Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Aug 13, 2016

  "WALL OF TEXT OMG! No, PLEASE, give me the short version!" [i]-Ok, here goes:[/i] Infectionator : Survivors is a game with lots of potential but sadly doesn't deliver, it's says it's released but plays like it's still in early access. Easy to master, quick to finish, lacks replay value. I bought this game on it's release day, it's full/gold release day. It had been in early access for quite a while before that and been on my wish list for almost as long. So seeing that it was finally completed pleased me, so I bought it. The game is good in many ways, great even. It has nice pixel graphics and a fitting soundtrack. It is also fun to play, for a while. The first reef barrier you hit is the frustrating random no-control insta gibs of one or all of your survivors; when on the strategical map, now and then when you move to another city block you get a prompt telling you that your team of survivors has encountered this or that, like a car on the street with boxes spread around it. Now you get pick between two choices, either leave it alone or examine the boxes. The results? Well, it's either, A. nothing of value, B. some lesser valued stuff like twenty rounds of ammo and two food supplies, C. something valuable like a weapon (really, really rare, only found one once), or D. for Death; one to four of your survivors die, with no chance to revive, heal or mitigate damage. And the D. result happens quite often, I'd estimate about 20-25% of the times. So, you learn fast not to examine any boxes, open any doors, or doing anything besides leaving text events alone. The risk is NOT worth the reward, not at all. But it doesn't end there, no no. Sometimes you don't get a choice. Instead, the game simply straight up tells you that one or more of your survivors have died, because "Hey, tough luck!". Could be ok if survivors in this game were like lemmings in Lemmings, or soldiers in Cannon Fodder but they are not, they are more like the soldiers in X-Com or adventurers in Baldur's Gate. Dieing in a hard game, a survival rogue-lite because you make mistakes, misjudge or just plain isn't skilled enough is one thing. But losing because of random events you have little to no control over isn't fun, especially not when these events are text based in an action oriented game, no booming explosions or goory pictures of zombies gorging on flesh, only a plain sentence telling you that "Mike didn't make it". Good thing that you can press Alt+F4, restart the game and get a new random seed. Mike is alive! So, how is the "actual" game then, when the random text events are finally handled? It's fun. Well, for a while. If your survivors live on long enough (more than one day), either because you chose not to take part in any of the texted events, restarted the game to get a new seed or just got lucky (I don't like this kind of luck, unvolontary russian roulette is not fun, only frustrating), you will quickly find all you need for your team while you are out exploring the city. Sure, you can craft alot of things in your base, like weapons, armour, grow and cook your own food to make supplies and rations, but there is no need for it really. Because you will find everything you need while you are out exploring, even food. If you have the slightest amount of brain power you will quickly find the optimal tactic to win the action sequences, whether that be the tower defence-like scouting missons or the more free-roaming exploration missions. And then you win the game. On my first successfully completed playthrough I had owned the game for three days, played a little each day. I beat the game under nine in-game days, which there is an achievement for. You start out with a fifteen days limit in which you must repair your car and escape. That can be extended to thirty days if you spend tickets which you earn by completing runs, winning or losing. So, after beating the game, even doing so on less than half of the required time, do I feel like play ing it again? No, not really. I mighth be going back for (some of) the achievements that are left, but I don't feel too excited about them since they are mostly "grindy" ones. Remember how I wrote that that you don't need craft anything, because you will find everything you need? Well, guess what, several of the achievements are for crafting lots stuff. Others are grindy in the hoarding sense, either kill things in the thousands or collect ammo in the tens upon tens of thousands, or loot a couple of thous... well, you get the idea. These "grindy" achievements might have been ok if the game had any kind of real replay value, which it doesn't. Sure, you can unlock different teams with your tickets, instead of stomping koopas with Mario you can flatten koopas with Luigi, or you can beat M. Bison with Ken instead of with Ryu (ok, maybe this is a bad analogy, ...yeah it is). Point is, there is no replay value except for grinding out achievements; there are no special endings, no leaderboards, no functional endless/survival mode, no actual new things to explore or discover. Apart from this there are also bugs, glitches and genereally unbalanced and unfinished elements in the game. This game left early access too early. Which is sad, because it could be a great game, and I really want to enjoy it. Perhaps it will become updated and finally become "full" some day, I surely hope so, and that that day comes sooner than later. If so, I will update my review.
• gamedeal user

