When is a World War Z game not a World War Z game?
I had the opportunity to play the tutorial and the first level in a preview build of the new VR version of Saber Interactive’s World War Z, and I’m not sure I’m loving what I found. When I consider World War Z video games, there are a few basic tenants of the franchise that I immediately think of.
- Mountains of varied zombies piling up as they scurry like insects over buildings and objects
- Tightly coordinated but bombastic battles shared among multiple players
- Intricate settings and well-designed levels with lots of branches and nooks
The new World War Z VR game has…none of this. Instead, I found that the level I played felt like a substandard PS2-era level, with AI companions taking the place of my friends. The loss of multiplayer in this version of the game feels like a fundamental shift, putting it well behind games like Arizona Sunshine and After the Fall. The level design was extremely linear, with a few very small side branches that delivered additional weapons or ammo (though nothing that could be called “exploration” was required).
And the zombies themselves – well, it was not uncommon to see three or four of the exact same model on the screen at the same time, even when there were only eight or nine zombies on the entire screen. The total number of zombie models was extremely low, though the number of overall zombies running around in the game was more impressive. There were a few interesting boss-type zombies (bombers, poison cloud guys), but I found that dipping behind my AI buddies would usually take care of the more advanced baddies, as they would just stand there like dummies and absorb the brunt of the attack.
More satisfying was the gunplay, as there are a number of different weapons available. I really enjoyed dual-wielding, with a machine pistol in one hand and an assault shotgun in the other. Still, using the auto reload felt extremely fumble-y, and I wasn’t exactly thrilled that I couldn’t reload a weapon until the magazine was completely spent. I was also bewildered by the game’s healing spray, which seemed to work very inconsistently. Do I spray my face? The top of my head? My hand? The game seemed to change the target regularly, and I spent more than one canister of healing spray gushing it all over my body to little effect. It’s super weird.
On the technical side, the Quest 3 seems to be struggling a bit to render even the modest number of zombies I saw in my demo. My framerate started chugging more than once (a VR killer if there ever was one), and there were several scenes where the zombies arrive by flinging themselves off a rooftop just to kind of crumple and die on the sidewalk. I mean, yes, technically they are there, but are they really doing anything? Many of the rendered zombies only appeared to be window dressing.
I played through the demo level three times, each time having an easier time of things until I was eventually able just to kinda walk through it. Overall, I got the impression of a game that has made many compromises in order to run on Meta Quest 3, to the point where it may have lost its core identity. Although, to be fair, I was only playing one level of the game, as opposed to the complete package that releases next month.
Interested parties can check out and reserve World War Z VR in the Meta Quest store here.
