Joystiq hands-on: Zombie Apocalypse
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Tucked away in a corner at Konami's recent Gamers Night event was probably the single most entertaining game of the night: Zombie Apocalypse. No one from the publisher was demoing it, no information was provided on it -- we're still waiting for confirmation of its developer -- but everyone was playing it ... until a tripped breaker put the kiosk out of commission.
This four-player co-op game was running on PS3 and, from what the gaggle of assembled journalists could deduce, appeared to be a downloadable title. That was finally confirmed this morning; it's coming to PSN and XBLA on an unknown date this summer. (Seriously, whoever is in charge of promoting the game is doing a horrible job.) As you can probably glean from the title, the gist of the game is killing zombies. The basic gameplay won't win any innovation awards; movement is on one analog stick, firing on the other.
What made this simple game so fun -- apart from the fact that its simplicity made it instantly fun -- were the arenas (for lack of a better term) themselves. We played in two: a downtown disaster zone and a junkyard. Both had multiple interactive elements (a downed airliner's jet engine, a car compactor) that we were able to toss zombie bait towards, luring dozens of the undead to their (very grizzly) comeuppance. Working together with three other players to almost "herd" the zombies into these traps was almost as fun as routing them with chainsaws (every character has one as standard equipment).
Konami hasn't announced who's developing Zombie Apocalypse, but we're trying to confirm rumors Nihilistic Software (Conan, Marvel Nemesis) is behind it. We definitely want to know more about the game, and we'll be sure to share whatever we find out with you.
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