6. Zombie Driver HD
Another game that involves cars and zombies, this time with other mechanics in place. In this oh, so different zombie apocalypse ([/sarcasm]), you are a taxi driver that wakes up in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. And you decide to pick up the people that are in distress with your fancy 4 door taxi and get them to safety. You will even save the Mayor, but with one huge price that the developers didn’t turn into a sequel.
Gameplay and Features
Zombie Driver HD, combines helicopter-view camera with cars that have big-ass weapons mounted on them like a machine gun or a flamethrower and even a rocket launcher. For you speed maniacs out there, you also have access to nitrous and you can even burn those brain-eaters down while using it. All these items can be found throughout the map as pick-ups alongside with the highly worshipped Repair-All.
Though you start with a puny yellow cab, once you complete missions and get money you can make it a reinforced puny yellow cab. You can access new vehicles though by completing main or side objectives which are presented at the mission briefing. Also, you can unlock weapon upgrades to make them more reliable on the battlefield, since the number of the zombie hordes will exponentially increase both in numbers and toughness.
You can receive money through other means as well, so listen very carefully, because without this you’ll be too poor to play the game properly. You can get lots and lots and lots of money by killing lots and lots and lots of zombies making lots and lots and lots of combos.
The higher the combo, the more money you’ll get. So don’t be afraid to go all CAR-HULK SMASH! on them; weapons counts as well. The second alternate way of getting money is through yellow circled pick-ups. You get an idea of the amount you’ll receive through the size of the money picture: the more bills stuffed in that icon, the more you receive.
The developers thought that it would be nicely to have a miniature radar on the screen though it’s true purpose is unknown since you don’t actually have time to stare at it because:
a) You’ll either have zombies wrecking your car if you dare to stop it;
b) You’ll smash into a parapet taking a bit of damage. Other display information like ammunition, vehicle health and nitrous bar are also integrated.
Bonus, when you run over the living-dead, information regarding the number of kills and also with which side of the car the kills were performed, appear on bottom left of the screen.
Also in case you don’t smash into the wall too often by daylight, don’t worry, some of the missions will force you to widen up your eyes at the headlights and choose, perhaps, a slower vehicle. The dynamic shadows do not help too much either as you dash towards the wall in a speedy car, the light magically disappears into nothingness as the wall mystically approaches you at the speed of light (surrender now or prepare to crash).
And because everyone knows that you can extend a zombie story by oh, so much, there are 2 other game modes in which you can quench your thirst for destruction. The first one is basically Death Race reincarnated, a bloody racing tournament in which you fight for the big prize. With the money gained you purchase new cars and upgrades. The second one is an Arena in which your purpose is to kill even more zombies than you did in the story.
The map, the enemies and the cars
Well, the map is an entire city with various landscapes like a train station, school, parks and so on. Lots of houses to crash into as well. Nothing else to describe here though, so moving towards the enemies.
As almost any other zombie game, there are common zombies and special ones and even bosses… huge, weird bosses at which the camera doesn’t help too much and they tend to throw big things at you. As for the special zombies there are speeders and boomers which may explode around your car and damage it (surprise, surprise).
The game contains a high variety of cars, starting with that cab and finishing up with even an ambulance and a bus. Each vehicle has different stats and number of passengers that it can accept, so think carefully which car you shall choose to complete the mission in a proper time.
DLC’s
There are currently 5 DLC’s (and I have my honest doubts that there will by any other released) that include new Slaughter Arena and Bloody Tournament maps, as well as new cars and paintjobs.
Pros:
– Fun game, lots of gore and destruction
– Some of the characters you get to save are a bit unorthodox
– Cute cars to waltz with through zombies
Cons:
– The story can be a bit unoriginal
– No sequel though there’s a semi-interesting cliffhanger
– Too many walls to crash into
– Camera can be sometimes your greatest enemy.
Genre: Vehicular Combat
Price: 6.99 $/€
Steam Store Page: Click Here
Score: 4.5/5
5. Prototype 2
The second of the series published by Activision comes up with some new superpowers that extend the amount of fun you can have and the amount of terror you can spread in the area.
Three years after the finale of the first game, you take the role of Sergeant James Heller, a U.S. Marine that returned from Iraq who discovered his wife and child to be listed as dead, causing him to reroll into the military to fight the Blacklight virus.
While pursuing the prequel’s main protagonist, Alex Mercer, he ends up infected by him, receiving the same superpower abilities Mercer has. With the help of some unexpected allies, Heller manages to uncover the whole truth behind the Blacklight virus and to have his revenged served fresh and warm.
Prototype 1 v Prototype 2
Prototype 2 suffered a complete rehaul at the abilities unlocks, the ‘EP’ currency being completely removed and having instead added a leveling system with the same name. Upon reaching a new level, you receive a point that you can use to increase one of the passive abilities, like health or speed. The new fighting moves are unlocked by completing series of side missions. The new weapons though are still received through the story missions.
