8/10: Great idea and massive potential, but it isn't there yet. The game feels like it's getting easier to play with the most difficult settings.

Wood for construction, wood for cooking... I wish this game wood give me a gosh darn break!!

However difficult, modifications to Infection Free Zone seem to be coming in good time.

Given the appeal of games like Rebuild 3: Gangs of Deadsville and Judgment: Apoclapyse Survival Simulation, you know ol' Il Pallino just had to try Infection Free Zone. The game starts in the aftermath of a pandemic in which a large amount of people were infected with a disease turned into something similar to zombies and raveged the Earth. The player is challenged to (first scavenge and then) redevelop their starting area for useful buildings. Eventually the infected will discover the player's settlement, and when that time comes, armed squads will need to take the fight to the enemy. Given the current state of the game, the settlement will eventually either be overrun by the infected or will starve to death for a plethora of reasons.

The dreary graphics are a perfect mood-setter.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3211604192

It's also nice how the game even allows for far away zooming to see what potential resources can be found on the map.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3215578817

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3216822126

The only downer about the graphics is that the people all look AI generated, and every gosh dang male has a beard while none of the women are winning any beauty contests.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3215640478

The sounds are all realistic enough. The howls of the infected are frightening enough and the music that plays when hostile elements are threatening a squad or building is ominous enough to motivate the player to get ready for a fight.

The main reason why this category is lumped together, is because of the ability to play anywhere in the world. Isn't it cool that the player can play in a place like Truth or Consequences, New Mexico? Only in theory.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3212523249

In practice, the player better plan on playing in a city where there's enough firearms to scavenge to build all five squads if they're playing on the most difficult setting. Ol' Il Pallino played games set in Atlanta, GA, USA (a default city); Meridian, MS, USA; Rushden, Northants, UK; Gainesville, FL, USA; and Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Tyne & Wear, UK. So far the one single default city was the only viable city to play in on account of the number of firearms that can be scavenged. In a major city, buildings potentially containing firearms are common enough, but in smaller cities, the predominate buldings are homes which are merely denoted with a question mark, and are most likely stocked with food and/or ammunition. Playing on the most difficult level (minimum survivalists, minimum resources, and maximum hordes) ol' Il Pallino couldn't amass enough firearms to create five squads in time to defend the community.

Another double-edged sword is that the player doesn't need to renovate an entire building to make use of it. This was perhaps the best idea in the game, but it was ruined by the fact that if the player wants to increase capacity, first they'll need to vacate the building (reclaiming half of the resources in the process) and then repurpose the building. (Either that, or hope that another building of larger size is nearby to repurpose.) Was it that difficult for the developers to make it to where building expansion doesn't involve the waste of resources? Hopefully not!

The imbalanced gameplay caused ol' Il Pallino to quit after Day 36 when the two possibilities were to either get overrun by the infected, or starve. Owing to early access blues, the fields stopped producing grain when the fertilizer ran out. (The fields were growing just fine before fertilizer became an issue.) The event in which livestock is discovered no longer spawns after the current build of the game. (0.24.4.5 Alpha.) Livestock was useful in which it could provide more cooked meals than grain, and even produce fertilizer for the fields to grow even more grain.) Without this, all the player could do to sustain the community was to scavenge canned food. While there was plenty of food to scavenge in the city of Atlanta, the number of infected hordes became so big that ol' Il Pallino had to concentrate all five squads during the night to skirmishing the infected away from the base and sometimes even fighting the infected. During the day, the proverbial Catch-22 was to either send squads to fight the infected looking to hide in buildings, or scavenge for food and risk having to deal with an even larger number of infected for the next night. Using vehicles to run over the infected isn't much of an option in this case due to vehicles having hit points, and squads absolutely needing vehicles at this critical juncture of the game made it impossible to have them repaired at the base.

