I've posted on this blog years ago about 7 Days to Die. Back then it was Alpha 8 I was talking about, and I already loved the game then. Well, the game has now launched. And it's been one hell of a ride!
It's my most played game on Steam, with, as of writing this, a few hours short of 1300 hours. Yes, not as much as some people, but I think a fair bit enough that I can write this review.
What is 7 Days to Die?
In a nutshell, it's a survival game with intensive crafting options, taking place in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by zombies. This world is voxel-based, meaning it's fully destructible, and every single building and point of interest in the game can be explored. Every 7 days, a big horde of zombies show up, so your task is to basically prepare in the 7 days leading up to that to survive.
Survival
As with any survival game, 7 Days to Die also has the usual features. Hunger and thirst being the two main things to worry about. Now, I say worry about, but in the game these things are never really an issue. Not once have I died because of not finding food or water.
Food comes in all shapes and sizes, with the first piece of food you'll most probably get being a rotten sandwich haha! You can eat it, but it takes away some of your health, and there's also a chance of getting dysentery. A playthrough starts you off with a can of chili in your inventory.
You can hunt animals, like chickens, rabbits, boar, deer and even wolves and bears. These provide you with animal fat and raw meat. Raw meat can be cooked on a campfire to give you charred meat, but finding things like a cooking grill or cooking pot can let you make better versions, like grilled or boiled meat.
As you progress through your game, you'll unlock better recipes to make better foods like stews, or fish tacos, or steak and potatoes!
As for drink, you can at any time drink from a water source. This too has a chance of getting dysentery though, so only do that when you've just swallowed some vitamins, or have a water purifier mod installed. Some drinks, like beer, or coffee, give you buffs, like faster stamina regeneration, or better performance when brawling.
Skills and progression
You start as a weakling in the game, but with several options of improving your character. These skills are governed by the main skill it's associated with, like Perception, Strength, Fortitude, Agility and Intellect. Some skills include things like being better with certain weapons, like handguns or spears. Some skills make you less encumbered by wearing certain armor, or can make you jump higher (a very handy skill for survival!) or be better at bartering or crafting.
To level up, simply do stuff in the world - be it looting containers, of which there are a plenty, killing zombies, digging up hidden supplies, completing trader quests, building yourself a house, harvesting resources, etc. Each level up gives you a skill point that you can allocate.
The game has a skill book mechanic - in the world, you'll constantly find magazines that will provide you with knowledge on how to craft better equipment and gear. Your chances of finding specific skill books improve as you spec into the associated skill. For example, if you want to craft better shotguns, put some points into the Boomstick skill - this will let you find more shotgun parts, shotgun ammo, and the shotgun skill books so you can ultimately craft the best shotgun in the game eventually.
This mechanic has been met with a lot of criticism, but I really like it. It gives a lot more meaning to exploring and looting.
Fighting zombies
This is after all a survival game with zombies. So fighting them is a big part of it. Several of these foes exist, some with better stats and speed and health. During the day, most of the are just walking, but come nightfall, they start running and things become a lot more dangerous. In the early game, it's very common for you to find a place to huddle up for the night and only head out again when morning comes.
It's not just zombies though, you also have zombie dogs to compete with, they're really scary in the beginning, and wildlife like boars, bears, wolves and vultures.
As you go about your adventuring day, every now and then a wandering horde will show up to make things interesting, and then there's the big horde to prepare for every 7 days.
Later on, stronger and tougher version of the zombies start showing up, upping the challenge even more!
How to prepare for the horde
The hordes you'll be facing every 7 days will get progressively harder as your gamestage goes up - gamestage is a mechanic in the game that is determined by your character level, as well as the biome you're in in the world.
Speaking of biomes, you start off in a forest biome, which is the easiest. You then progress, at your own pace, to a burnt forest, desert, snow and wasteland biomes.
I would suggest you build your first base in the forest biome, as it's noticeably easier to be here hehe :)
Most people find an existing building and convert it to their started horde base. The main idea here is to be off the ground and some kind of barrier between you and the zombies so you can hit and shoot them. Ammo will be scarce to start with, so you'll have to resort to melee attacks to fend them off.
Defeating the horde provides you with loot bags that some of the zombies drop, and more importantly, experience and level-ups.
Traders
A big part of the game is finding each biome's trader. This is like a questing hub from where you can get jobs to do, as well as buy and sell stuff. Trader compounds are also safe havens, in that zombies cannot penetrate their walls - but, only during the day! At night time they close and you'll have to seek shelter elsewhere.