Several other features have been replaced like the funny Patsy skill where you could accuse another Blackwatch soldier of being you and see him getting turned into a sprinkler by their teammates’ lead, has now evolved and became the Bio-Bomb, where you approach an enemy and inject him with something that makes him go boom, not before having tendrils get out of him, sticking to other nearby enemies that have been attracted by the noise and pulled towards him.
The conquest of military bases has also disappeared, though I admit that it was quite boring after a while, it still was nice to have as an optional thing to do. Instead of it, the players got access to zombie hives from which they can also acquire new powers or upgrade some other passives they already got, like weapon effectiveness or vehicle expertise. The Quick-Time Events for gaining control at helicopters have been removed leaving only the mashing button for opening the chopper’s doors.
A new, quite cool, feature has been added, called ‘The Hunt’. The Hunt is crucial in side story missions since it helps identifying a special target, required to start the actual mission. The Hunt is basically a sort of tracking system that not even the protagonist knows how it works so don’t expect any precise definition of it.
Your job is to push the button, wait to get the whole city covered in a reddish hue then see from which point it starts to return to the original color; it helps if you’re high above the ground. Another new option when climbing upon a military vehicle is to steal their weaponry and kill them with it. From what I noticed, it can be really satisfying.
Also a new introduction is the Pack Leader option where you can call and control up to 4 Super Mutants to do your bidding until their own death. But if you feel that their usefulness expired, you can command them to selfdetonate in a similar manner as the Bio-Bomb, thus creating more damage upon their death.
There are several types of side missions like Hive and military bases complete destruction, scientists ’annihilation, special mutants’ crowd control and so on. The missions come in a series of 2 to 4, each being a different type of mission in order to not allow the user get bored too soon. As I mentioned before, each completed series allows a certain skill tree to be upgraded by 1 point.
The collectibles system has also been changed. Instead of the floating orbs you can find audio tapes around the whole map from dead Blackwatch soldiers.
New types of challenges have also been added like some type of bowling play where you use your skills to take down as many Blackwatch human pins as possible with a few shots or exercise your barrel throwing skills in the attempt to avoid a mass infestation in that city area. This last presented challenge is available as well as a main story mission meaning that it can be used as a training mission before taking on the challenges since it has no countdown.
Another nice addition to the game is the cheats section of the game, which can be found in the View Map section at ‘Radnet’. Most of the cheats there can create such a crazy gameplay experience that it can almost be compared to a Saints Row IV experience. Abilities like Wrecking Ball, Mercer’s Bullet Dive and Medusa’s eyes make the game flashier at the expense of challenges and achievements to stop being tracked until you reload the save game.
Gameplay and Features
This game includes several nifty abilities like prolonged resistance to pain, extremely fast speed, high jumps and even gliding in air. Since you’ve been affected with the Blacklight virus you can create several types of weapons out of your arms, like blades, hammers and a grappling hook as well as 2 huge shields with the ability to get spikes on them for an easier defending and enemy stunning.
You can use any 2 of the weapons at the same time, each being controlled separately through left and right click. After several upgrade you can combine the powers harmoniously for extreme damages. Each weapon has several types of attacks, like the short ones with which you can create combos and those that require keeping the button pressed for a longer time; those 2 can be combined for an effective way to make room around you.
The third type of attack consists of grabbing the enemy, either to throw him or consume him. Consuming an enemy results in either of these outcomes: Regain health and fill the Devastation Attack bar, acquire/upgrade abilities, trigger a mission or it is presented as a required objective. Upon consuming the mission trigger, your mind gets flooded by the person’s memories, viewed in a cutscene.
Some of the missions will contain bonus objectives, shown on the top-left of the screen as well as its progress until it is completed or failed. Completing a bonus objective gives bonus experience to the character. Also in some of the missions it will be required for the player to not trigger any alarm.
For this, when attempting to consume a Blackwatch enemy the player can choose either of the 2 methods of devouring: either normally in which you can grab and lift him in the air, followed by the said messy voring, or silently in which the enemy gets rapidly absorbed after getting hugged from the behind by the character, taking his place.
The second option will not be always easy since other soldiers can keep their eye in your direction; if this occurs, you will be notified that you’re being watched and a yellow eye icon will be shown above the soldiers that have their visual cone in your direction.
At that moment you have 2 options (the later one being available after you advanced a bit in the story): you can either hunt for the ones that watch, 1 by 1, or Bio-bomb one of the more far-away enemies and get the others’ attention towards the victim. Consuming a Blackwatch soldier stealthily will grant you instant access to the weapons they were having.
