State of Decay 3

To Be Released

With base building, scavenging, third- person action and a whole lot of zombies to boot right in the face, welcome to State of Decay 3 by Undead Labs. This game isn’t out yet but we can take a good look at what we can expect from it. Barricade those doors and settle in for the night as we discuss the newest entry in this expansive zombie survival franchise.

DISCLAIMER: This title has not yet been released and this article is purely speculation.

Gameplay

Simply put, the gameplay should be quite similar to what we’ve seen in the past, just a lot more polished. Characters should move with a bit more weight, base building should move to a new level of depth and they should definitely move the survivor counter to however many you want.

In State of Decay 2, you were restricted to about 15 survivors to try to get you to connect with them on an individual level but realistically, with the new engines in the next gen consoles, we should be able to expect a complete redesign from the ground up.

In the trailer, we witnessed a character set up at a small camp meaning there is a strong possibility that we could be looking setting up forward camps throughout the world. Instead of setting up shop at a pre established building, it could let us open up the map from a whole new perspective.

There is a real possibility that we could be looking at a title with the same attention to detail as The Last of Us, focusing on interpersonal relationships and survival with a much more realistic and heartfelt approach. It’s hard to say but I’m excited to find out.

World

Also in the trailer, we saw a large open world caught in throws of winter. We also saw the inclusion of wolves and deer, meaning wildlife could now play a part in the games; adding a lifelike diversity and new enemies into the world for the player to experience.

This enemy diversity could come into play in 2 separate ways. The wolf we saw could provide predators for the player to combat but shortly after that we saw the wolf had been killed and was being eaten by a zombie deer; which means creature zombie-fication could play a large part in the world as well, adding enemy diversity in that area alone. It would be really cool for the player to have to take things like warmth, shelter and hunting for food into consideration alongside other mechanics, we could be looking at a game with much greater depth than we’ve seen before in this franchise.

Visuals

Sadly, as no gameplay footage has dropped, we cannot yet see what the game is set to look like. Until we do, we will have to settle with what the trailer shows us, alongside conjecture on the engine in conjunction with the new consoles and what they are capable of. We should be able to comfortably expect a larger game with greater detail.

Pros

• Adding fauna would add great depth
• Adding zombie fauna would be awesome and creepy as heck

Cons

• If the developers don’t make full use of the new platforms and their improved capabilities then they could kill the franchise with a missed opportunity
• We need to see some gameplay. ASAP