Dead State - Reanimated Review

GameBanshee gives us a review of Dead State: Reanimated. Here's the conclusion:

Dead State surprised me. I knew going in that it was a budget title, and so I wasn't expecting anything really fancy. But also I knew that it had received multiple patches, including its special Reanimated patch, and so I was expecting it to be fairly well polished. Instead, Dead State feels more like a game that's just been released, and needs that one patch to raise it from being mediocre to good.

Still, I enjoyed my time with Dead State more than I didn't. It has enough elements that work to make up for the ones that don't. So if you enjoy turn-based RPGs or zombie apocalypse games in general, then it's certainly something to check out, although you might want to wait for a sale first.

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Right on the money, just one more patch, and it would be good.

I keep starting this and not getting far...

I beat the original version and haven't played the Reanimated edition yet. As for the review I agree the game feels like it needs another patch to be a better game.

Yub, completely agree. Played it a couple of months ago in the last version. Lots of potential, but in it's state not a game I'd recommend. Too many bugs and especially gameplay mechanics which are broken.

Some examples:
-unconcious bodies completely screw AI, making range combat completely stupid
-opening a fight on a zombie is basically broken
-game can't handle real time AI calculations (make a noise to activate all AI in a level and the game freezes)
-game can't handle multi level calculations
-repeating crashes with a certain party member
-horrible inventory management which isn't explained well (and bad interface in general)
-horrible balancing (buildings, forced gamespan...)

So, yeah...if there were a couple more patches, the game could become good.
But according to the developer this won't happen. No patches planed and the game is in it's final state. So nothing I'd recommend to anyone.

The worst element by far is that the environments are nearly all generic and there is nothing to do in 98% of them but loot, and occasionally meet a new ally. It's mind-numbingly boring. At the end looking at the inventory made me physically sick.

I really enjoyed the game despite its bugs, I just wanted more dialogue for the companions. The main issue with the combat, was that fighting zombies was boring as hell, although I am not sure how you can have great tactical combat when your main opponents are dumb zombies. Fighting humans on the other hand was a lot more challenging especially in the reanimated version of the game. I would definitely recommend the game when its on sale, I have spent well over 70 h playing.

Is there a better RPG, with the same or less budget? Amazing game for the 700k they received from Kickstarter!

Serpent in the Staglands got 28K on Kickstarter and, by pretty much all accounts, is a far better game than Dead State. There's many more examples, that's just the first one that came to mind.

Second one that comes to mind: Underrail had effectively no budget other than whatever it sold in Early Access to finish up the game. Also, by all accounts, a far better game. And Age of Decadence was in the same boat - no budget other than whatever they raised in pre-orders. And it was also much better received than Dead State.

So, to answer your question, yeah.

Was Underrail a Kickstarter? How much money did they get?

No, it wasn't.

Acleacius said:

Is there a better RPG, with the same or less budget? Amazing game for the 700k they received from Kickstarter!

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I guess you haven't played Lords of Xulima, Paper Sorcerer, or Expeditions:Conquistadors.

I liked Dead State. *shrug*

Admittedly, I didn't finish it, but I played pretty far in, I think.

I'll check out Serpent in the Staglands, Lords of Xulima, Paper Sorcerer and Expeditions: Conquistadors, thanks.

A quick look, Serpent in the Staglands doesn't seem to have C & C (sort of a big no no in a real RPGs if not the defining trait) are there any choices at all? Or maybe this is just an action adventure with gameplay skill development instead of an RPG? So not really sure we are on the same page here.

On Lords of Xulima and Paper Sorcerer seems to be the same, no C & C. Is it also just an action RPG with skills development?

Expeditions: Conquistadors sounds like it does have C & C, also seems a bit more strategy than I play.

I'm currently playing Underrail and afaik it wasn't Kickstarter. I actually waited for the 1.8 patch ( 1.6 broke Faceless faction without going into spoilers), but annoyingly GOG held the 1.8. They didn't know it fixed broken main quest for neutral and good players, until 1.9 came out. Then 1.10 came out a couple days later, so I just gave up till then after restarting multiple times

Dead State is still an excellent RPG. I can see why some get bored with basic TB combat, with so many games using flashy spells and effects. They clearly spent their time and resources on C & C. I think most players were overwhelm at all the C & C, base management, Food and Resource management, not to mention constant worry about NPC abandonment and easy deaths. Probably just too hard core for most people.

Meh…well, imho Dead State is not a game made to be played on Ironman, even if it is possible to do so (but even then you can save/load anyways, so…). And with using save/load it's basically impossible to actually die of starvation. The Food management doesn't matter at all. And I wouldn't say that people dislike TB combat in general. But the TB implementation in Dead State is pretty bad.
The choices you have are management choices (what do build first, where to go first) and party choices (some could have some drastic outcomes, which was pretty cool). (My German Review can be found here)

I'd say regarding choices Expeditions Conquistador has more to offer.

Lords of Xulima is a game in the direction of EoB, Stonekeep, Dungeonmaster and so on. No choices there - at all.

My impressions from the updates was that there wasn't much to this game. So I passed.

Thanks for the infos, I've added them all to my *get to eventually list. I do like Stonekeep and Dungeonmaster (EoB? guess my caffeine hasn't kicked in yet).

Yeah, not sure I've seen anyone starve but Reputation falls quickly without food causing NPCs to leave and certain deadly consequences for the player. I've never played it on Ironman but there are ways to adjust TB combat, such as speed. I don't think DB ever tried to sell Dead State as the greatest TB ever. TB combat was clearly serviceable yet secondary to C & C and Imo they did succeeded. There is a great diversity of NPCs, personalities, choices and consequences.

As far as great low budget Kickstarters, Paper Sorcerer as mentioned, and Antharion, which raised only $14K, was in development for 17 months, and ended up a nice light turn-based RPG. No C&C in that one but entertaining for what it is.

Acleacius said:

I'll check out Serpent in the Staglands, Lords of Xulima, Paper Sorcerer and Expeditions: Conquistadors, thanks.

A quick look, Serpent in the Staglands doesn't seem to have C & C (sort of a big no no in a real RPGs if not the defining trait) are there any choices at all? Or maybe this is just an action adventure with gameplay skill development instead of an RPG? So not really sure we are on the same page here.

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Not sure what you consider acceptable level of C&C for a RPG.

SitS is definitely an RPG although it focuses more on exploration than Fallout 1/2 level of C&C.