After getting deeper into the game, you will be allowed to pilot military vehicles and helicopters. Each of the vehicles will have a primary and a secondary, with infinite ammo though a reloading time exists to balance a bit the gameplay. The primary weapon consists in a machine gun while the secondary is a rocket launcher, though different vehicles perform different amounts of damage.
For those that prefer weapons, there is a mediocre variety with an assault rifle, machine gun, rocket and grenade launcher with the additions of those you can get from the military machines like other types of LMG’s and rocket launchers. The aim is activated by pressing the Tab key and pointing the crosshair on a target.
The downside of it is that due to the impressive amount of zombies around the one you want to target, the aiming requires some time to finally hit the wanted target and after you eliminate him, you will have to go again with the targeting system. Fortunately, as a balance to this poorly implemented feature, each time you target someone, time slows down so you have an increased time for reaction. The vehicles have an auto-aim based on the direction you turn your target towards.
The aiming system can help though in close-encounter combat type since turning the camera in the right position can take a bit more time than your comfortable with, your character when attacking turns automatically towards the selected target, though there is no clue on how close or far he is so you might just hit the air.
Maps and Enemies
The allocated area of NewYork has been massively changed from having only the Manhattan to including 2 more fictional islands and only half of Manhattan. You can travel between the 3 areas by accessing ‘Airbridge’ locations.
All the past enemies from Prototype 1 like the Super Mutants and Hydra have been kept in the sequel with nice additions like the Goliath and Evolved (other infected people by Alex Mercer). I have to say that the fights with the Evolved feel the most satisfying since they are quite the only formidable opponent besides the game’s last boss.
Pros:
– The gameplay has been basically revamped, the new weapons and enemies make the game more challenging and fun to play
– Removal of some annoying features like QTE’s (kept only in some critical parts)
– Challenging bosses (at least the first time you encounter them)
Cons:
– Repetitive animations, too few implemented
– Mediocre story
– Poor and mostly annoying aiming system.
– The price is a bit too high since the DLC is not included.
Genre: Action-Adventure
Publisher: Activision
Price: 29.99 $/€
Steam Store Page: Click Here Prototype One
Score: 4.25/5
4. Killing Floor 2
Killing Floor 2 is the sequel to the critically acclaimed Killing Floor, a Co-op First Person Shooter, Horror, Wave-Based game using the marvelous Unreal Engine 3. The game focuses on killing zombies in the goriest ways: Decapitation, limb removal, sliced in half and so on. The gameplay is divided in classes, both for players and zombies which will be presented later on.
Gameplay and Features
One of the most notable features in both games is the ZED time, the Killing Floor’s equivalent of bullet time. This occurs by executing scenarios that the game deems incredible, like: extremely distant kill, fast reaction kill or multiple kills. Once the ZED time occurs, it lasts for around 3 seconds with the possibility to be extended up to 3 times with the help of some character classes. Some of the decapitated flying heads might provide too much detail for some people due to the ZED time’s effect, so ye be warned.
The vendor design has been reworked, replacing the NPC with a vending machine, which can be accessed at the end of a wave in order to restock or purchase new weapons. The vendor can provide, besides weapons and ammo, grenades specific to each class and Kevlar. It also can be used to sell weaponry found on the ground or the ones you previously purchased in order to get better ones. A guiding arrow will appear for each player after the last zombie in a wave has been killed, to pinpoint the temporarily unlocked vendor.
As previously mentioned, a decent number of items can be found on the ground while roaming the map like ammo kits, starter weapons and armor to aid the player in the current and even future waves, if he decides to keep the items. All the starter weapons will sell with 100$ regardless of the used class so those might be welcomed in getting some extra change to completely restock the ammo on your class’ weapons.
The ammo kits will provide a clip for each weapon you currently own + the chance to get a grenade. So far, Killing Floor 2 doesn’t recognize if your ammo count is full and it will keep getting the boxes without having any further effect.
The game contains 4 difficulty levels, starting with the Normal difficulty, meant for beginners and low-levels and ending up with Hell on Earth which is meant for max level classes.
Classes and Weapons
The game currently has available 4 classes, with plans to release 6 more in the future. So far the released classes are: Field Medic, Commando, Berserker and Support Specialist. Each of the classes has a distinctive loadout, making the need of various classes across a co-op play quite necessary.
For example, the support specialist can take care of extreme crowds with its wide array of shotguns and wield doors using the necessary tool, faster than any other class; the Field Medic can use almost all the types of weaponry available (except for blades) in order to shoot down enemies and help your friends. Each of the medic’s weapons has medical syringes that will heal his teammates.
The Commando opts for assault rifles like AK and SCAR-H, bringing him on the level with the support specialist to suppress big crowds. And the Berserker does what the name says: goes blade first towards the enemies and leaves pieces of them behind him, probably to be picked up by the teammates for a later barbeque.
