Undead Development is a hybrid game that combines first-person shooter alongside survival gameplay mechanics. The game takes place in an apocalyptic zombie infested world. In the game, you explore maps and choose your base to defend and that place will later be used as a shelter to protect yourself against waves of zombie invasions. There is an open area where the player can freely roam through using teleportation and search for useful items like ammunition and weapons, or items that can be later used for crafting.
One of the unique gameplay mechanics is its nailing system, which allows players to nail almost any object to another. You can use that, for example, to nail a wooden door to the open front door area or nail an ax to your M16 rifle to serve as a single range and melee weapon.
You can also use your axe to break items to their individual parts. For example, hitting a wooden bed in the room will give you wooden plates which you can then use to nail them to prevent access through broken walls.
The game also encourages players to search for more items in the world. For example, in the trailer, you can see the player nailing an ax to a gun. If one axe is not enough, you can combine another axe, each one on each side for a really badass hybrid weapon. I'm sure that some players will come up with some crazier and more creative ideas. Managing your inventory is also really straight forward. You have your belt which you can hang your items and easily put and take them out when needed.
One you scavenged the environment and have confidence in your preparations, you can push the trigger near the door to start the zombie wave attack. This part is where the shooting fun begins. Zombies will attack the house from all direction, trying to take down your defenses and kill you. You need to quickly move from one side to the other to make sure to take any zombie on sight and also make sure that your defenses are still in place, and if not, make sure you quickly nail more woods to block any entrance in forthcoming waves. You have two minutes for preparations before the next wave begins. Of course, if you lack of resources, you need to get out and quickly scavenge more resources to build new defenses.
The game has simplistic kind of cartoony blocky visuals. I personally really like the visuals because it's easy to locate and differentiate between items without lots of screen clatter. The color palette used is quite pastelic and has low saturation. I personally prefer more vivid and highly saturated colors, but I have to admit that it fits the post-apocalyptic theme of the game and it's also quite calming as well, at least that what I felt when I played it.
I think that the dynamic nailing system is what makes this game stand out from the rest. I really liked this innovative crafting system that allows players to come up with their own creative ways to protect themselves; kind like in real life when you come to think about it.
I think all of the game elements, including the crafting mechanics, the defense building system, the visuals and the shooting mechanics are all mixed up surprisingly well to create a really compelling survival and shooting experience.
Undead Development (cool game title by the way) is coming in 2017 for HTC Vive - I highly recommend checking it out!
Image credit: Masterstrike