use some looking into as well, as some guns are clearly much stronger, and easier to use. Sometimes a cheaper gun like the XR18 can kill the entire wave of zombies all on its own, and then only cost $200 (which is nothing) to refill it for the next set. Meanwhile a more expensive gun has a higher recoil, seemingly does less damage, and is a great way to get yourself killed.
On the flip side, the game does do a lot of good, and have unique ideas!
The base building is a lot of fun, and Billy and I were able to create some fun setups. We were smart about our placement, but also went for what "looked cool" and that paid off quite nicely. Special enemies do start spawning after awhile, so it's not always the same thing, and the whole "Hell Challenge" pulls you into the underworld to fight a terrifying (and powerful) boss. One such boss required us to aggro it, and then get it to run into giant rock pillars to know out its shield - so it isn't always just "shoot until it is dead" with this game.
On the other hand, some normal enemies had weird attack effects, such as ones that blinded us or made us disoriented. These added to the challenge, and nearly got us killed a number of times. It was also nice to see that the game does include a map to help find zombies, and your friends, so there is always that as well.
Overall the game is a solid foundation, and it is great to see that the developer will be actively working on it to improve it, but there is no denying that it also has a long way to go. For $15 on Steam, it isn't bad as a game to play with friends, but it isn't a game I can recommend if you are going at it solo. It also didn't have a large playerbase online during our play testing, so even finding random players could be difficult. It honestly feels like a game that would benefit from a "4 player co-op pack" version at a discounted price, as maybe asking $15 from you and your three friends could be a bit much.
Still, I'm optimistic that this game can become something worth that price, and that the currently announced features will improve it greatly. We're just in the early stages of the project at this point, and I feel it is very important that everyone understands that. Do not buy this game if you are expecting a co-op campaign mode or anything along those lines... But if you like round based zombie games, then it could be worth at least giving a shot. (Just don't expect anything too crazy.)
I would like to thank Terror Dog Studio for providing a review copy of the game however! It was really nice of them, and I truly did have fun playing your game.
Disclosure: I received a free review copy of this product from https://www.keymailer.co
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