  Jun 30, 2017

  This game has been getting a bit of hate lately, but it's really a pretty fun little roguelike RTS. + RTS-style combat (move your people and they will fight on their own) + RPG-style character development + Base building + Strategic exploration of world map + Charming retro visuals + You will recognize some of the characters in the game - Game is too easy to beat if you play carefully - Base building options are limited - Characters max out at level 5 - No hotkeys Here are some tips for struggling players. But beware: the game becomes super easy if you play this way. 1. When Exploring a location, first make a full circuit around the outside of the building. This is safe to do, brings you very close to Fully Explored status, helps you get a handle on the map, and - most importantly - starts off your killing spree. The noise you make from combat while making that circuit will bring zombies, and killing those will bring more, and so on. This saves you the trouble of having to hunt them down and greatly lowers the possibility of you getting trapped in a room when you move inside the building later on. If the zombies keep coming, you can keep circling until the flow slows to a trickle. 2. Actually, once you have slightly better weapons (say, an MP5, desert eagle, and 2 shotguns), you can just park your team somewhere rather than keep circling. Just put your survivors into a tight square against one side of the building (or in an outside corner of the building if one is available), then go read a book or something. When you return, your team will have killed most of the zombies on the map and gained a lot of ammo in the process. Just make sure you are at least 2 squares from doors/blind corners on either side and that the map doesn't contain a boss (or you have already killed the boss). Incidentally, you can do this even with weaker weapons if you park your team farther out towards the edge of the map: the zombie flow rate will typically be low enough there for this to work out. 3. If you have Vic in your team, give him a sawed-off shotgun. His x2 reload speed gives him ridiculous DPS with this tier 1 weapon (78 vs the usual 48.5), and his ability to reload on the move means you can easily kite a boss to death if you have a Speed stat of 80. Just keep moving the team to stay a couple of squares ahead of the boss and you can kill it and its surrounding zombies in a matter of seconds and without taking any damage. When you have enough Desert Eagles for everyone else, upgrade Vic to a Desert Eagle as well (new DPS 90). 4. If you face human enemies on a Scouting/Ambush map, your best bet is to quickly build a turret near the left of the map and then head right. If you have breathing space, build another turret near the right of the map and then huddle in the middle of the map and wait out the fight. 5. If there are human enemies on your Exploration map, do the circuit described in point 2. Whenever you come across a swordsman, stand at range and let him come to you. You should rush into melee range against gunmen though (even if you don't have a melee character) - this allows your entire party to get into range as quickly as possible. 6. Don't bother Scouting locations. This costs a full stamina point, yields very poor returns, and can result in a team wipe from zombies getting past you if you are extremely careless. 7. Place the characters with the highest Search stats in the first slots on your team. This makes it a bit easier for you to move the team as a whole and still perform search and revive actions. Also, in case you didn't know, whenever you select a single character, that character is designated (temporary) team leader. When you have the whole group selected, the current team leader is the one who responds first to any single-person command you give (search and revive, usually). If the team leader is busy, the first non-busy person performs the action. Therefore, sorting your people by Search makes it a lot easier to loot a building or recover from character death. 8. Make sure that your away team members are well-rested before missions. Either don't assign them any base jobs or make sure to free them up by 4.30 pm or so every day so that they will go get some rest (automatically). Tired members take quite a hit to Speed, slowing the game down and making tactical retreats difficult. 9. Always expend all your stamina points for the night. Plan out your route and try to hit as many marked locations as possible each night. Despite the scary sounding warning when you choose the Retreat command on the world map, retreating is mostly safe. By the way, it's generally safe to push on a little further after you are out of stamina, though I wouldn't recommend taking this too far. 10. The very first thing you need to research in your base is Extra Rations in the kitchen. The more Stamina you have, the further you can go each night. Always level this up the moment you get the chance. (You will need to upgrade the kitchen to unlock higher levels of this research.) 11. The next thing you want to do is to upgrade your farm plot as high as it can go. Afterwards, look at the best recipe you can cook in your kitchen and stock up on those ingredients. Cooking takes very little time (you can complete cooking tasks multiple times a day), allowing you to quickly save yourself from starvation if you get careless/unlucky. 12. Speaking of food, try to keep your supply level at x2 your daily needs at the least. 13. You can only find a weapon or item you are able to craft, so it is helpful to perform weapon/item research once you have enough Stamina and Supplies. The highest DPS weapons in this game are, in descending order (DPS most characters / DPS Vic): AA12 Shotgun (333.3 / 400) Lightsaber (200 / 200) SCAR-H MG (142.9 / 166.7) Benelli Shotgun (132.4 / 155.2) SAW MG (124.1 / 141.6) SPAS-12 Shotgun (97.5 / 111.4) The best sniper rifle you can get is the Barrett .50 with a range of 5.5 and DPS of 88.2 (101.7 for Vic). Because of their range and pierce-through capability, sniper rifles are better than they look on paper against bandits and against large groups. There is really no need to do much weapon research though: I completed my 2nd playthrough in 7 days using only Deserts Eagles, which I believe are available either without any research or after 1 level of weapon research. 14. Incidentally, don't be afraid to use fuel to speed up research and building. Just keep 7 fuel (5 base + 2 for loss due to bad events) and you're good to go. Don't waste it on cooking though. 15. This is a bit of a cheat: if something goes very wrong and you are about to ragequit, just immediately quit the game instead. This will effectively turn back the clock and restart that map. Of if you aren't allowed to quit at that point (e.g., a bad event happens on the world map), just Alt+F4 to close the game. But really, you shouldn't need to do this at all if you are careful. As for bad world map events, those really do suck, but that's roguelikes for you. As roguelikes go, this game is very, very kind, to be perfectly honest.
• gamedeal user

