[IGN] Zenless Zone Zero Review - 8/10
[IGN] Zenless Zone Zero Review - 8/10
Style and substance combine in HoYoverse’s urban gacha brawler.
I'm going the 100% free-to-play route and I'm actually enjoying this game so far. I've tried to get into some other Hoyoverse games, but had a hard time because of how cheesy a lot of the writing was, and just not being that into the general gameplay loops for those games, so I wasn't going into this with very high hopes. But the writing is significantly better this time around, and the gameplay is a pretty good balance of being engaging enough to be fun while not being a total grind.
I've been hyped for this game for a while! Didn't realize it was already out, does it work on Linux?
For the moment, yes! I just ran the installer with Lutris + wineGE 8-26 and it has been working fine for the few hours I played. No telling if it will change though.
Don't know why I'm not hyped about this game. It should appeal to me. I love a cyberpunky dystopia, retro-futurism is perhaps my favourite aesthetic and early 2000s influences should be prime nostalgia bait for me. But I've watched some trailers and it just isn't hitting the spot for me. It looks like it's going for more comedy, so maybe the humour comes through better in the actual game?
Can someone who played it fill me in? Is it actually good? Is the combat actually good? I heard mixed things from people during the betas.
Ive only played like 4 hours yesterday (not like it's been out for very long), but I guess for just seeing if it's worth trying that works.
I think the strongest point is definitely the style it has going on - it knows what it's trying to do and the UI and art style work together to convey that. It's similar to Persona 5 in that way, and imo if P5 is a 10/10 execution of this, ZZZ is at least a 9/10.
I haven't watched the trailer but the characters are certainly quite goofy, so what you said about it going for more comedy seems accurate. I didn't have any actual laugh out loud moments though, it's more of a generally amusing athmosphere they're going for. The dystopian setting isn't ignored but the overall vibes are definitely more on the fun than the depressing side.
Combat has been fun so far, both perfect dodging and a form of blocking (by swapping characters when the enemy attacks) exist and are rewarded by the game. The blocking in particular feels really good imo. The stylishness of it all makes it enjoyable even though it's not hard (at least so far, there will probably be harder content at some point since that's how gachas usually work).
So far I like it a lot, in many places it feels like a lot of passion went into it (though I feel similarly about all the mihoyo games I've played) in spite of it being a gacha. If you like the aesthetics I think you'll at least have a good time for a while and can judge the rest for yourself.