7 Days to Die

Story

The game's events happen after a nuclear Third World War that destroyed an extremely large part of the world, except for some areas such as the fictional county of Navezgane, Arizona. The player is a survivor of the war who must survive by finding shelter, food and water, as well as scavenging supplies to fend off the numerous zombies (hinted to be the consequence of nuclear fallout) that populate Navezgane. Though there is no real objective except surviving at this moment, the developers hinted at a possible storyline that will be added in future updates.

Gameplay

In 7 Days To Die, the player spawns into a randomly generated world or the preset world of Navezgane, Arizona, with the objective of surviving for as long as possible. As the days go by, the zombies get tougher and more aggressive. The game features the ability to craft, destroy, and manipulate objects. The game also comes with a physics system in which building a structure with no support such as pillars and walls can lead to its collapse. The game is voxel-based, allowing for simple building, and destruction of objects in a physics-simulated environment.

The game's main focus is to have the players try to survive the night, as the game features a day and night cycle, making the zombies slow and weak during the day, yet fast and aggressive during night-time. The game features a system in which the character constantly needs food and water. Objects in the world degrade through use, so the player has to search for or make new tools as the game progresses. The player can build their own house or destroy existing ones in order to gather materials to construct a fort. The game also features a stealth and distraction system to avoid unnecessary conflict with the zombies. Carrying raw meat or foods that have a smell means the zombies can detect the player. The zombies in 7 Days to Die will climb, dig, destroy walls, doors to get to the player and kill them. The player needs to set up traps for the defense of his or her base in order to survive.

Multiplayer

Multiplayer is available through player-hosted servers and enables multiple players to interact and communicate with each other on a single world. Interactions can be cooperative or hostile depending on the used server options. Players can run their own servers or use a hosting provider. Single player worlds have local area network support, allowing players to join worlds on locally interconnected computers without a server setup. Players are also able to provide Wide Area Network support via single player worlds. 7 Days to die Servers can run on both consoles, Windows and Linux. There are two supported game modes for multiplayer: Survival (both randomly generated and standard) and Creative.

Development

The Windows alpha version of the game was released on August 16, 2013, for people who pre-ordered the game on either Kickstarter or PayPal. As of August 11, 2013, development of the game is ongoing with a Kickstarter campaign ending on August 15. The estimated release date was May 2014 for Windows PC; Macintosh and Linux versions were planned for later in the year. The game has also been greenlit on Steam after 23 days getting over 75,000 yes votes, 8,340 followers, and 8,700 favorites. It was number one on Steam Greenlight, after only 16 days with over 56,000 votes. The Mac version was released on September 13, 2013 at the same time as update Alpha 1.1.

Alpha

7 Days To Die was released to the public on Alpha 1.0. Only users who had backed the game via the Kickstarter Campaign or who bought it via PayPal had access to the Alpha until Alpha 5.0 which was released on Steam as an Early Access game 13 December 2013. Since the Alpha release of 7 Days To Die there have been multiple game changing updates that contained features such as a new snow biome, forging systems, new weapons, general graphical changes and smoother terrains which are to be completed by Alpha 8. Alpha 7.8 was released 4 April 2014 and was promptly followed by Alpha 7.9 which was released 8 April 2014. Alpha 7.10 was later added 19 April 2014. Alpha 8 was released 7 May 2014 which updated the visuals to zombie animations and smoothed the terrain for a final time. Alpha Version 9 was released 19 August 2014 and added random generated worlds, new injuries and new lighteffects and graphics. Alpha Version 10 was released 22 November 2014 and added a new character creation system with face/body morphing and visible clothing, a new zombie horde world heat map system and a new wellness system. Alpha Version 11 was released 2 April 2015, the developers updated to Unity 5, which includes many graphical improvements, a new quality range system for guns, weapons, tools and armor and a new Zombie called "Feral". Alpha 12 was released 3 July 2015, and added a new vehicle system with a Mini Bike, first weather system, new sound and physic systems, among other fixes and additions. Alpha 13 released on 12 December 2015, adding temperature survival elements, a skill system, and a redesigned crafting system. The difficulty of the game has increased, but it continues to be popular.

In April 2016, the game was announced for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It is set to be published by Telltale Publishing and was released in June 2016.

Reception

7 Days to Die received "mixed" reviews for the PC, and "unfavorable" for Xbox and PS4, according to video game review aggregator Metacritic.