Though each class has a set of weapons with which he performs best, that doesn’t stop him from purchasing from other classes or even from a jack-of-all-trade type category. Also each class has a passive power skill that can be shared with the other players in the co-op room.
For example, the commando can see the invisible zombies from a certain distance (based on his level), and he can choose to share the ability with the others offering greater protection against surprise attacks. The medic can enforce his armor vest making it more durable than the other classes thus giving him an edge in extreme situations where he might end up surrounded.
The weapons vary greatly depending on the chosen class, the most brutal weapons being available for the moment to Berserkers, starting with a shovel and going up to explosive sledgehammers or circular blade crossbows and even a nail gun with shotgun firing mechanism. Almost all the weapons include an alternative firing rate or a flashlight to allow the player use the ammo as he sees fit or to know into whom he actually shoots.
Outside the class’ area, the players can customize their character with certain player models and then further add hats, choose their clothes color and adding various accessories.
Enemies and Maps
So far the enemies are the same like in the first game with the exception of bosses, which suffered a complete change. There are 10 types of zombies which I will present in a list below:
– The Clot – The ‘starter’ zombie available from the first wave until the last of the waves, is a slow zombie which can still be dangerous if allowed to sneak near you, being able to grab and hold you into place allowing the other zombies to attack you way easier. Fortunately, in this sequel you can know exactly which one grabbed you due to the camera suddenly changing to your capturer, allowing you to shove him away or kill him directly.
– The Crawler – Presented by the game’s lore as a hybrid between humans and spiders (and apparently some zombie genes as well), it tends to appear from tight places, crawl towards you then jump and attack you. Like the Clots their health is low so they can be easily disposed of.
– The Gorefast – A somewhat upgraded version of the Clot, this one cannot catch you but it has an increased speed and a blade as one of his arms meant to leave his signature on you.
– The Stalker – The fore mentioned invisible class. It tends to move carefully to not make too much sound but its voice can still be heard. Stalkersappear visible right in the moment of the attack leaving you with almost no time to defend yourself.
– The Bloat – This one is pretty much the KF’s version of Boomer from Left 4 Dead 2: It spits with vomit, causing mild damage (but it won’t attract other zombies) and if it explodes near you, you get further damage.
– The Siren – The second female-gendered enemy in the game (The first being the Stalker), her main ability is to emit extremely high-pitched screaming, damaging the player directly, bypassing his armor, and it can also destroy any grenade or rocket coming towards her (There will be a demolitioner class in the near future). Like the Bloat it has an extended HP amount making her tougher to take down.
–The Husk – The last of the level 2 enemies is the Husk, an entity with a fireball launcher as one of his arms. His aim can be quite precise, but fortunately his aim is towards your body than the ground you stand on, allowing you to jump over the projectile or just move a bit to left or right to avoid it entirely.
– The Scrake – The first level 3 type enemy encounter is with the Scrake, a slow enemy, while calm, with a high amount of HP, which has a Chainsaw as his right arm. When angered he can leave quite the massacre behind unless the Support Specialist steps in to calm him fast.
– The Fleshpound – Personally, I consider this guy and the boss to be the only one you should be afraid of. The Fleshpound acts on a calm/anger system like the other level 3 though his damage being more devastating as he has 2 rotative spiked grinders on each of his arms and is a lot faster than the Scrake when angered. His HP has the highest value except for the boss so never encounter him alone.
– The Boss – Known as Hans Volter, a ‘100-year-old Nazi evil doctor character that is keeping himself alive with Horzine technology.’ So far, he is the only boss the players will encounter, with plans to return the Patriarch from the original game in development. He has a wide range of attacks, from nerve gas that damages the player, to vampiric features like rushing, catching and absorbing the life of a random player when he reaches a certain low-hp threshold. During the boss fight, level 1 enemies like Clots and Crawlers have a chance to appear to keep the players busy.
The number of enemies in each wave is affected by the number of players (max 6 players) on the same server.
There are only 4 maps available in the game at the moment, most of them placed in a night setting like ‘Burning Paris’ and ‘Manor’. Each of the maps have multiple spawning points for zombies that will deactivate themselves if the players are near it.
Also, since a recent patch, the players can search the entire map for a golden item shaped like the game’s currency. Each of the ~30 items will give a small amount of money and if the items are all found, each of the players inside that room receives a Steam Achievement. 3 of the 4 existing maps allow the players to carry their fights either inside a building or outside of it.
Pros:
– Interesting graphics
– Really gory
– Exquisite Rag Doll effects
– Nice soundtracks, fitting the fights.
Cons:
– Still a few bugs
Genre: FPS, Horror-Survival.
Price: 19.99 $/€
Steam Store Page: Click Here
Score: 4.75/5