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7 Days to Die (Early Access) Review – A Great Example of Sandbox Survival Horror Done Right

7 Days to Die
The Fun Pimps

My buddy Rock and I had just scavenged enough materials to craft some basic clothes for ourselves, including hemp shirts, pants, and hats to protect us from the scorching glare of the afternoon sun. Since we’d heard that the zombies of the post-apocalyptic world we’d found ourselves in were much more active during the nocturnal hours, we traversed the wastelands as hastily as our feet could carry us. Our main goal was to find some form of shelter, no matter how rudimentary.

As the sun lazily sunk ever closer into the hazy horizon, we easily dodged around multitudes of lumbering zombies of different types—a policeman here; a nurse there; all in various states of decomposition. As we ran, we kept reminding each other that soon, these shambling messes would transform into fast-moving, highly mobile menaces.

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Suddenly, Rock shouted through my headphones that he’d spotted an old, two-story farmhouse off in the distance. As the last rays of the sun began to fade, we made a beeline directly for our newly discovered potential shelter. We’d barely managed to take a few steps when day became night, and we could hear the feral noises of undead all around us as the flesh-eaters became invigorated by the darkness.

As we sprinted for the house, we dared a look or two behind us and could see that we were being chased by equally fast-moving zombies, some of which kind we’d never seen before. We managed to make it through the dilapidated dwelling’s front doorway and quickly boarded it up with planks of wood we’d scavenged during the daylight hours. Moments later, as we began boarding up the windows, we could hear the pounding of the zombie’s fists and scratching of their nails on the front door.

Soon, they likewise sought entry through the boarded windows, but we had already scampered up the rickety stairs to the house’s second level. We quickly searched the upstairs rooms for any place to hide or any weapons that we could get our hands on since we were unarmed. Just as we heard our undead pursuers smash into the downstairs level, Rock reported that he’d found a ladder leading up into a small attic.

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We hurriedly climbed the ladder and as we did we heard the zombies running up the stairs to the second level—Rock went up first and I second. I was so frightened that I kept bumping in my friend’s rear end on the way up. I’d just lifted my rear leg up into the attic when a few zombies entered the room below us. Had they seen or heard us? We’d heard that their senses were boosted during the nighttime hours.

We squatted in the darkness of the attic, looking down at the undead creatures below and spotted one that had black skin and red eyes. To us, it almost appeared to be some sort of demonic entity. As we squatted there, trying not to move, the thing with the red eyes lifted its head and looked up directly at us.

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As you can see, indie developer’s survival horror extravaganza, 7 Days to Die, can be quite nerve-wracking. Whereas in many other games which feature zombies, players have access to lots of weapons and ammo, and can swagger around killing the undead indiscriminately, in 7 Days to Die every zombie that you encounter can be a handful. That’s because not only are weapons and ammo relatively scarce in 7 Days to Die, but its zombies are a lot tougher than in other games.

For example, in a comparable zombie-apocalypse game, Miscreated, you can take down most of the zombies without much of a problem. In 7 Days to Die, each encounter with the undead, especially at night, can be a nightmare to contend with.

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Fortunately for the survivors within damned lands of 7 Days to Die, there are plenty of resources that may be collected during the daylight hours. In turn, you can use these materials to craft all manner of items and weapons, including bladed weapons, bludgeons, bows, and others. Or, you can manufacture useful survival items such as healing salves and backpacks. 7 Days to Die’s crafting system even lets you craft larger items, such as furniture for a dwelling that you’ve designed or refurbished.

Speaking of dwellings, in 7 Days to Die you can either renovate pre-existing structures that you come across, such as houses, banks, or stores, or you can custom-build a base of your own design. Although not as robust a building system as say, a survival game like Rust, 7 Days to Die nevertheless allows you to erect some pretty impressive bases. Certainly better than anything that you can cobble together with Miscreated’s lackluster base-building system.

What really impresses me the most about 7 Days to Die, however, is the sheer feeling of freedom that the game delivers. You can literally go anywhere and do anything. We once randomly found ourselves in a city as the sun was falling. We decided to investigate one of its massive corporate buildings and climbed to its highest floor, where we hoped to ride out the night, clandestinely.

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7 Days to Die is an exceptional zombie survival horror game that keeps getting better and better with every developer patch and update. If you’re a fan of survival horror games, or even survival games in general, 7 Days to Die is a great pick up to round out your survival game library with.

SCORE: 81%

7 Days to Die features great graphics that make its survival horror gameplay come alive. However, you want to have a pretty beefy gaming PC or gaming laptop in order to play it at a decent framerate. So, you may just want to invest in a decent gaming rig:

HALLOWEEN TRACER II 15 VR
HALLOWEEN TRACER II 15 VR

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