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Infestation: Survivor Stories

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The War Z
File:Warzlogo.jpg
The War Z logo
Developer(s)Hammerpoint Interactive
Publisher(s)OP Productions
Producer(s)Sergey Titov
EngineEclipse
Platform(s)Windows
Genre(s)Open world, survival horror
Mode(s)Multiplayer

The War Z is an open world zombie survival horror video game developed by Hammerpoint Interactive.[1][2] The War Z features both first person and third person shooting perspectives. The game offers players the option of killing zombies or playing against other users (PvP).[3] The War Z can be purchased and played online without the need for a ongoing monthly subscription. The game comes with all of the content, and updates are free. Players can however purchase cosmetic, and convenience items such as private servers, or additional weapons and ammo, that they would otherwise have to find in the game.[4] The War Z has dedicated public servers accessible by all players in addition to player purchases private servers.[5] The game runs on the Eclipse engine (not to be confused with BioWare's engine of the same name) made by Arktos Entertainment.

The War Z began its closed beta on October 2012,[6] and was fully released on Steam December 17, 2012. Two days after the launch (December 19, 2012) the game was removed from Steam due to player complaints regarding features implied on the webpage that were not currently available in the game.[7] After rectifying the issue, The War Z was again made available for purchase on Steam (February 26, 2013).[8] The game has since received extremely negative reviews from professional critics.

Gameplay

The War Z is a zombie survival game, where players endure the hardships of a post-apocalyptic, zombie infested world. By collaborating with other players, finding weapons and items, players increase their chances of survival. The game incorporates survival elements like as hunger and thirst, displayed as bars, which gradually deplete over time. Supplies such as food and water can be found to replenish these stats. If the player fails to properly quench their hunger and thirst, their character will eventually die. It is possible to buy food and drinks if the player has not or chooses not to scavenge for the items in the world. Upon character death, users are given the option to either wait 60 minutes before respawning, or pay GC (the game's currency) to revive instantly. Items carried by the deceased character are lost on death, whether purchased in-game or not, but can be found and retrieved by other players continuing the cycle of life and death in the game.[9]

"Safe Settlements" or "Safe Zones" give users an area where they are protected from combat and zombie attacks. There players can access their "Global Inventory", an inventory shared between characters, and shop for items via the General Store.[5]

Outside the Safe Zones, players can engage in player versus player combat and player versus environment combat with zombies. Killing other players grants the user reputation based on the victim's standing[10] and a chance to collect their dropped items, whereas killing zombies grants the user experience points for use in the game's skill tree.[11]

Reception

Alpha Reception

A reviewer for PC World stated that "overall, the game looks terrific" and had the "typical alpha bugs" of an alpha release, with the game holding promise.[12] A reviewer for Joystiq praised the character personalization, saying that there were more options than they expected and that the gameplay would be easy for experienced gamers to understand.[13] Another reviewer for Joystiq commented that one of the game's biggest dangers was from other users, with the game currently not having any rules or policing of the PvP element and hacking.[14]

Critical Reception

On release the game received overwhelmingly negative reviews from critics. Aggregate review website, Metacritic assigned an overall score of 20 out of 100 based on reviews from 13 professional critics.[15]

GameSpy writer Craig Pearson stated that the game "displays astonishing design ineptitude and some of the worst kinds of microtransactions in gaming, all in one ugly package".[18] Eurogamer writer, Rich Stanton gave The War Z a score of 3 out of 10; he stated "The War Z is a real disaster" and criticised both the game's design and the work ethics of the developer.[19] Stanton elaborated that the developers were "both dishonest and incompetent."[19]

Controversies

In October 2012, executive producer, Sergey Titov, referred to spawn campers in The War Z as "faggots" in a forum post.[23] A representative of the game's press team issued a statement saying that Titov has no prejudice against homosexuals and that it was just a poor and inappropriate choice of words.[23]