The kinds of quests you can pick up from these traders are:
- Retrieve the supplies
- Kill all the zombies
- Retrieve the supplies AND kill all the zombies
- Dig up buried supplies
- Infested clear (buildings with lots more zombies than usual)
You can only do one quest at a time for a specific trader, and once you've completed the task, you'll be provided with a reward and experience. What you get can also be improved with relevant skills.
As you complete more and more jobs, you'll increase the tier of the quests you have access to, raning from tier 1 to tier 6. Completing a tier gives you the location of the next trader in the next biome, as well as a bigger reward.
Getting around
In the beginning, you'll walk and run everywhere. Which is slow and tedious, but fret not! Better modes of transport become available, the first being a bicycle - hey it's better than nothing! You can either craft one, or unlock one by completing the tier 1 jobs with your trader.
Next up, there's the minibike, the motorcycle, 4x4 and ultimately the gyrocopter. These all use gas, which you can harvest and loot in the world, or eventually craft yourself. Each vehicle also comes with storage, something that's very handy if you go out looting!
Loot!
This is a big part of the game! Besides leveling up, finding better gear will pretty much be one of your main priorities! There are weapons, tools, armor sets and mods to go for:
Weapons and ammo
You have the four main types of weapons: Melee, Ranged,Throw-ables and traps.
You can start off by crafting primitive weapons, like pipe-guns and a primitive bow. This can go all the way up to Sniper rifles, SMG's, M60 Machine guns and even rocket launchers. Finding or crafting these is one of the big joys of the game, so I won't spoil too much here! Each can also be modded that can improve things like accuracy, damage, handling etc.
Melee weapons are a big part of the game too, ranging from better reach spears, to heavy hitting sledge hammers, to shocking stun batons. They also all have different tiers in their own right, and they too can be modded :)
Traps can be done too - like spike traps (always handy to have a bunch in your inventory!), blade traps, dart traps and electric fences!
Armor
There are tons of different armor sets you can collect, each giving individual buffs, like better carrying capacity or faster run speed, and when wearing a full set (each set has 4 pieces) provides an additional buff. As with weapons, these too can be modded to improve their stats and give the player buffs.
Tools
Various tools are available. As you need to gather resources, these will come in handy. These are your typical axes, like a pickax, wooden ax, to things like hammers and nail-guns, and even electric tools like augers and chainsaws.
Crafting
This is of course a massive part of the game. Crafting can be done from your inventory for basic things, and then there are several kinds of work stations to unlock and build, like a forge to smelt down iron and lead, a workbench, cement mixer and chemistry station. Some recipes require certain work stations to be able to craft.
And, get this, as a player you have access to everything needed to build any building you see in the game. There are well over 1700 building block shapes you can play around with, and make your base really stand out from the rest!
Physics is also a thing, you won't find hanging in the air blocks here like Minecraft, here if something isn't structurally sound, the whole building can come tumbling down - speaking of that, you can literally tear down a sky scraper if you want!
The world
The game takes place in a fictional county in America called Navezgane. This is a hand built map you can play on. But wait, there's more! The game has a really extensive random world generator! So each and every playthrough can be completely different and new, and maps can be small or massive!
100's of hand built POI's exist, from a small tent next to the road, to a massive skyscraper that can take several in-game days to fully explore and clear! And with every minor update, more and more of these get added. You can even use the level editor and make your own, so if you're the creative type and want your own house to appear as an explorable poi in the game, nothing's stopping ya!
Multiplayer
Multiplayer is where the game really shines! Clearing out poi's with friends, and building that ultimate horde base is just the most satisfying thing you can ask for! There are tons of servers to tune into, or you can host your own private games that your friends can join. PVP or PVE or both, go for it! It's a blast for sure!
Modding community
7 Days to Die was built from the ground up with modding support included, and boy has the modding community made some incredible mods. Some popular ones are Darkness Falls and Undead Legacy. Some mods completely overhall the game, while some just introduces quality of life tweaks.
Each game can also be customized to your hearts' content - want it easier and less hectic, dial down the horde nights to be only every 10 or 20 or 30 days, or turn them off completely. Want a higher challenge, try horde every night! Want progression to be slower or faster? Tweak how quickly you gain experience. The sky's the limit, and if you do hit a limit, chances are there's already a mod for that!
Conclusion
I keep coming back to 7 Days to Die for a new playthrough. They've just absolutely nailed it on the head! It has everything you want in an open world survival game. Nothing comes close!
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