Why do buildings that have already been built need wood to be repurposed in the first place? The current build of the game requires too much wood. Then there's a stupid tutorial requirement to build a wooden tower. (If the player so chooses to accept this tutorial requirement, they best tear down the tower before the infected do, because the player will have the resources to build a metal tower, which is not only vastly superior to the wooden tower, but also requires less wood.) Wood is also needed for cooking food, and while the player will have little trouble finding tress to chop down if their base is near a park or in a suburban (or rural) area, the best bet for wood is to tear down buildings in urbanized areas. While skyscrapers the player doesn't want to repurpose will contain lots of wood, there's no way at this time to tell players what to salvage from buildings, and the amount of bricks that the player will receive from tearing down and salvaging buildings will overwhelm the base's storage.

Weather is an issue which is good and bad. Sometimes there may be a clear sky with a full moon which causes the infected to hide during the day, but it's also possible for have rain and a dark sky during the day which causes the infected to become active. This last time lead to ol' Il Pallino's downfall because thirty-six straight (in-game) hours had to be spent dealing with the infected, and the ammunition ran out without the ability to spend the day scrounging for more ammunition.

Beyond the playable parts of the map, the scouting of other areas is overly generalistic with the outer areas. One square on the map inferred that there was only research materials, and apart from the number of research materials scrounged being a letdown, more ammunition was scrounged in that expedition.

Constructing ammunition (which the player will absolutely need to do later on in the game) requires building a chemical plant. Why not allow the player to scrounge for chemicals? Certainly an industrial area IRL will have chemicals.... RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT?


Changes to gameplay balance and reception to community feedback (most notably the addition of armor) are both being implemented, so there's not only progress made, but even more to be expected.

I said it once and I'll say it again: I wish this game wood give me a gosh darn break with all of the demands for wood!!

Follow our curator page, OCG-Curations, if you like and want to see more reviews like this one.