On November 15, 2012, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) sent a letter to the game's publisher and developer stating that the request to trademark the name The War Z had been suspended.[24] The suspension was because the name too closely resembles Paramount Pictures upcoming film World War Z.[24] On December 24, 2012, Titov responded by saying that he doesn't think that the trademark has been suspended even though the USPTO lists it as suspended.[25]

On December 17, 2012, Hammerpoint Interactive launched the "foundation release" of the game on Valve's digital distribution platform Steam.[26] Sergey Titov, stated in a press release, “Now that we’ve reached the Foundation Release milestone we will continue to work, as promised, to add features and content that will satisfy our community and keep them playing.”[26] The developer was accused of attempting to get customers to buy the game directly from their website rather than Steam's platform by claiming that they would be raising the price of the game on Steam.[27]

Following the game's release, many customers accused the developers of fraud for lying about key features that were advertised but not featured in the game.[7][27] The game was initially described on Steam by the developers as containing certain features, such as multiple large game worlds varying in size, a skill point based leveling system, player versus environment combat, hundred-player servers, and private servers, none of which were a part of the game at the time.[7][28] The Steam page was updated within 24 hours of release, but still mentioned features not yet in the game.[28] Titov defended the way the information was presented by stating that the map size and player limits fell within the ranges shown, e.g., "Size of the area, once again, come on—[the] first map is over 100 sq km. So [the] text is right."[28] However, an independent analysis by PCGamesN.com estimated the actual map size at just under 10 sq km.[29] Titov also claimed that players had misread the information about the game's features on the store's page.[28]

The game has also received criticism for using a pay-to-play business model while including the micropayments frequently seen in a freemium game.[27] On the day of the game's launch, players could respawn one hour after their character died.[7][30] On the following day, Hammerpoint Interactive released an update that increased the respawn time to four hours and added the ability to instantly respawn for in-game currency that is purchased through microtransactions.[7][30] Two days later, a patch was released that returned the respawn time to one hour.[31]

When questioned about the complaints received, Titov responded saying that the customers complaining were a minority and "As of right now over 93% of our customers like the game, with over 40% saying it's perfect and around 50% saying it's good, but they'd like to see more polishing and features."[32]

On December 19, 2012, a Valve employee stated that they would be investigating concerns raised by users about censorship and moderation on Steam's forum.[33] The concerns were directed towards a developer of the game who was accused of banning Steam forum users unfairly for criticising The War Z.[33] On the same day, The War Z was temporarily removed from sale on Steam's store, with Valve issuing statement saying, "We apologize for this and have temporary [sic] removed the sale offering of the title until we have time to work with the developer and have confidence in a new build."[34] Valve also said that users could submit a ticket for a refund if they weren't satisfied with the game.[34]

On April 2, 2013, OP Productions announced that The War Z game and forums had been taken offline as "hackers gained access to our forum and game databases and the player data in those databases." Hackers gained access to user information such as email addresses, character names, IP addresses, and encrypted passwords. No payment information was stolen, though it was noted that simple passwords would not be hard to extract from the stolen data.[35]