  Aug 14, 2016

  Please Remove the 15 day Time limit. There is so much here, but i can't enjoy any of it because i am racing a very close deadline. As a result, I ignore All forms of crafting, side quests, population building, and anything else that isn't growing/cooking food or getting to quest markers. That means that 90% of the game features are wasted. Just give us a sand box mode. it'll be nice.
• gamedeal user

  Apr 15, 2014

  Infectonator : Survivors , Small Review by Santo98 I would just like to start with this game being within Alpha and I can not go full blown with this. Pros: - The Music gets you pump'd - The Scavange System is nice - Movement system is nice, you can either click and drag or just click - For being in Alpha, there is a nice amount of weapons. Cons: - After Completing a Mission, you are only greeted by a sentence saying you've made it, at least something visual - The price of healing, I think it could be lowered to atleast 30 or 35 coins, 50 coins is quite a lot - Your ability to reload, automatic reloading between waves would be nice Overall though, I'm enjoying this game so far and hope the best for it and all of it's future updates, being a fan of the series.
• gamedeal user

  Dec 16, 2016

  I really want to like this game, I really do. But the mechanics are bad, and the luck factor is completely imbalanced. One game you get 5 car batteries and 6 fuel on your first run, the next you get neither after 4 raids, making winning virtually impossible at that point. The swarms are overpowered and random, your characters are idiots (run through the toxic slime or just stand there dying for no reason!) and there is no sense of balance in the gameplay. It's a great idea and a setup that really should have worked, but it doesn't. Don't drop your money on this one. You'll just be rage quitting again and again after hoping "this time" the potential will pay off.
• gamedeal user

  Apr 15, 2014

  Pretty fun little game. For an early access game, it's pretty enjoyable. Very difficult at times. If you expect it to be like Toge's flash project "Infectonator", you'll be dissapointed. It has the same art style, but this game is much more than what the original flash game was. There's still some room for work here, but like I said.. Early access, so it has time to become something huge.
• gamedeal user

  Jun 12, 2017

  It's a low-quality phone game with deceptively decent pixel graphics, stuffed chock-full of 'features' designed from the ground up to force you to spend real money on in-game purchases in order to make the game even vaguely playable.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 3, 2018

  Challenging? Yes. Frustrating? Yes. Fun? Yes. I played for a solid 8 hours and learned everything I needed to know to beat campaign mode though, so it's not going to take you a lifetime to figure this game out. I got this game during the Winter Sale 2017 for $2.49 and I'm certainly not disappointed.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 20, 2017

  It is kinda with a heavy heart that I have to rate this bad. I played it when it first arrived on armor games and fell in love. (fun fact this was actually my first steam game) However over the last year it has gotten worse. Overall: I liked the game but it has since gone way downhill and I really hope they can update or fix it to be amazing again. Back in may I had 14 survivors 100+ food and made it to town 4. It was ablast and I was constantly pushing further. This changed however after a few updates that did not improve the game. First thing is (like everyone else) I do not like the acid. It does way too much damage and pops up way too often. Another is that one of the starting survior groups that you could choose (Mar and pewds) are no longer selectable. The quest system is also very confusing. Unless you are writing it down or have a really good memory you will forget what each spot is and will waste time. It has lost its original feel of stockpile and try to survive. It now has changed to: How lucky am I this run?
• gamedeal user

  Aug 13, 2016

  This game is almost good. I enjoy the survival aspect and the resource gathering. However I do not like how you cannot assign a character to rest. He will just stand around "tired" for hours. When it comes time for a mission he is tired and will walk slowly for all the missions you under take that night. There is not a way to strategically avoid this. It is a dice roll to see who is tired and who isn't. It is a strategy game so that is frustrating. When you need a particular resource it is not more abundant or more likely to be found at any particular destination. If I need fuel I am just as likely to find it at a church as I am to find it at a gas station. This removes the strategic nature of choosing your missions. The game also appears to be free on http://www.miniclip.com/games/infectonator-survivors/en/#t-sd. Perhaps it is an older version of the game with less features but it appears to be the same game. I paid for a free game. I feel like I have been hoodwinked!