Zafehouse: Diaries

This game isn’t quite as good as people say it is—it has its points, you focus more on your survivors than just killing zombies. But that’s only one part. Your survivors are simply out to harm anyone in the group that they dislike. Yes, it can be realistic, but the game fails to take into consideration a person’s ability to suck up their own feelings and beliefs when faced with terrible events. The whole town is covered in zombies; they want to get out alive. Not every person would simply, as the game puts, ‘throws a mirror at Person B’ even when they aren’t working together. The game simply has it that the survivors will do anything to harm each other. You can only do one rumor a day, and even then, not all the rumors assist in making the group like each other. You also can’t stay in one place for long; you have to keep moving to keep them fed. But every single choice has a dice roll effect to it. The game itself doesn’t take into consideration people’s abilities as much as it should, especially a game that claims to be more about the survivors than the zombies. This game is incredibly luck based, leaving many people to sit here, frustrated, at their survivors breaking each other’s legs or arms or failing to take the world into consideration, as many people would, indeed, attempt to.

If you're sick and tired of zombies being an over-used gimmick, and that's the only reason you didn't get this game, then please reconsider. The focus on this game is not on the undead, but on on the survival situation that is created in a hostile environment, and even more so, the interactions between your survivors. There are many things you will need to do in order to ensure your survivors make it through the night. On top of that, tasks also have specific ways they can be executed. Do you build barricades quickly but noisily, or slowly and quietly? Build normal, safe traps, or experimental traps that could do huge damage but backfire? Random survivors and city maps are generated each time you start, and you're not guaranteed to get every kind of building. Your town might not have a school, or a police station. You can also make custom survivors and locations with your own pictures, and even custom occupations. Though, there are downsides. The game is stingy with information, the good stuff is all in the manual, spoiler free of course. The UI can be clunky at times. Turns pass one hour at a time and down times can be just you clicking the watch over and over. And there's only a save and quit feature, no quicksave function I could find. All in all, a very solid and hard-as-nails survival game with intriguing interaction between randomized characters and lots of replayability.

My full review didn't fit so I posted it on the forums but I'll sum up my feelings for the game. Zafehouse: Diaries is a unique game that requires quite a bit of an attention to detail. Not all of the game's details are exact, often being a bit unpredictable but it doesn't take away from the experience. It does feel quite a bit like managing a group of survivors from a desk somewhere while waiting for a helicopter to show up and being able to add yourself and your friends/family to the party of characters in the game adds to that feeling a bit. I fully recommend getting this game. At this point in time, it's a one-of-a-kind experience.

It could be good, but in the end it's just frustrating. Played for many hours over several days, never lasted more then 3 hours. The AI seems very random and doesn't usually do what you would think from the tip and often causes more negative results. I enjoy a challenge, but one that you can win if you use the correct strategy, this seem dependent on luck. Investigate and fine 1 zombie, breach the next turn and find 22 outside, and inside you're swarmed and they are breaking down the door. Very very happy I got this on sale for $2.50! So sad this could be a really good game.