References

  1. ^ Gauntlett, Adam. "Zombies Eat the World in The War Z MMO". Escapist Magazine. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  2. ^ Gallegos, Anthony. "The War Z -- A New Zombie Survival Experience". IGN. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  3. ^ Lahti, Evan. "The War Z announced: zombie survival shooter-MMO with strong parallels to Day Z". PC Gamer. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  4. ^ Zeidler, Brett. "Zombie survival MMO The War Z to release this fall". Destructoid. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  5. ^ a b "Patch Notes 2/12/13". OP Productions. Retrieved 25 March, 2013. {{cite web}}: |first= missing |last= (help); Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  6. ^ Mitchell, Richard. "The War Z closed beta starts on Halloween, pre-orders get in early". Joystiq. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  7. ^ a b c d e "Player complaints drive zombie game off Steam". BBC News. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  8. ^ "The War Z Now Available for Purchase". Steam. Valve Corporation. 26 February 2013. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  9. ^ "Interview: The War Z And Surviving A Zombie Apocalypse MMO". Gaming Blend. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  10. ^ "Reputation Explained". OP Productions. Retrieved 25 March, 2013. {{cite web}}: |first= missing |last= (help); Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  11. ^ "Patch Notes 3/4/13". OP Productions. Retrieved 25 March, 2013. {{cite web}}: |first= missing |last= (help); Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  12. ^ Cocilova, Alex. "Hands-on with The War Z". PC World. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  13. ^ Hindman, Beau. "GDC Online 2012: A (severed) hands-on with The War Z". Joystiq. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  14. ^ Hinkle, David. "The War Z makes it easy to tell your own story". Joystiq. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  15. ^ a b "The War Z". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. Retrieved March 16, 2013.
  16. ^ "The War Z". GameRankings. CBS Interactive. Retrieved March 16, 2013.
  17. ^ Todd, Brett (January 17, 2013). "The War Z Review". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved January 19, 2013.
  18. ^ a b Pearson, Craig (December 21, 2012). "The War Z Review". GameSpy. Retrieved December 24, 2012.
  19. ^ a b c Stanton, Rich (January 2, 2013). "The War Z review". Eurogamer. Retrieved January 2, 2013.
  20. ^ Gallegos, Anthony (January 8, 2013). "The War Z review". IGN. News Corporation. Retrieved January 9, 2013.
  21. ^ Lahti, Evan (January 25, 2012). "The War Z Review". PC Gamer. Future plc. Retrieved January 26, 2012.
  22. ^ Hargreaves, Roger (January 4, 2013). "The War Z review – apocalyptic vision". Metro. Associated Newspapers. Retrieved January 4, 2013.
  23. ^ a b Makuch, Eddie (October 23, 2012). "The War Z producer calls campers f**gots". GameSpot. Retrieved December 24, 2012.
  24. ^ a b Mardiney, Brian (December 23, 2012). "The War Z Might Have to Change Its Name". GameSpy. Retrieved December 24, 2012.
  25. ^ Schreier, Jason (December 24, 2012). "War Z Creator Says His Game's Trademark Wasn't Suspended". Kotaku. Retrieved December 25, 2012.
  26. ^ a b "Hammerpoint Interactive Launches Foundation Release of The War Z on Steam". Yahoo! Finance. December 17, 2012. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  27. ^ a b c Sterling, Jim (December 18, 2012). "The War Z launches on Steam amid accusations of fraud". Destructoid. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  28. ^ a b c d Stapleton, Dan (December 18, 2012). "A Shocking Interview With The War Z Developer On False Steam Store Claims". GameSpy. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  29. ^ Hogarty, Steve (December 19, 2012). "How big is The War Z's map?". PCGamesN.com. Retrieved March 28, 2013.
  30. ^ a b Plunkett, Luke (December 19, 2012). "WarZ Gets Suspicious Microtransactions Just As It Hits The Top Of Steam's Charts". Kotaku. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  31. ^ "Patch Notes 12/20/12". OP Productions. December 20, 2012. Retrieved March 25, 2013. {{cite web}}: |first= missing |last= (help)
  32. ^ Schreier, Jason (December 18, 2012). "Fans Rage Over War Z's Misleading Steam Description, But Devs Say '93% Of Our Customers Like The Game'". Kotaku. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  33. ^ a b Yin-Poole, Wesley (December 19, 2012). "The War Z dev apologises to gamers who "misread" Steam page, hits out at "extreme DayZ fanboys"". Eurogamer. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  34. ^ a b Schreier, Jason (December 19, 2012). "The War Z Removed From Steam". Kotaku. Retrieved December 19, 2012.
  35. ^ Savage, Phil (April 2, 2013). "The War Z taken offline after hackers gain access to player data". Retrieved April 2, 2013. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |Publisher= ignored (|publisher= suggested) (help)
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