[h1]TL;DR[/h1] 8/10: Great idea and massive potential, but it isn't there yet. The game feels like it's getting easier to play with the most difficult settings. Wood for construction, wood for cooking... I wish this game [i]wood[/i] give me a gosh darn break!! However difficult, modifications to [i]Infection Free Zone[/i] seem to be coming in good time. [h1]Overview[/h1] Given the appeal of games like [i]Rebuild 3: Gangs of Deadsville[/i] and [i]Judgment: Apoclapyse Survival Simulation[/i], you know ol' Il Pallino just had to try [i]Infection Free Zone[/i]. The game starts in the aftermath of a pandemic in which a large amount of people were infected with a disease turned into something similar to zombies and raveged the Earth. The player is challenged to (first scavenge and then) redevelop their starting area for useful buildings. Eventually the infected will discover the player's settlement, and when that time comes, armed squads will need to take the fight to the enemy. Given the current state of the game, the settlement will eventually either be overrun by the infected or will starve to death for a plethora of reasons. [h1]Graphics and Sound[/h1] The dreary graphics are a perfect mood-setter. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3211604192 It's also nice how the game even allows for far away zooming to see what potential resources can be found on the map. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3215578817 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3216822126 The only downer about the graphics is that the people all look AI generated, and every gosh dang male has a beard while none of the women are winning any beauty contests. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3215640478 The sounds are all realistic enough. The howls of the infected are frightening enough and the music that plays when hostile elements are threatening a squad or building is ominous enough to motivate the player to get ready for a fight. [h1]Positives and Negatives[/h1] The main reason why this category is lumped together, is because of the ability to play anywhere in the world. Isn't it cool that the player can play in a place like Truth or Consequences, New Mexico? Only in theory. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3212523249 In practice, the player better plan on playing in a city where there's enough firearms to scavenge to build all five squads if they're playing on the most difficult setting. Ol' Il Pallino played games set in Atlanta, GA, USA (a default city); Meridian, MS, USA; Rushden, Northants, UK; Gainesville, FL, USA; and Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Tyne & Wear, UK. So far the one single default city was the only viable city to play in on account of the number of firearms that can be scavenged. In a major city, buildings potentially containing firearms are common enough, but in smaller cities, the predominate buldings are homes which are merely denoted with a question mark, and are most likely stocked with food and/or ammunition. Playing on the most difficult level (minimum survivalists, minimum resources, and maximum hordes) ol' Il Pallino couldn't amass enough firearms to create five squads in time to defend the community. Another double-edged sword is that the player doesn't need to renovate an entire building to make use of it. This was perhaps the best idea in the game, but it was ruined by the fact that if the player wants to increase capacity, first they'll need to vacate the building (reclaiming half of the resources in the process) and then repurpose the building. (Either that, or hope that another building of larger size is nearby to repurpose.) Was it that difficult for the developers to make it to where building expansion doesn't involve the waste of resources? Hopefully not! The imbalanced gameplay caused ol' Il Pallino to quit after [i]Day 36[/i] when the two possibilities were to either get overrun by the infected, or starve. Owing to early access blues, the fields stopped producing grain when the fertilizer ran out. (The fields were growing just fine before fertilizer became an issue.) The event in which livestock is discovered no longer spawns after the current build of the game. (0.24.4.5 Alpha.) Livestock was useful in which it could provide more cooked meals than grain, and even produce fertilizer for the fields to grow even more grain.) Without this, all the player could do to sustain the community was to scavenge canned food. While there was plenty of food to scavenge in the city of Atlanta, the number of infected hordes became so big that ol' Il Pallino had to concentrate all five squads during the night to skirmishing the infected away from the base and sometimes even fighting the infected. During the day, the proverbial Catch-22 was to either send squads to fight the infected looking to hide in buildings, or scavenge for food and risk having to deal with an even larger number of infected for the next night. Using vehicles to run over the infected isn't much of an option in this case due to vehicles having hit points, and squads absolutely needing vehicles at this critical juncture of the game made it impossible to have them repaired at the base. Why do buildings that have already been built need wood to be repurposed in the first place? The current build of the game requires too much wood. Then there's a stupid tutorial requirement to build a wooden tower. (If the player so chooses to accept this tutorial requirement, they best tear down the tower before the infected do, because the player will have the resources to build a metal tower, which is not only vastly superior to the wooden tower, but also requires less wood.) Wood is also needed for cooking food, and while the player will have little trouble finding tress to chop down if their base is near a park or in a suburban (or rural) area, the best bet for wood is to tear down buildings in urbanized areas. While skyscrapers the player doesn't want to repurpose will contain lots of wood, there's no way at this time to tell players what to salvage from buildings, and the amount of bricks that the player will receive from tearing down and salvaging buildings will overwhelm the base's storage. Weather is an issue which is good and bad. Sometimes there may be a clear sky with a full moon which causes the infected to hide during the day, but it's also possible for have rain and a dark sky during the day which causes the infected to become active. This last time lead to ol' Il Pallino's downfall because thirty-six straight (in-game) hours had to be spent dealing with the infected, and the ammunition ran out without the ability to spend the day scrounging for more ammunition. Beyond the playable parts of the map, the scouting of other areas is overly generalistic with the outer areas. One square on the map inferred that there was only research materials, and apart from the number of research materials scrounged being a letdown, more ammunition was scrounged in that expedition. Constructing ammunition (which the player will absolutely need to do later on in the game) requires building a chemical plant. Why not allow the player to scrounge for chemicals? Certainly an industrial area IRL will have chemicals.... RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT? [h1]Conclusion[/h1] Changes to gameplay balance and reception to community feedback (most notably the addition of armor) are both being implemented, so there's not only progress made, but even more to be expected. I said it once and I'll say it again: I wish this game [i]wood[/i] give me a gosh darn break with all of the demands for wood!! [h1]The honest word of Il Pallino... OR ELSE![/h1] [quote]Follow our curator page, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/7871885/]OCG-Curations[/url], if you like and want to see more reviews like this one.[/quote]